Do your school have the children missing a whole day of lessons to work reception?

[sighthoundofdoom]

I have never heard of this but next week one of dc will miss a whole day of lessons to spend the day couriering messages from the office and the classrooms, apparently they take it in turns. I have never heard of this! We used to cover reception at lunch if they were short staffed but not the whole day.

I'm guessing it will be good experience for them i am just suprised as the school is very very strict to the point one of mine wasnt allowed on a group trip with their class because they had been on a school residential over the weekend missing one morning of school the week before and it was vital they didn't miss a full days lessons as it would have a massive detriment

I'm a secondary school welfare/receptionist, and we call them runners. It's one day in year 8, one day out of 7 school years. I think Y8 are chosen as in the great scheme of things it's the least important year in terms of being new or getting ready for GCSE etc.

Year head vetoes any naughty kids, and it's seen as a big responsibility and an important job, which it's is.

The kids love it, they get to go on breaks a few minutes early, they can eat and drink at the desk they sit at, they get to go into parts of the school that would usually be out of bounds to them, and they usually get a hot chocolate and a biscuit at some point in the day from us.

They are expected to do h/w or read when not busy. We would not expect them do anything yucky.

We could not manage without them tbh. We are school of 1200 with 150 staff. We get dozens of visitors everyday who have to be "delivered". Parents regularly decide in the middle of the day that their kids need to leave for GP appts etc without telling the child in the morning so we have to send a runner to collect them when the parent arrives wanting their kid NOW. Kids forget kits/homework/lunch/violin and facebookwe have to deliver those - literally 30 to 40 times a day.

If I was running around delivering things for disorganised kids/parents, then I wouldn't have time to take care of the constant stream of kids with period pains, headaches, cut knees etc etc.

It's looked at a learning experience and a privilege for the students and they really enjoy it (apart from the odd lazy/grumpy one!).

Also, the students know in advance which day they are doing. And if they don't want to or their parents object then that is cool. If they want to do a particular lesson for a test or because it's a favourite then they can go and do it and we manage with one for that period.

It's or mandatory.

*not !

We did it at our school 25 years ago. One day out of a whole school life. I got to carry a Madagascan cockroach to the biology lab. We all looked forward to it.

DD did reception duty in year *. I wasn't happy that she missed out on a day's lessons because she hadn't been very well that term and had missed a lot of school already.

Obviously i am just being grumpy on the whole thing then. Dc1 thinks it is great after seeing what they did and that they were given no work at all and would like to do it everyday i actually think as a child who struggles to speak socially it may do them a world of good i just worry about them missing lessons they struggle in already.

Mine did it year 8 and they were supposed to collect work from each lesson, they really enjoyed it.

Yes, ours designates year 8 as "service" year and they do various jobs like office, library, taking tours on open evenings and open mornings etc.

I'm not entirely happy about the missed lessons either but I can see the value in doing it.

Yes my son is in year 8 and did it just before half term. I wasn't that keen on his missing a day of lessons but actually he learnt a lot and found a new respect for how hard the office staff work. It was a very good experience for him.