The government is so hot on time off school these days, but it doesn’t always put the needs of the child first. This week J has been struggling with a virus, not a bad one, but not 100%. He’s gone into school every day, and every day I’ve half expected a phone call asking me to collect him.
Given free rein I’d have given him an easy week, maybe a few half days or a day off, but the school system isn’t flexible enough to allow for that. I think it ought to be especially at primary level. I know the government goes on about how it’s best for children not to miss school and they talk about the study they had done. If you read the study in detail though, it’s clearly deeply flawed and the facts have been collected in such a way as to support the argument the government is putting forward. Their figures aren’t about a child having a week off in primary school, but all about a child missing time in crucial exam years, but you wouldn’t know that from the spin they put on it. If they want people to take them seriously they should get a proper impartial study done.
Anyway my child has had a tough week, but he’s come through it and he still has a 100% attendance record for the year, just in case he needs to miss time later in the year, he has credit built up for now.