Another famous "taking your kids out of school" thread ..

[Suprize2017]

I teach 5th grade, have two boys entering 7th grade, and a daughter entering 8th grade. We will all be missing 5 days of school the last week of February. The missed days will stress all four of us out, but the time with family will override that. If you are not in violation of her school’s attendance policy, I see no reason to not go. Just emphasize with your daughter that you will do everything you can to help her get back on track. That may mean some extra time at school, a tutor for a few days, help from mom or dad, etc. Whatever is needed. That may help her feel a little less stressed. I truly believe the time with family, and the memories being made, is more important. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

As far as 3-4 hours of homework for a 6th grader?? That is asinine! Shame on that school and those teachers for allowing that to happen! That really makes me sad for those kids (and their families). They need time to unwind, be a kid, spend time with family and friends, and participate in extra curricular activities. I get so upset when I read things like that.

 

[tinkerhon]

I teach 5th grade, have two boys entering 7th grade, and a daughter entering 8th grade. We will all be missing 5 days of school the last week of February. The missed days will stress all four of us out, but the time with family will override that. If you are not in violation of her school’s attendance policy, I see no reason to not go. Just emphasize with your daughter that you will do everything you can to help her get back on track. That may mean some extra time at school, a tutor for a few days, help from mom or dad, etc. Whatever is needed. That may help her feel a little less stressed. I truly believe the time with family, and the memories being made, is more important. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

As far as 3-4 hours of homework for a 6th grader?? That is asinine! Shame on that school and those teachers for allowing that to happen! That really makes me sad for those kids (and their families). They need time to unwind, be a kid, spend time with family and friends, and participate in extra curricular activities. I get so upset when I read things like that.

Well said ! As far as the homework- I agree - there were kids up till after midnite doing homework, and most, like my daughter, have to wake up at 6 to make the bus!

 

[lolomarie]

I have two different perspectives, both arriving at the same conclusion.

First, as a teacher I strongly believe that whatever children are learning in school does not matter at all(shocking, I know!) The PROCESS of learning is the most important thing: critical thinking, organizing an argument, media literacy, discovering bias, analyzing, planning, working in a group, etc. None of this will be disrupted by a short family vacation. Whatever is learned on said vacation is far more valuable than what can be learned in school for those short days.

Second, as a kid that lost their parent at a young age (sorry to be a downer). But based on this, take the trip! Life is short, take the trip, spend the time, invest in family. Family and friends are the most important things in life. Memories made are literally priceless.

 

[Magical2017]

I have two different perspectives, both arriving at the same conclusion.

First, as a teacher I strongly believe that whatever children are learning in school does not matter at all(shocking, I know!) The PROCESS of learning is the most important thing: critical thinking, organizing an argument, media literacy, discovering bias, analyzing, planning, working in a group, etc. None of this will be disrupted by a short family vacation. Whatever is learned on said vacation is far more valuable than what can be learned in school for those short days.

Second, as a kid that lost their parent at a young age (sorry to be a downer). But based on this, take the trip! Life is short, take the trip, spend the time, invest in family. Family and friends are the most important things in life. Memories made are literally priceless.

I am sorry for your loss. I lost my dad at age 9. We took a big trip to Europe the summer before. I still have wonderful memories of that last vacation. Life IS short.

 

[NYCgrrl]

4-5 hours of homework at night in 6th grade???
I was an aide at a middle school for years, and never did the teachers assign so much to do after a full day of school.
No wonder your DD is stressed!!

I can't say how many hours are dedicated to each subject but 3.75 hours is the average that DGD spent on homework last year. This includes her time with the math tutor and an afterschool foreign language immersion class. She doesn't seem to mind, shows no visible signs of being stressed thus I don't fuss with her about it.

I have two different perspectives, both arriving at the same conclusion.

First, as a teacher I strongly believe that whatever children are learning in school does not matter at all(shocking, I know!) The PROCESS of learning is the most important thing: critical thinking, organizing an argument, media literacy, discovering bias, analyzing, planning, working in a group, etc. None of this will be disrupted by a short family vacation. Whatever is learned on said vacation is far more valuable than what can be learned in school for those short days.

Second, as a kid that lost their parent at a young age (sorry to be a downer). But based on this, take the trip! Life is short, take the trip, spend the time, invest in family. Family and friends are the most important things in life. Memories made are literally priceless.

A version of the bolded section brings back memories of my 2nd and 4th grade teacher, Miss Foran. It was from her I first heard that articulated minus any references to media literacy and bias. Of course good citizenship, comportment, and such were another component of our education at that time. One could say that working in a group was still part of civics though. Somehow I believe this (civics) is somewhat lacking in your otherwise well written argument for missing school at will.

 

[MarBee]

Teacher here. There are only a few circumstances that I would say NOT to take the trip. Nothing that you posted would make me say to skip the trip. In fact, your daughter stressing about school is a reason for going!
Go for it and enjoy.

Just please please please don’t do any of the following to the teacher:
1) ask for the entire week’s worth of lessons to take home. It’s impossible to do, it takes so much time to put together, and no one ever does it.
2) bombard the teacher with “why is my child behind” emails after the trip

Instead, send a postcard or bring back a little souvenir like a pencil or something. Also, ask the teacher how they’d like to handle the absences and missed work.

Most importantly, have fun and make memories!

 

[J'aime Paris]

I can't say how many hours are dedicated to each subject but 3.75 hours is the average that DGD spent on homework last year. This includes her time with the math tutor and an afterschool foreign language immersion class. She doesn't seem to mind, shows no visible signs of being stressed thus I don't fuss with her about it.

OP stated that 4-5 hours was homework. Mandatory work, in addition to a full school day.

I'd consider a math tutor and an after school foreign lang. immersion class to be "extras". Those are chosen activities ...much like a club, sport, volunteerism, etc.
One would choose to add these onto the school day.

 

[NYCgrrl]

OP stated that 4-5 hours was homework. Mandatory work, in addition to a full school day.

I'd consider a math tutor and an after school foreign lang. immersion class to be "extras". Those are chosen activities ...much like a club, sport, volunteerism, etc.

The math tutor was mandatory from my and her father's POV (she's a bit shaky and needs to think too much of her response for certain math problems. Her dad can do most any type of math problem in his head whilst I was a complete math dope at her age.
Hmmmmm.........the language is part mandatory and part for fun. She'll be visiting my ex's homeland next summer and we all would like her to be able to converse with that part of the family with ease and not be dependent on their knowledge of English which is kinda stereotypically embarrassing when you think on it.

Her regular school suggests that 3-3.5 hours be set aside for their homework in their P/T handbook so no surprises on that end. Her doing it faster and accurately just allows more time for "little grey cell expansion".

 

[tinkerhon]

I am sorry for your loss. I lost my dad at age 9. We took a big trip to Europe the summer before. I still have wonderful memories of that last vacation. Life IS short.

Sorry for your loss as well - per my OP- same boat - lost my dad when I was 15 - memories of our vacations priceless ! Never went to Disney, but Dutch Wonderland entrenched in my memory bank - decided to book it - kids would only miss 3 days

 

[tinkerhon]

OP stated that 4-5 hours was homework. Mandatory work, in addition to a full school day.

I'd consider a math tutor and an after school foreign lang. immersion class to be "extras". Those are chosen activities ...much like a club, sport, volunteerism, etc.
One would choose to add these onto the school day.

Yep- the 4-5 hrs homework was in addition to the reg schoolwork - they tried to get some of it done at lunch , but was impossible

 

[iivye]

Yea, she is majorly stressing 7th grade - she's in a pretty tough middle school - I don't ever remember getting 4-5 hours of homework a night in 6th grade !

For some reason the homework was really stepped up in 7th grade at my daughter's school. That was also when they stopped getting recess during the day which was tough too.

Yep- I did book the room just to have it held, but we are going to give her a few months and see how comfortable she is before making a decision - as others have mentioned - a stressed out pre-teen would not be fun !

I think this is a great idea! It got to be too hard for my daughter to catch up when we missed multiple days so we had to stop around this same age. It was a combination of the daily homework she missed and all the projects that teachers assigned for the kids to complete over breaks. I never understood assigning more homework over a period that was supposed to be a break from school.

 

[tinkerhon]

Teacher here. There are only a few circumstances that I would say NOT to take the trip. Nothing that you posted would make me say to skip the trip. In fact, your daughter stressing about school is a reason for going!
Go for it and enjoy.

Just please please please don’t do any of the following to the teacher:
1) ask for the entire week’s worth of lessons to take home. It’s impossible to do, it takes so much time to put together, and no one ever does it.
2) bombard the teacher with “why is my child behind” emails after the trip

Instead, send a postcard or bring back a little souvenir like a pencil or something. Also, ask the teacher how they’d like to handle the absences and missed work.

Most importantly, have fun and make memories!

Thanks so much ! Just booked "Pop" and DD stress level dropped a lot ! The dean also got back to us and said "she's an excellent student- talkative, but good student- go, enjoy the family !"

 

[NYCgrrl]

Thanks so much ! Just booked "Pop" and DD stress level dropped a lot ! The dean also got back to us and said "she's an excellent student- talkative, but good student- go, enjoy the family !"

Glad all your related problems were resolved and in such a short time.
Onward to Disney!

 

[sullyfam]

Similar dilemma here. My son is starting 6th grade and we are going for 9 days over Veteran's Day. Because of the long weekend and teacher conferences, he will end up missing 5 days of school. He is the type of kid that does not like to miss school and tends to run a little anxious. He knows about the trip and is excited but nervous at the same time. My daughter on the other hand who is going into 3rd grade could care less about missing school. And my youngest is 3 and blissfully oblivious.

I plan to do what I have done in the past, let the front office and teachers know ahead of time. I hope that they'll get work to take with them but there are no guarantees. It seems all teachers are different when it comes to this. Last year, we went to Chicago with our oldest and he missed a few days. His teacher emailed me back saying "no need to take work with you, enjoy your family time!" As someone else mentioned, the same thing happens unintentionally when your kid gets sick. I remember a friend of mine had mono in HS and was out for a month!

In general, we try to plan things so that the kids don't miss school. But we make exceptions and I think that's OK. I don't remember what I learned in 7th grade but I do remember the trip we took to Disney as a family that year. It was the one and only trip we took with my grandmother who I was extremely close with.

At the end of the day, life is short and missing school for a few days is not the end of the world. The kids will be fine and will bounce back and you will have family memories which are priceless.

 

[tinkerhon]

Glad all your related problems were resolved and in such a short time.
Onward to Disney!

Thanks ! Yea- DD seems ok with it now and in the long run, our vacations and time together were more important - if she had problems in school historically, we definitely would not be going !

 

[MarBee]

Deleted for posting on wrong thread

 

[NYCgrrl]

Question about purchasing EBCI. I booked flights for February but may need to change my dates/times later. If I were to purchase EBCI for my family of 4 now, do I get refunded if I switch flights? Or will the EBCI “transfer” to the new flight?

Do you mean early check-in via SW airline? Are you sure you didn't mean to post this on the Transportation forum?

 

[MarBee]

Do you mean early check-in via SW airline? Are you sure you didn't mean to post this on the Transportation forum?

Omg I’m cracking up! I was reading both posts and accidentally posted here. Sorry! I will delete.

 

[NYCgrrl]

Omg I’m cracking up! I was reading both posts and accidentally posted here. Sorry! I will delete.

BTDT, .

 

[mi*vida*loca]

I stopped pulling my kids out of school around 3-4 grade due to the amount of work. Plus my districts strict attendance policy. It's just not worth the trouble and I don't feel like fighting a school district over a vacation. Vacations are unexcused.

This year I am pulling DD out during Jersey week but it'll only be one full day and two half days and we will be in Disney for 10 days so not bad IMO. Since it's during Jersey Week that Friday (the full day) may be the day she misses the most stuff but the two half days during Jersey week they do nothing but watch movies and mess around. So I don't feel bad about it and we will be within our attendance policy for school.