Would you send 7yr old on a week long school trip?

[admylin]

OK, I am in Germany and I know everything is different here but wondered what you would feel like.
Dd is 7 and in year 2, some of the kids are 8 already as dd is the youngest in the class. They are going on a school trip from Monday to Friday in July.
There are 26 pupils and one male and one female teacher will go with them. I don't feel like sending her but before we even heard about this trip the teacher had told all the kids about it and said how he expected all of them to join in. When I asked her if she wanted to go she said yeah I suppose so but teacher said we all had to anyway so I'm not sure about that. Cost of trip is about 100 pounds which is OK for us but I know alot of parents in the class won't be able to afford it.

Yes I would. However, it depends on the child. DS1 (just 8) would be fine.

I wouldn't.

I would definitely ask questions about staffing, sleeping arrangements etc - that's natural, not unreasonable to ask!

As well as the Yr4 trip, our school also does a Yr6 trip - 5 days on the Isle of Wight. For that trip, they take 5 members of staff (including the head), for approx 40-ish children. That's in addition to the staff at the centre where they are based.

And that's for 10-11 year-olds - a very different scenario to children who are 7 or 8.

At that age, I would feel more comfortable with a 1-2 night 'taster' trip away, somewhere fairly local.

My DD went on a Mon-Fri trip last year when she was 8. She loved it but the adult-child ratio was 1:8 which I think is better than what is being suggested for your trip.
She is off next week on a whole week trip (Friday to Friday) to a farm and is really looking forward to it.
Personally I think I would always err on the side of letting them do stuff rather than not, but it seems there are genuine issues with this particular trip that need to be sorted out.

Thanks for all the opinions ladies!
Will try and find out more about the safety issues and have a talk to dd again before we sign any slips of paper. Think she is too young but if all her mates go and she absoloutly wants to, I will just have to be brave and let her go.