I'm letting my son bunk off a cross country run - what would you have done?

[tigermoth]

My 11 year old son's class has a 50 minute cross country run to do on Tuesday morning. His form teacher says they must run it, not walk it, no messing around.

My son is dreading it. He is not a runner. He is already finding it difficult to run to his lessons, getting there in time, though he has just about managed to avoid a detention. He says this is the hardest thing about his new secondary school. He is already getting a name for being a slow coach.

Dh and I do not want to put him through the humiliation of the cross country run. DS has plenty of exercise as he is cricket mad. He plays cricket every lunchtime at school and this weekend (as usual) he spent an hour each day at the cricket nets. It really is his sport. Running is not.

I have fond memories of my mother letting me miss the odd cookery lesson, as I hated them and got teased for being so impractical. It really made a difference to my settling in at big school.

So, dh and I are doing the same for our son, and have told him we will send in a note to say he has a doctor's appointment on the morning of the run. Apparently the run is not an occasional, not weekly event.

Just wondered what people feel about this decision? don't mind if you disagree with me, just interested to know the consensus of opinion here.

at the memory of cross-country runs. I do feel for your poor ds. My school used to post teachers at every gate and stile to make sure we jumped over them rather than walking through or climbing.

But people are right about coming up with a better plan for next time. He won't always be able to duck out of nasty things that are difficult. You need to work out how to help him deal with them construtively. And I bet his friends in the other class are exaggerating - that's what kids do: 'Ooh, that exam was so hard, I never even got to question four....' etc. etc.

Having said that, there are sadistic PE teachers out there (especially if any of the ones who 'taught' me are still around) so it could be true...

Hopefully ds will be ok about the run next time round - it's not as if he hates all sport. He has just started to play rugby this term and is thinking of doing a try out for the year 7 team.

I forgot to say this earlier. When my ds was taking part in the school's open evening a few weeks ago, I came to collect him and we had time to wander round the school together, just before it closed. We went to the gym area and bumped into 3 of 4 PE teachers. As soon as they saw ds, they said 'ah ds, just arrived for your PE lesson!' followed by some general joking about how he must run faster to get to his lessons. It was all done with a smile, and ds did not seem upset by it. It stuck in my mind, however, as it was the very first thing they said, and it was said in front of me, ds's mother.

I think that probably influenced my decision.

Update to this, I took ds1 to the doctor on Monday, as he has been complaining about his knees hurting a bit since August. Dh and I assumed it was a slight strain due to overenthusiastic cricket-playing. We hoped the enforced rest following his tonsils/adenoids operation would sort his knees out, too.

As it hadn't, I wanted a doctor's opinion. The doctor was imediately concerned and has now banned ds1 from playing all sport for two weeks and given him anti inflammitory medicine. He said at worst ds1 could have Arthritis

Tigermoth - you can get have something similar to arthritis as a reaction to strep infections - which if your ds has had lots of tonsilitis he's probably had. It can be quite acute or linger on at a low level for some time.

Hope that his pain is improving and it isn't a more permanent form of arthritis.

So it could be a strep infection? many thanks potty1. I know nothing about strep infections and never realised there might be a link between throat, ear and knees. I really, really hope this is the case. I am so hoping ds1 has nothing permanently wrong with his knees.