BellaOnline Forums Relationships Married No Kids I'd like to smack some sense into my friend, but..

Being back in school sucks because I have to take vacations on spring and summer break. Our vacation this summer will cost twice as much as our vacation last year because it is 'peak season.' Grr. I'm looking forward to be done with school so DH and I can start enjoying our off-time vacations.

I understand about having vacations at peak times. Sometimes we do but we prefer to go in the fall and or early spring, when the rates really are lower and there is the benefit of most kids being in school, so fewer children to be around.

There is a wedding that DW's nephew is having April 26th, so we'll be traveling up there to Michigan for that. I guess that qualifies as semi-offtime It won't be bad. Everyone there will be her family, and they know that we won't be having kids. The wedding will not be in a church, either, so that is a super double plus bonus for us

Has anyone else noticed, though, that there is a growing number of people taking their kids on vacation during off-season? Apparently they just pull 'em out of school for a week and go on vacation.

I have a feeling that as parents value education and personal responsibility less and less that we might start seeing more and more children at off-times. I also wonder as the population increases if there will cease to be 'off-times' since no matter what time of the year it is, vacation destinations will be swamped.

I know it can be an issue.

The trouble is in england at least, tourist agencies put the prices up on purpose in Term holidays, so parents on low wages cannot afford to go on holiday in the proper vacation time. If the tourist agents were fairer it would make it easier. Of course that does not make it right just to abuse the system, but unfortuantly it is not always abuse.

Also legally, parents are allowed to take their children out of school for 10 days of the academic year. So many do this because of that reason.

Tress, you nailed it. Whenever I hear parents talking about "pulling their kids out of school" for some vacation, I kind of cringe because I want kids to stay in school and not crowd everywhere else!!

my DH told me that in germany you can't take kids out of school during off-vacation times b/c they'll send someone to your house and the parents can get into trouble for it.

indigo

That is happening more and more often. Parents regularly ask teachers to provide (ahead of time) the work their children will miss while out of school for vacation. I say no, they will have to make up the work when they return. It creates a ton of extra work for me either way, and thinking the kid won't miss anything just because the teacher has given him/her a pile of work to do is delusional.

I know! When did it become common practice to just ignore when children have breaks? My parents didn't even pull us out of school for a few days when a relative got married - and I was already in high school! School is much more important than a vacation. Whatever happened to parents who enforced the idea of personal responsibility? They even make excuses for them if they didn't get their homework done!

I shudder to think of how the future generations are going to behave themselves in the workplace.

My sister in law just whines all the time about how she can't believe her sons wait till the last minute to write reports, lie about having homework, don't turn it in, etc. My SIL is a TEACHER, by the way. I always want to ask her why she (of all people) allows her children to do this.

"They have no motivation, Kim," she tells me. "I wasn't like that!"

I want to tell her it's HER responsibility to TEACH them that homework and reports are important the way her parents obviously taught her. But I don't because I'm pretty sure she'll fall back on the famous "You don't have kids. You don't know" response.

Fine by me. I don't. But if I did, they'd do their homework. It's called consistancy. Both parents have to inforce the rules and never let them slide. You have to train dogs that way too.

My husband and I went to Florida in late January to visit his family, well after the Christmas break time period. We flew into Orlando, and I was amazed at how many school-age kids there were on the plane, on a Monday! (I don't think it was Martin Luther King day either). I don't get it...

Cindy