Taking days off in term time - your advice please

[MrsCurly]

My daughter has just started school and is going to be bridesmaid at my sister's wedding which is taking place in term time in November at the other end of the UK (where all my family live).

The wedding is on a Saturday, but there is a family party on the Friday night. There is no way we would make that if we left home straight after school on Friday as it is a 7/8 hour drive. We are also going to have a problem getting back in time for school on Monday unless we spend all day Sunday getting back (the trains are really slow on Sundays)

Ideally I'd like to travel down by train on Thurs and back on Monday. Do you think is it acceptable to take her out of school for three days during term time? I could just travel down on Friday instead which would mean taking just two days. Or of course travel back on Sunday which I am loathe to do but would just mean taking her out for one day.

It is a really special time for our very close family, and I'd really like to be there as much as I can, and I know DD feels the same.

To complicate things a little she is very shy at school and very clingy, which is completely the opposite of how she was at nnursery, but I am hoping by November she will have settled a lot more and this will be less of an issue.

What would you do and when / how should I tell the school?

Thank you!

No school is going to object to a child taking a couple of term-time days off for a family wedding. Please don't say she's ill - she will have to continue the lie when she goes back to school and that can't be a good thing. She won't be able to talk about being a bridesmaid, or take the photos to show and tell or take her teacher a peice of wedding cake...

Take her out, be honest about why. Don't show a child lying and deceit or she will think it is acceptable behaviour! The school will put it down as unauthorised absence as part of the statistics they have to submit to the county. But the head will tell you that but most of them will have no problem with what you are doing. It is those who continually take their kids out who may get visits from the education officers in time. (school governor)

I am a teacher and I agree, you would have to be a bit mad to think that going to a family wedding was an unsuitable reason.

I do however, object to the 'colouring in' comments. After next week the children in my reception class will be learning to read among other things and we do introduce one phoneme a day, so if you're off for a week, that's 5 sounds. I know some of you will scoff, but no matter how you 'catch up' your child will miss out on that time learning with their peers. Of course, that is only around 1 hour of the school day, and doesn't include number work, topic work, and your child making friends.

That said if there was something important such as a family wedding I would say that the child would gain far more from being there than coming to school and so it would be well worth the absence. As a teacher I am more concerned about the parents who don't bring their child in because they couldn't get them out of bed and were late, so decided not to bother. Yes that happens a lot!

I can believe it happens a lot. The council gave all children starting school this year a free alarm clock

Thanks for all your advice. I would never have told the school she was ill - as someone said it sets an appalling example. Will speak to her teacher in the morning.