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Tuesday 28 January 2020

Why I Won't be Celebrating my Daughters Attendance Award

This week my daughters school shared that they would be giving out "attendance certificates" to children who had attended over 97% attendance during each term. Now don't get my wrong I love celebrating and sharing my daughters excitement when she comes home with an award, a sticker or a certificate.


I love seeing the joy and pride on her face when she comes running out with her work in one hand and a shiny sticker or certificate in the other. But her attendance award will be one we won't be celebrating and I wanted to share with you why.

You see as parents, we are all too aware of how important attendance is. After all we chose to send our children to school for a reason, we are the ones who try so hard to play catch up when our children fall behind, miss out on lessons or get frustrated right alongside the teachers. I get that schools want to help parents get their kids to school but shaming our kids with not getting a certificate really isn't the way!

(photo credit www.redkitedays.co.uk)

Young children very rarely have control over whether they go to school or not. Instead its us as parents who make that choice. It's parents who have to make the decisions over whether to send our child to school or not when they wake up sick or tell us they feel poorly. Schools regularly talk about how important it is to keep our children home if they are unwell to protect other kids, the 48hour rule when sick or have diarrhoea. And we all know, most of us first hand, what happens when kids who are sick attend school and just how quickly illness spreads in a school!

So as parents we make that choice, we keep our kids home when they are sick! We arrange our work schedules, lose money and spend our time caring for our kids so that we can get that better as soon as possible. Only for our children to be told that because they followed the rules, because they were unfortunate enough to get sick or feel poorly, that they don't get an award like their friends.


Now that little piece of paper might not seem like a big deal to us adults, but when you are 4/ 5/ 6 years old and you don't receive a certificate that all your friends get, its kind of a big deal!

So schools please remember that, when you hand out an "attendance certificate" to a percentage of your pupils but not the rest, you are punishing the wrong person. Our children are so young and there are so many other great achievements our children are making and gaining all the time. Riding their bikes, learning to swim, learning to spell their name or excelling in maths, moving up a reading level, making new friends and I could go on and go.

So instead of focusing on something that's out of their control like attendance, lets celebrate their other great achievements, their hard work, their kindness and them being awesome.

Do your child's school give out attendance awards?

xXx

15 comments:

  1. I totally agree and while I think it's good schools keep an eye on attendance for kids who are sick and miss out because of that this seems really unfair. Great post.

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  2. I totally agree with you. There are more negatives with getting/not getting a certificate, than there are positives. It's an extra pressure that children, and their parents, don't need! x

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  3. I totally agree with you, this is something that should be abolished it is not fair on shaming those kids who do not have perfect attendance x

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  4. Yes I find this tough too. Some kids have no control over their illness or perhaps even parents who don't take it seriously. Mich X

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  5. We have this at the end of every school year and it absolutely grinds my nut! All it does is pinpoint the children who have been in school constantly even when they are ill... in turn making our children ill. Utterly ridiculous! Sim x SimsLife

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  6. I think it is so hard with these awards - there are so many reasons children won't get full attendance and for some it is almost being punished for being ill.

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  7. We’re never received an attendance certificate and I’m kinda glad about that. I wish they wouldn't measure kids on this because it’s not something they can control. Especially if they are sick! Dawn and Bella at Dear Mummy Blog

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  8. I completely agree with you and it's something I had never thought about but it is actually true: these children who do not have perfect attendance - it is not their fault! I don't agree with the concept of rewarding those who do and in effect punishing those who do not. Schools really need to readdress the issue if this their policy!

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  9. These attendance awards are not fair at all. My girls never got them in primary school because they used to have regular appointments to check on their hearts and their health was obviously more important than being at school. Now my youngest is at secondary school they don't bother with them. x

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  10. YES!! I totally agree with this. They are rewarding kids with good health, but those that do get sick through no fault of their own don't get a certificate

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  11. I totally agree with you! The kids in my daughters school get a prize and a certificate if they manage to do 100% attendance each term. My daughter went to school 30 minutes late has she had a dentist appointment and because of that she didn't get her prize. She was so disappointed.

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  12. I agree with this, we had to take our children out of school last year to go overseas for a close family wedding and this affected their attendance. Kids should not be made to worry about this

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  13. Mellissa Williams21 January 2020 at 21:07

    Attendance awards weren't really a thing when my son was at school. I do think rewarding attendance is silly as kids can't help being ill but you're damned if you do and damned if you don't - they want the kids in all the time but want you to stay away for x amount of time when they're ill!

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  14. I don't agree with attendance certificates, there are a whole host of reasons why a child might be absent from school. Most of which are completely uncontrollable such as illness and family deaths etc.

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  15. I toally agree, I've always felt like this too. My eldest used to get them but I dont think my youngest does.. I think they do it as a whole class now.

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