DD (Y4) has brought home details of next year's residential trip. They get the opportunity to go in Y5 and/or Y6 but a lot do both.
The letter emphasises about how very much the children get from the trips re confidence; learning to live/work together, sense of achievement etc. They want a £50 deposit by next week (!), another £100 by Sept and the rest (another £200) by September. I have been wracking my brains trying to think of how this is doable for us but it really isn't. DD wants to go but now she knows it's £350 is obviously saying she doesn't.
I used to hide these letters so my parents never found out about them until it was too late as there was no way they could ever afford for me to go on them. But I remember how it felt when most of my year was away on holiday. I wanted better for my kids and I feel really crap about it.
Ironically she moved schools earlier this year to one in a better area and the downside is that most parents at this school wouldn't blink at the cost. The children who don't get to go (DD says it amounts to about 5 out of the two whole years although it's a one-class intake so only two classes) get to wear own clothes that week and do "fun things" in school but it's a poor substitute isn't it.
Poor old DD misses out on lots of stuff in lots of ways - sometimes it feels as if the well-off kids get all the fun and don't even realise how lucky they are. There's no such thing as equality really.
Are there any other Mners who have had to let their children down like I'm going to have let DD down? How did you handle it?