Taking kids out of school for OS holidays

[Warks]

This story was in the Sydney Morning Herald today:

Public school principals crack down on family holidays in term time

We're taking our high school age kids (not yet seniors) out of school for the last week (plus a couple of days) of Term 2 (June). All this blather from the schools threatening all sorts of guff holds no water with us. Kids learn more from overseas travel than they ever will in a classroom full of disruptive students and bored teachers.

What can they actually do anyway? Take away our passports to stop us leaving?

I'm sure most people on here have taken kids out of school to go overseas. The deciding factor for us was the airfares. We'd have paid several thousand dollars more to leave just two days later!

 

[Colster]

We are taking the mini Colsters to Europe for five weeks in September, and no one will convince me that visiting Gaudi's works in Barcelona, the Roman Forum, Colloseum, St Peters, the Lourve, Mussee'd'Orsay, Natural History Museum, Greenwich Naval Museum, Edinburgh Castle is less of an educational experience than a couple of weeks of year 4.

 

[robd]

I did it with my kids through primary and secondary school. The school threatened that Jnr wouldn't be allowed to sit exams if she was absent for x days without a doctor's certificate. It didn't stop us going and nothing came of it in the end.

I agree with you that kids learn more from overseas travel and had we not gone out of school holiday periods, we would not have been able to afford it.

 

[Pushka]

Do it. As long as it isn't every year the kids will be fine and learn from it. Any decent teacher will tell you the same. It will bring history and geography to life.

 

[Princess Fiona]

Yes, have done it before. Faced the same issues. I don't think it's the fault of the schools, more likely the rules and red tape they are bound by.

 

[robd]

Someone on this forum has part of this Mark Twain quote as their signature and I think it sums up this topic very well:-

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

Surely the earlier our children experience this, the better chance they have of being open minded and well rounded adults?

 

[Noel Mugavin]

Teacher here. Do it.

 

[mimishat]

We have done it and will continue to do it. DS1 is only in year 1 so the school haven't said anything to us yet. He does a "show and tell" session when he gets back about his holiday and still does reading and writing while away.

 

[Cynicor]

If the kids were to suddenly come down with a hideous gastro prior to your trip, come see me

We took time off every year except 11 and 12, including several months for Mum's sabbatical.

 

[Groundhog]

We are taking our kids out of school for Gallipoli this April. Luckily for us our Principal fully supports the trip. Wish my parents would have taken me OS when i was young, what a great experience.

 

[kpc]

I agree that travel broadens the mind and kids learn a lot about life's lessons by travelling, especially OS....from the school's point of view, it is difficult if 1/2 the class are absent in the week prior to the hols! I missed a whole year of primary school when my father did a sabbatical in Melbourne in 1977/8 but I did attend Erroll Street Primary school in Nth Melbourne instead .....I think it is criminal how the travel industry esp. domestically jack up everything in school hols...this can be somewhat avoided by clever forward planning of OS hols in school hols using your coughnal of frequent flyer tricks

 

[Mark3000]

Great thread!
We've been given warnings by our school but plan on leaving a week early.
There was a story a year or two ago about a boy in Sydney who was denied time of school to represent Australia in chess! Some schools take it too far

 

[Pushka]

We are taking our kids out of school for Gallipoli this April. Luckily for us our Principal fully supports the trip. Wish my parents would have taken me OS when i was young, what a great experience.

Our parents couldn't have afforded to do this. It was the car road trip in the "good" old days. No airconditioning and dodgy roads.

My first trip in a plane was when I was 20. My son - 6 weeks.

 

[juddles]

Our parents couldn't have afforded to do this. It was the car road trip in the "good" old days. No airconditioning and dodgy roads.

My first trip in a plane was when I was 20. My son - 6 weeks.

Pushka, that is so true! For my first 10 years the yearly ¨holiday¨ was something like driving from Tenant Creek to Melbourne to visit the grandparents for a few days. The road all the way down through Alice to Adelaide was still dirt!!

But then my family moved to Chile and suddenly as a kid I got a taste of foreign countries. I never looked back

We have no problem taking the kids out of school to do some trip. I totally agree that an overseas visit will teach them more about life than the same time in school.

But as long as it is reasonable. I can see how teachers could struggle if a large number of people start holidays early.

 

[Groundhog]

Our parents couldn't have afforded to do this. It was the car road trip in the "good" old days. No airconditioning and dodgy roads.

My first trip in a plane was when I was 20. My son - 6 weeks.

True Pushka, we were similar. The family vehicle was a Ford Falcon 500 with vinyl seats in the Qld sun and heat. Every holiday trip we were swiming before we even got out of the car. FF 35 years and just about everyones family holiday vehicle is an A380 with TV's in the seats and aircon. Back then the trip was mostly about the destination, now with my kids its more about the plane. I expect this to change as they get older ( hopefully )

 

[andye]

Have taken our children out of school regularly since we moved to Australia. The only long holidays is Christmas, which I certainly can't take more than once in a blue moon.It is just not feasible to visit family in Europe for a sub-16 day trip, let alone the expense and the undesirable weather at that time of year. Thankfully all Australian schools have been fine so far for less than 2 weeks at end of term.

Couldn't agree more about the value of travel as education. (and there doesn't seem to be a lot of learning going on at my childrens' schools in the last week of term)

For what its worth, UK state schools are very hard line. My sister is anticipating a very tough time when she takes her son out for our family reunion in Spain this June.

 

[dk4]

IMO the article quoted is designed to create maximum torque (and advertising revenue) via an overly emotive, one-sided review of the new regulations.

My read (between the lines) is that it is more about giving the local principal the right to say "no" to things like in-term family holidays to say; the Gold Coast, Bali or coughet, but "allow" trips to more educational, cultural or otherwise horizon expanding locations/societies/destinations.

I think that most educational professionals appreciate the great learning and development opportunity afforded by some types of travel.

 

[Moody]

There is a subtle difference between approved and unapproved leave. Our kids have frequent time off school to attend musical events, camps and tours - yet at the end of the year their report cards say "Absences - Nil" as this is all approved leave. We have also taken them out of school for a couple of days to a couple of weeks, so that we could maximise hols (and our chances of nabbing awards or cheapish flights). This may or may not have been approved (it didn't worry us at the time), but there is a subtle difference.

If the principal approves the leave then the school must accommodate the student's absence, but if it is NOT approved (which is more likely moving forward) then they don't. For example if there was an assessment task set during the student's absence then the teacher is within their rights to award them a zero mark. If the period of unapproved absence is extensive then the school can contact the police as it is an offence to not ensure your children attend school, though in reality this rarely happens.

All-in-all the rules have not really changed, just that principals have been instructed to apply them.

 

[medhead]

I missed half of year 3 with the parents taking us to europe for 6 months. Great birthday in an Ozzie run boarding house around the corner from Paddington station, freezing in munich, octoberfest, seeing the berlin wall when they had machine guns, taken to the toilet at checkpoint charlie by an east german border guard, etc., etc., etc.

Took the kids to europe for my brother's wedding when the oldest was 6, only a few weeks. The most tangible benefit of that was that she was super fit afterwards as we walked just about everywhere. In paris we probably did at least 100km in a few days - Notre Dame to Louvre to Eiffel tower, Arch de Tromiphe, to Montmartre to Sacre Coeur and back to the left bank. Then similar in Madrid, Barcelona, Nice and Rome. She was so fit that one of the popular girls was crying on sports day because she got beaten in the 100m. Not so much academic performance but schools like sporting excellence as well.

That being said, it really is just a matter of applying for leave in South Australia.

We are taking our kids out of school for Gallipoli this April. Luckily for us our Principal fully supports the trip. Wish my parents would have taken me OS when i was young, what a great experience.

Anzac day does coincides with school holidays in NSW, half with it in South Australia. My kids have both refused to go anyway, instead opting for a scifi convention at home. Either way I'm proud of them nothing wrong with sci-fi at all.

 

[ellen10]

I have worked in both a High School and a Primary School.

The high school was quite multicultural and often families would take their children overseas for 3-6 months. This was mainly to stay with family. These children would come back and be way behind with their peers, in many subjects, and it was very difficult to engage the children, let alone get them back up to speed. Previously this type of leave was called "exempt" and not counted as absences on school reports. But the shift from the Education department is now to count this as "leave" and the absence will be recorded not only on the students reports but against the schools total absences.
The Education Ministers, Premiers and PM are pushing this because Australia's education rankings have dropped.

I now work in a Primary school. Small amounts of leave are no problem for Primary students and as mentioned earlier, are often very beneficial.
But we have been instructed to now record these as leave and record them on school reports.

We were in the Uk last year and UK schools have gotten very strict, and now fine parents for taking their children out of school on school days . Sick children have to supply a doctors certificate.