Kate
by KATE HUNTER
Dear Mrs Sheehan,
Just to let you know that Annabel and Sally will be absent from school Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of next week. We are taking the children on a study trip, exploring alpine environments and communities which we believe will be of enormous benefit to their intellectual, physical and social development.
Best Regards,
Kate Hunter
Seriously? Who am I kidding?
Dear Mrs Sheehan,
Annabel and Sally will miss three days of school next week because we are going skiing. It’s a travel-writing gig, only available outside school hols, and the snow is fab. I’ll make sure they do some maths. Hopefully.
Cheers,
Kate
Well. It turns out my children are part of the ‘New Absentee’ class. Apparently this a growing group of kids whose parents pull them out of school to take advantage of cheap holiday fares. There are also kids who get days off for haircuts, birthdays and visits from Aunty Suzanne. Educators aren’t happy about it. Here’s an edited version of the story from news.com.au:
CHILDREN are missing alarming amounts of school as parents take advantage of cheaper overseas holidays and let them stay home on their birthday or to go shopping.
Principals say parents are increasingly pulling their kids out of school for up to six weeks for overseas trips because airfares are cheaper outside school holidays, but it’s having a negative impact on their learning.
Public Schools Principal forum chairperson Cheryl McBride said a birthday was no excuse to miss class.
She said overseas holidays were fuelling absenteeism. “There is the frustrating issue of children going on long holidays with mum and dad and missing significant slabs of school,” she said.
“I really commiserate with parents who say I can only get the cheapest airfare out of school holidays, but need to go home and visit family. But there are some families who want to take kids away for six or seven weeks every year and then come to school and complain that kids are not achieving as well as they should.”
Forbes High School principal David Harris said children miss school for reasons unheard of 20 years ago. “Reasons like celebrating their birthday or sibling’s birthday, stayed up too late watching TV, going shopping for clothes, extended long weekend, non-participation in sports carnival or special school events,” he wrote in a news- letter to parents.
He said children miss an average of 12-15 days a year with parent-condoned absenteeism highest among young primary aged children.
Sydney University research fellow Andrew Martin said school absenteeism can have a detrimental effect on learning.
“The amounts of time children are involved in instruction and lessons and learning does have a significant relationship with achievement.” he said.
“Shopping days, an aunty coming over and late nights have no educational yield.”
Teachers Federation deputy president Gary Zadkovich said children should only miss school if they are unwell or have an important family issue.
‘We believe absence from school should be a result of valid reasons to do with illness, important family issues or concerns but some of those reasons they are not supportable,” he said. “We place a high value premium on providing high quality teaching and learning for our students and we hope and expect that parents will support us in that endeavour.”
The top 5 excuses for days off (when kids aren’t sick):
1) Travel is cheaper outside of school holidays.
2) It’s their birthday or their sibling’s birthday.
3) They went clothes shopping.
4) They stayed up late watching TV the night before.
5) They don’t want to participate in a sports carnival.
I don’t have a problem – obviously – taking my kids out of school to go on a family holiday. Especially if it’s free. They’re still in primary school, on top of their work and rarely miss school because of illness (I’m touching every bit of wood I can reach). I’d never give them a day off for shopping, a haircut or to recover from a late night (?!) And I’m ruthless about participation in school events, even if they LOATHE the swimming carnival and come last in everything.
Kate Hunter is an advertising copywriter with over 20 years experience and one Gruen Transfer appearance to her name. Kate is also the author of the Mosquito Advertising series of novels. You can buy them here.
Does this make me hypocritical or normal? Where do you stand on days off school for healthy kids?
Comments
347 Comments so far
My parents were so strict about us having time off. ‘Sickies’ were virtually unheard of unless we were legitimately very sick (as in, stay in bed all day) or contagious.
However…my mum pulled me out of school for 2 weeks at 15 to go travelling in Europe. It was approved by the school and I caught up on any work I needed to before I left / when I returned. Travelling overseas was such a huge educational opportunity and I think certain absences should be supported by teachers provided they are properly planned and approved.
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Hi Kate. I sent that same email off to my kids’ teachers yesterday, except that instead of the snow fields it is QLD and the warm sun which beckon. They are also in primary school and doing well. I think it’s perfectly reasonable.
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The only time I took a non-sick day off school was for a week holiday when I was 8. I was visiting a sheep station during their off-season (part of my family’s heritage) and my parents ensured they got my (and my sister’s) essential week’s lessons in advance from the teacher to do while we were there. If we had been performing below our year levels’ expectations my parents would have definately not taken us away from school.
I did make up this week in year 12 when my parents made me attend a week long TEE course during the school holidays though!
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Kate, this piece was well written! Good job.
In my family though, we are only allowed to take days off if we are having a school day with not much going on and where we could be more productive at home. These are days where we have too many free periods/study periods and bludgy classes ie work lessons (In maths this means the teacher doesn’t teach anything that day but we sit quietly and do work)…. But this takes lots of convincing and doesn’t happen very often.
In my defence, we go to all school carnivals and never miss school to go on holidays. We never take days off for late nights, sick days and hair cuts… Hair cuts and dentists are booked after school!
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Oh dear, I just took my kids out of school for 3 days to go on a family holiday to QLD. We did it to coincide with their school holidays so the cousins could play together. We did speak to the teacher about it first and they were the last 3 days of school so no major work was planned to be done, but now I feel really guilty about it!
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Don’t worry about it! As a teacher, 3 days off particularly at the end of term is fine and completely understandable. It sounds like a lovely holiday for your kids.
It’s when parents take their child who is struggling on a 3 week holiday to Bali and then look at you like you’re crazy when you suggest maybe they practise some of their spelling words or keep a journal to help their writing that annoys me!
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I remember kids getting the day off for their birthday when I was in primary school – my mum never let me do that, I had to be just about dead before I was allowed to miss school. And plenty of kids were allowed to stay home “sick” from cross country or swimming carnival. I am 32, so it can’t be something that is too new
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Can anyone tell me why skipping the swimming carnival, athletics day, cross country etc. is a big deal if you aren’t participating in any way? My parents always made me go, but all I and about a hundred other kids did all day was sit on our butts getting sunburnt for 7 hours. Surely it would be better to have a few classes running at school for the kids who have nothing to do at those events?
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Hi Anonymous. Funny I should feel this way as I’m the one yanking my kids out of school to go skiing, but I insist they attend sports days and swimming carnivals. Not one of my three is an athlete, and they moan about going, but I’m big on supporting others and doing what is asked of you, even if you don’t enjoy it and/or are no good at it. Participation for me, is a big thing.
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But that’s the thing. When I was a kid, if you weren’t one of the swimmers, runners or whatever, and you weren’t one of the small group who made banners and the like, you didn’t get to participate in anything. You just sat around all day, often so far away from the action you couldn’t tell what was going on.
At least high school ones were better than primary school ones because teachers stopped pressuring me to join a race. There is nothing more embarassing than having to explain to a male teacher at 9 years old that you can’t run the 400 metres because you have very large breasts and your parents can’t afford to buy you a $100 sports bra, and without that support it’s extremely painful and embarassing.
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Yes, Anonymous, I see your point.
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Most primary school carnivals award ‘house points’ for a variety of participation and supportive behaviors during carnivals. We all have to do things we don’t love for work, sometimes even for family and loved ones. It is important that we do not continue to allow our younger generations to shirk responsibility and commitment. It would be similar to saying that because a child is not interested or good at science, every time there is a lesson involving science they can sit out or stay home. What is the overall message that we as a community are sending? That it is ok not to do things just because? I don’t know of any school that forces children to run in a race, but they should attend the day regardless, as it is part of schooling and provides opportunities for social and physical development outside of the classroom, much more than being at home would.
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Can’t see much wrong with a child having their birthday off, though I would not have let it happen with my kids, the issue I have is watching my husband shake his head over workers saying they are having their birthday off and the day after so they can get “paryletic” (sp). Really. Aren’t we grown ups now?
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As someone who did previously work as a classroom teacher, I agree that the curriculum is chocker-block – missing even one lesson can be a disadvantge. My favourites I recieved were “I was up until four in the morning playing C.O.D” and “I have to go get my streaks re-done”. Yep. Well, when mummy wants to know why you ain’t no rocket scientist, I’ll need to go have my eyebrows tinted. Toodles kiddo.
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Ha! I have a pal whose mum was so soft she would get days off because it was COLD! We lived in BRISBANE.
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I always got more work done outside of school. In Year 12 I often took a day off and got a weeks work done in a few hours.
When I was 15 my family went on a 5 week European holiday during the school term. When I came back I found I’d missed almost nothing. We were still discussing the same books in English and Literature, and as I’d already read these books years before and handed in my essay’s before the trip, I was still so bored I wanted to scream. We were still doing the same stuff in Maths and Science, and it only took me a night to catch-up on the chapters I’d missed and another night to do the worksheets. I’d missed quite a bit of French, but I was already fluent so no great loss. I’d been doing History and Philosophy via correspondence, and I’d already finished the work for the term before we left, so I was actually still a month ahead anyway.
That trip to Europe was more educational than my entire high school experience.
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I guess it depends on the child. I too could’ve missed a lot of high school, because until at least year 11 I found it moved quite slowly (at my school anyway).
But then another child who struggles or just keeps up normally, would be quite set back by missing any.
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I also took a lot of time off in year 12, some might call it wagging. However it allowed me to put in extra effort to my assignments and I even used it to tutor 2 friends while we ate toasted sandwiches and cups of tea.
I have always worked better alone, but I think you need to be motivated.
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True. True. True. True. True. As a primary school teacher and parent I feel a bit ambivalent about this. The school curriculum is tightly packed so any absence means your child could miss an important maths or english or other concept. On the other hand family bonding time is also important on those extra special one-off occasions (even if I personally don’t get to take advantage of travel holidays during term time). What I would like to point out that is frequently overlooked is the impact a child’s absence has on the rest of the grade. Kids miss each other. They miss those who are absent even if that child is not a particular friend. Every grade develops its own dynamic based on all the children in that class. Primary school teachers work hard to build this relationship at the start of the year. And when a child is absent that dynamic gets tipped out of whack especially at the end of term when up to a third of the grade can be awol. This impacts the learning of the whole class not just your child. It cuts the same way for me as a teacher. I know that my absence has an impact on the children I teach so I don’t take any non-sick sick days nudge nudge wink wink you know what I mean. We are such a me-me-me focused society we forget how integral we each are to the fabric of the whole. Which is a good thing when you think about it. And maybe we should all be taking that a bit more into consideration when we are tossing up whether to keep our children home or not.
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fantastic comment tanlee! great to get a teachers perspective!
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‘kids miss each other’
That was very interesting to read tanlee. We went on an overseas trip for nearly 2 months recently. Our eldest is only in kinder and apparently her classmates missed her terribly. One little boy drove his poor mother insane asking every single day for 8 weeks when she would be returning. And several mums have told me about the endless dinnertime discussions at their homes about the fact that our daughter would have been having her breakfast if they were sitting down to dinner.
And I have been told that one day, the whole class congregated in the sandpit and started digging wildly. When asked what they were doing they said they were trying to find my daughter, she had been gone so long!
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Last term I had a Year 8 boy travel overseas for a month. Did he miss his classmates? Yes, so much so that he toook to Skyping his friends during my lessons. I coudn’t believe it! Not only was he missing out on the classwork but he was managing to interrupt his classmates’ learning at the same time!! Ah, the joys of technology!
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I found this such an interesting article when it appeared on the weekend, especially hot on the heels of the one about bullying mothers in the carpark.
On the one hand its another blaming parents article.
On the other is it pointing out the totally obvious – which so many parents apparently need these days. In spades.
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