Year 6 and 11 Induction Days and Proms all cancelled

In addition, why have year 11 been allowed to finish school well before the end of term when no exams have been done. Surely this is an opportunity for those going into year 12 to have some ‘catch up’ classes.
I asked exactly this question Gwyneth. I suggested team building activities, critical thinking, projects, working in the community etc. but it seems the year 11s and their teachers need to "chill" because they have worked so hard.
I am one poster on here who would put the children's needs before those of teachers and who would pull out all of the stops. Members of my family in schools also agree it is ludicrous not to pack in another 6 weeks at school for year 11s if only for the social aspect. There's no time like the present.

Ellianne yes I think there have definitely been missed opportunities where students could have done the kind of activities you have suggested which would have benefited them greatly. I really don’t see any reason why they couldn’t have stayed at school until the end of term.

A friend has completely the opposite view - she thinks that it is our age group that has lost out the most. Young people have a lifetime to recover from the problems of the pandemic whereas our generation has much less time left!

Newquay

Totally agree-let’s hope this is the death of those daft American proms.
Generally speaking most children are quite resilient.
In my day (!) when I started girls Grammar School-The only one to pass the 11 plus- I was told to go and wait on the corner of the square and see if I could see anyone else who looked like it was her first day. . . So I did and we walked in together.

Newquay we moved from another area the day before DD was due to start Y7 - new school, new area, no house (we hadn't been able to find one to rent pro tem) but somehow she got through it all!

Ellianne

^In addition, why have year 11 been allowed to finish school well before the end of term when no exams have been done. Surely this is an opportunity for those going into year 12 to have some ‘catch up’ classes.^
I asked exactly this question Gwyneth. I suggested team building activities, critical thinking, projects, working in the community etc. but it seems the year 11s and their teachers need to "chill" because they have worked so hard.
I am one poster on here who would put the children's needs before those of teachers and who would pull out all of the stops. Members of my family in schools also agree it is ludicrous not to pack in another 6 weeks at school for year 11s if only for the social aspect. There's no time like the present.

I've explained this before. Year 11s would be wasting their time. The kind of activities you suggest take hours of time to prepare and generally aren't worth the time they take to organise.

Many Year 11s will be going on to different institutions and will be dropping over half the subjects they have been studying so far. They have finished their courses.

I appreciate that you haven't had any experience of secondary education and possibly don't understand the systems. On behalf of current secondary school teachers, I resent your implication that teachers are lazy and don't prioritise their pupils. You obviously have no idea how stressful the last few months have been, as teachers have had the responsibility for assessment "dumped" on them by the DfE and exam boards who have issued very little guidance and nearly always at the last minute.

MerylStreep

Teacheranne
I was all prepared to follow the rules back in March 2020 in respect of not seeing my daughter and grandchildren.
But when Professor Neil Ferguson ( he who worked out that if we didn’t 500,000+ would die.
But what he didn’t say at the time was: this only applies to you plebs. My married lover can still come to my place for some afternoon jiggy jiggy.
When I read what he had done I said: well, Mr Ferguson, you can go and f*&k yourself. Seeing my children is just as important ( more so) than your afternoon jiggy jiggy so that’s what I’m doing and continued to do so.

How childish to take that attitude.

Newquay

Totally agree-let’s hope this is the death of those daft American proms.
Generally speaking most children are quite resilient.
In my day (!) when I started girls Grammar School-The only one to pass the 11 plus- I was told to go and wait on the corner of the square and see if I could see anyone else who looked like it was her first day. . . So I did and we walked in together.

Agree. I had to catch the service bus on my own, none of my contemporaries were going to grammar school, lucky to get a seat, then all the new first formers were herded together at the school gate until directed to our classrooms.

No induction days, no meeting any other new children or teachers beforehand, never stepped inside the school, but we all somehow managed.

Growstuff. Two good comments !

No induction days, no meeting any other new children or teachers beforehand, never stepped inside the school, but we all somehow managed.

We certainly did! Perhaps it suited the staff for us to be overawed by this unfamiliar experience! On my first day at grammar school, it closed 40 minutes earlier than expected for a Staff Meeting without prior notification, throwing my mother's plan to meet me into disarray. I survived!

In my school one of our teachers kept a bottle of vodka in her desk, I want more field children than surviving.

For rather than field

It has ocurred to me that if they wanted to parents and grandparents could get together and organise outside activities for local Y11s. Take them camping, swimming and involve them in the local community. They won't of course because actually we all know that it's a difficult age and coping with them isn't easy. Passsing responsibility to the teacher is so much easier.

How childish to take that attitude.

Why?

When we see those who make the rules blatantly disregarding them it's understandable that people will feel like that, especially after so many have been seen to blatantly break theur own rules and lie about it.

In my school one of our teachers kept a bottle of vodka in her desk, I want more for children than surviving.

I meant I survived the experience I had on the first day regarding the school day ending early. In fact, by the end of that first day, I had made friends with two girls with whom I’m still in contact now, 60 years later. The few friends from my village primary school, who also started on the same day, were placed in different forms which was not unusual.

Having been a Y6 teacher for many years, I’ve been involved in transition arrangements, including induction days and recommending friendship groups, which are designed to ease the move to high school. It will be no surprise that the main factor in ensuring pupils settled in their new school was the attitude they displayed to their learning, their teachers and their peers.

I am so sad for the leavers not having their prom. The girls especially get very excited about it, their first big 'glam' outfit and the boys all looking so good in their suits. A celebration for all the hard word they've put into their school life and most of them going in different directions.

The school in our street took 2 coaches of year 5 children on a residential trip for 2 nights. Came back last evening.
The same school is going ahead with a outdoor marque for the year 6 prom. But this school cannot allow the reception newbees for September a morning in July in there newly built seperate unit, or a new parents meeting about the same time!
Granddaughter starting in reception in September would have really benefitted from meeting her new teacher before she starts. As usual, Madness.

Agree totally. Birthdays, Weddings etc are penalised but thousands of football fans probably drunken men (and women - but hope they’ve got more sense) crushing together spreading the virus and then coming home on public transport to spread it on the way to everyone they encounter. I am incandescent with fury.

My grandson is able to go on induction days, so I think it depends on the school and probably the local authority.

As for proms, I think it is high time these were scrapped . Parents are almost blackmailed into spending hundreds of pounds in a bid to outdo each other, and I know a couple of youngsters who have feigned illness so that they don’t have to admit their parents can’t afford this farce.

I cannot agree.

We have a clear duty to protect the young and a duty to demonstrate how serious a pandemic is and how it can be overcome.

No school has the capacity to hold serveral induction days so pupils from different schools don't mix, so obviously it makes sense to cancel.

Presumably those who consider going to events such as Ascot, football or Wimbledon have been vaccinated, which schoolchildren have not yet been.

I am of the generation who went from one school to another without any induction, who had sports day without many parents let alone grandparents present because they were at work. Prizegiving was held in the local church on the last day of term before the summer break and then only a few parents or relatives could get time off to go. The local high school where I stay (Scotland) has had a commemorative pin made for all the pupils leaving school this summer and they are having a garden party/concert that S6 have organised for themselves. The commemorative pin was designed by one of the pupils and has been made locally, a keepsake that will last way beyond any prom. Maybe the last 2 years will take the "American" feel out of leaving school. It will certainly mean that families on a limited budget won't feel pressured into giving in to peer pressure and ending up in debt. Some of the children's proms in the past have cost obscene amounts of money and have been ridiculous.

Granddaughter has just been away on school camp - loved it. She will also get an induction day at her secondary school. I guess different areas have different ways of doing things. (This is Cornwall)

Oh for goodness sake they'll get over it they are part of history so were last years school children. It's not the end of the world. Its something they can tell their children and their grandchildren."We were I the pandemic". I bet the parents are making more fuss which then makes the children think it's more upsetting h than it really is. Ruddy Prom is an American import anyway. I do feel sorry for them.misding out on their I duction day but last year they did it end of August.

It seems to have been left to the schools how they adapt at the moment. A lot of Primary age children are not getting a full day at school yet but other schools are managing it.

At the moment it’s the young that are not vaccinated, but most of the older population is, so it’s the young who are most likely to catch and transmit - with the most serious consequences

Could not agree more Franbern.
I feel so sorry for all the children but especially these 2 years.
All this disruption and isolation is storing up lots of mental health issues and dented their confidence.l really feel for them!