How long can I keep my kids off school without going to jail or getting in trouble???

[OneLieIn]

Long and short of it is that we are moving house. We had planned it to happen at the very end of August, but it won't happen until the middle of September maybe even towards the end of September. The problem is we have stopped the previous school the DCs (year 0 and year 2 moving up to 1 and 3) went to in July. They can't go back to that school as there are no spaces.

We are moving areas, so there will probably be 3 weeks at the most without school.

What do I do about this? How long is too long? At what point do I start getting into trouble? Is there a chance I will end up in jail (I am hopefully joking, but seriously worried??)

We sold our flat with nowhere to go and 'home educated' dd for 7 months. No one checked on us at all. In fact, though I tried to do educational things with her - writing, sums etc - I was very bad at it, my relationship with her deteriorated horribly and I didn't try very hard for very long, didn't think it was worth ruining our relationship for.

When we finally bought our house, she had missed 7 months of school, but wasn't behind and the only problem was getting her used to the routine, which didn't actually take very long.

The LEAs I was in touch with were perfectly OK about it, never checked up on us and whether we were actually educating her or anything. I think if they know that you are planning on getting your kids back to school at some point they don't worry. They were all very understanding of our circumstances, and you're only keeping them off school for a few weeks.

You have to inform their new school. I am a teacher and we would think it was extremely odd if the new kids didnt show at the beginning of term. You should speak to the new head and ask for advice. If she is not sure, speak to the LEA. Dont just decide not to turn up.

Legaly you are OK for your youngest as legally they don't have to be at school until the term after they turn 5 - I am assuming your youngest is 4 , so you'll only be fined for the other 2
The other 2 are supposed to be in education and I agree that the HE option temporarily might be the way to go, if they were in local schools before you would no doubt have held on to their places, but I understand with fees that wouldn't have been an option . Putting them in a new school for three weeks only to move them again would be too unsettling and I'm sure most LA's would agree. I'm sure schools have policies on this as 'exceptional circumstances'.
I too am hoping to move house mid term/school year although it is all so up in the air atm that we have no idea where we'll be in 3 months - I have just looked into schools and it has just become a nightmare as the school nextdoor is oversubscribed and we're in danger of having a 50 minute round the houses walk to get DS to the junior school and DD to the infants both for 9 am!! Both schools are about a mile away but they are 10 minutes apart! i'm sure there must be another way but ATM it's really put a spanner in the works