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[personal profile] velvetpage
There are a few good reasons to keep your child home from school, or to pick your child up/allow them to come home early. Illness, obviously, tops the list, followed by appointments that can't be scheduled outside school hours. Religious holidays that you observe, that aren't part of the school calendar, are fine too. (Orthodox Easter and Eid come to mind. I usually plan review days for those days, so that the kids who will be away won't have much to catch up on. I don't think it's fair to give them a holiday and then make them catch up on a ton of stuff from it.) It's important to train kids from early grades to find out what they will be missing or what they have missed, and ensure that they catch up - hopefully, if it's a scheduled event that more than one person is missing school for, there won't be much. That's a life skill, and skipping it does them no favours.

It is not, however, acceptable to tell your child that it is okay if they come home after pictures have been taken on picture day; that they may leave at lunchtime if there's an assembly in the afternoon that they aren't involved in; that they can leave after the field trip gets back, even if there's another hour of school time; you get the idea. Similarly, allowing them to stay home all day because the alarm didn't go off and they missed the bus, is a bad idea. If there's any possible way to get them to school late, they need to go.

Why? Well, let's think about lessons, here. School is on the list of things that just are. Like death and taxes, it's a part of life, neither a reward nor a punishment but just something kids do. (Assuming, of course, that you're not homeschooling - if you are, I would submit that the equivalent lesson is that learning needs to take place every day, no matter what.) If you let your child come home after the pictures have been taken, you're sending several messages. The first is that nothing important happens after pictures are taken; the rest of the day is a waste. The second is that routines can be changed when special things are happening (I'll get back to this one in a minute.) The third is that school is optional sometimes. The fourth is that pictures can be expected to make the child feel bad enough that they need to come home afterward, as though they're sick.

Now, in order: teachers get really annoyed when a day that has already been disrupted, is disrupted further by unnecessary comings and goings. I don't schedule tests for picture day, but I DO schedule regular learning and missing that for spurious reasons is not acceptable. It's a waste of the time I spend preparing for my class. This feeds into the issue of routines. When routines need to change to accommodate something like picture day, teachers think and plan how to keep those routines as close as possible to normal, so that everyone feels comfortable and is able to function. The routines do change, but they change as little as possible, because people work best when there are routines in place. So, while it's okay to bend routines to accommodate picture day, it's not okay to break them, and it's not okay to let a child decide to throw away the day's routines. School is not optional; it's what we do. And if you really want to teach your child that school is sometimes so upsetting that they have to plan to go home early, please, please don't enroll your child in my class. (Note: I'm not saying that school can't be upsetting; only that we shouldn't teach kids that we EXPECT it to be upsetting. That's setting them up for a bad attitude.)

I want to teach my girls that school is fun; that routines are important and should be respected as much as possible (I'm working on this at home;) that school is important enough not to miss unless there's no other choice; and that parents and teachers set the limits and make the decisions, not kids - that's something they'll be given increasing control over as they grow, but some things will remain non-negotiable because they are kids and I'm the parent. I want them to learn, also, that if they do miss school, catching up is important and is their responsibility, not the teacher's or mine. (That is, it's their responsibility to ask, to complete the work, and to hand it in.)

As with everything else about parenting, there are exceptions. If your child is asking to stay home, even though he used to enjoy school; if his eating or sleeping habits have changed; if his behaviour towards siblings or you has changed; if he's playing sick (the tummyache that disappears at five after nine, for example) when he never used to; all of these are signs that something at school is not right. Some investigation is in order, starting with talking to your child, then his teacher, and possibly a doctor. Possible culprits include bullying and childhood depression, or both.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 02:25 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] merlyn4401.livejournal.com
I completely agree with this. Mu oldest is only in kindergarten, but I am floored by the number of kids who turn up late (not 5 minutes "traffic was bad" late, but an hour "he wanted to watch his TV show" late, as well as by how many kids take "mental health days", for lack of a better descriptor. My parents would NEVER have allowed me to get away with that. School was my job - that was made clear to me at a very early age, as well as the expectation that I would do my best at all things. Jamie was in K4 last year, and missed one week for a family vacation that had been planned well before school even started, and I worked closely with his teacher to make sure he dind't miss anything vital, and one day for illness. So far this year, he missed one day for an emergency with his brother, and that's been it. I can't even begin to fathom the damaging messages it sends to treat school like an optional activity.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 02:33 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] velvetpage.livejournal.com
Elizabeth has missed three days of preschool so far, because of a bad hacking cough. For me to keep her home, she needed to have the cough but also to be feeling overtired, falling asleep when she normally wouldn't, and possibly a touch of fever. Since she only goes Monday-Thursday, her teacher gave me the option of making up the days she'd missed by coming a few Fridays. We've made up two of them so far.

I've known parents who pulled their kids out of school in January, in order to fly home to India for a wedding - for two months. Um, hold on a second here. I understand the desire to visit, the cultural benefits, and that India in July is impossible. But two months? Their kids' English was already poor. Another family left a few days before the Christmas vacation started, and came back two weeks after it ended, giving them nearly five weeks of holiday - of which only two were essential school weeks. That was a good compromise, IMO. But if you've committed to putting your kids in a Canadian school, have some respect for our holidays so that they can get the most possible benefit - and the teacher can plan effectively for them.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 05:27 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] hillarygayle.livejournal.com
My mom allowed us to do the "Mental Health Day" thing when I was young, before it was called that. Once per semester or thereabouts, we were allowed to stay home just because we were getting burned out. Kelsey & Courtney didn't take advantage of this as much as I did, but I was an extremely hard worker and a very academically oriented child, and I think possibly my mother saw me stressing my little brain out and realized I needed a break.

School was never an "optional" thing, but I really do think that "once-in-a-while" day was a good idea on her part. She'd take us to Memphis to the zoo or just out and about; no vegging on the couch unless we were actually sick. I never saw school as something unimportant, even with those "mental health days". I am going to have to ask her how she managed that, someday.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 05:39 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] velvetpage.livejournal.com
Oh, I can see an occasional break like that when things are getting too much. I find I need days like that periodically, too. But that's different, somehow - I think because it equates to a sick day in my mind.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 02:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] melstra.livejournal.com
Wow, I find it apalling that this is enough of an issue to even write a PoAC about! So sad. School is a no-brainer! *GRIN* I missed school quite a few days when I was in elementary school for family vacations because ours were planned around academic conferences (my dad's a prof). However, I was always upset to miss the classes and I always had some sort of alternative assignment. (Examples: I spent a week out in Colorado visiting my sister in 2nd grade and had to write a report about Colorado and present it to the class. In sixth grade I was gone for a week to Disneyland and had to keep a journal). I can't remember very many other students who were gone for anything other than major exceptions (not that I'd really have noticed, I suppose). Certainly no one would have DREAMED skipping out after pictures were taken.

College...well, I guess that's where we're seeing the result of this lackadaisical attitude. Kids who are taught that school is optional when they are living with their parents certainly take that to heart when parents are no longer around! My biggest pet peeve is the question "I missed class on Monday...did we do anything?" *eye roll*

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 04:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] redeem147.livejournal.com
Field Day's okay though, right? My mom used to write me a sick note on Field Day, cause it's evil.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 05:12 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mairesue.livejournal.com
I totally agree but my kid loves school so far. We have equated going to school like Daddy going to work, Mom doing work - that it is his responsibility and he has to take is seriously. He does and it is so great that he loves it too.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 05:14 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mairesue.livejournal.com
I also wanted to say that it is nice to hear from the teacher's point of view as well. Thank you for that.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 05:43 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] velvetpage.livejournal.com
When I go back to work, you'll get a lot more of these.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 07:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] blue-comet.livejournal.com
I hated elementary school and used to stay home every chance I got. I had some wonderful teachers, I liked doing schoolwork, I always received excellent grades, I had friends... but I hated going to school.

As an adult, I hate going to work. The last time I had a full-time, out-of-the-house job, I would spend every Sunday miserable and in tears because I was so anxious about going to work on Monday. And I didn't hate my job. I just hated going.

I haven't decided what I'm going to do when Holden reaches school age. I might try to send him to regular school and see how it is... if he hates it like I did, I will immediately look for alternatives.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 07:04 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] velvetpage.livejournal.com
That's fair enough, but I'd suggest you be very careful about the messages you send him for the next five years. If he knows that you half-expect him to hate school, it will influence how he deals with it.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 10:32 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] blue-comet.livejournal.com
I will try to watch out for that. I really don't want him to hate it like I did. I just don't want him to suffer if he does.


I think that living in a bigger city than Peterborough is probably a positive thing, because the public school system here is able to accommodate a wider variety of needs. There wasn't very much in the way of enriched programming for gifted children when I was a kid. Even after decades of cutbacks, it seems that Ottawa still has more to offer in that regard than Peterborough did. And I imagine it's like that with other things too.


I guess it's a bit presumptuous to assume that he'll be gifted, but his father and I both were, so it is a distinct possibility.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-10-19 11:14 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] velvetpage.livejournal.com
I've been guilty of the same presumption. :)

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