I started to worry about our small family business. How were we going to be able to continue running a business we enjoy and have built from scratch? Would we just have to stick to school holiday times? We have bookings year on year, how could we honour those outside the school holidays? The words "you can't have your cake and eat it!" came back to haunt me. Words I had been told when we began our business. Those words fuelled my stubborn streak again. There's nothing like someone telling you, you can't, to make you determined.
Year on year it has become more and more difficult to achieve balance between school attendance and our work. We travel to music festivals from May to September running Kindred Cafe and workshops and hire out our rainbow wheelbarrows. OK, so school closes from the end of July for two months, so from May to July, we wanted some support to continue this little family business growing.
I'm an ex primary school teacher, artist and I run art and craft workshops. My husband is a Health & Safety consultant who risk assesses the things we do. At festivals experts share their knowledge in fun activities and it is this authentic teaching that is often taken back to schools by teachers who have attended festival workshops. To be taught inside classrooms or in their own school grounds, adapted into their own unique format. What we do is meant to inspire. It is meant to enable everyone to be creative. Sessions are led by experts in their field (see what I did there ;o). It is meant to encourage you to want to have a go, in an relaxed, fun way.
Our sons like/d school and college and have no wish to be entirely home schooled. At school, they have great opportunities to do things they wouldn't at home, they have their school friends. Their time attending festivals has enabled them to learn skills, meet people that inspire and educate them in ways home or school could not. Music, art, dance, bush skills, circus skills, culture, socialising, working with others. Irrelevantly, all three of our sons are at or above their grades, because I believe ultimately they are happy.
"So, how do you get to take your children out of school?"- is a question we get asked a lot.
Initially, FLEXI-SCHOOLING was our ideal solution. We have been in talks since last June, 10 months. Emailing, waiting, chasing, writing, waiting, ringing, waiting.
Flexi-schooling is an agreement between the head and parents and is now made increasingly difficult with the pressure of having 'outstanding' schools or academies. Our flexi-schooling application was turned down by both schools. The council advising them we would increase the schools' unauthorised absence percentages, which means they would appear a bad school. What school wants that?
http://edyourself.org/articles/flexischooling.php
So the headteachers looked at solutions to support us and it was for us to stick to the maximum authorised allowance of 10 days for holidays for the May to July period.
But we have bookings to honour from 3 years ago!? This is not enough time to deliver what we promised.
We worked with the schools to meet tests and their timetable, calling on Nana and Pappy to take over childcare for those times. It still wasn't enough time.
Isn't a new business meant to grow? The system was stiffling it and us.
Ironically, the local Council's, Learning, Skills & Education Department is based in Old Gaol Block of County Hall. I expect most parents feel this is apt considering the restrictions placed on taking their own children on holidays during school time. The appeal of reduced costs, to experience the culture of an otherwise unaffordable far flung place often outweighs the cost of the fine. But most importantly, its a valuable learning experience, outside the classroom.
But our solution came at the end of Winter in the form of an email reply from the Council. We are now automatically considered 'New Travellers'. All we have to do is make this clear to those who need to know our label. We fall into the Gypsy, Traveller and Roma category.
As a child, I dreamt of being an art teacher, a dancer and part of a band of bohemian gypsies... it came true.
Please, don't give up on your dreams.
Year on year it has become more and more difficult to achieve balance between school attendance and our work. We travel to music festivals from May to September running Kindred Cafe and workshops and hire out our rainbow wheelbarrows. OK, so school closes from the end of July for two months, so from May to July, we wanted some support to continue this little family business growing.
I'm an ex primary school teacher, artist and I run art and craft workshops. My husband is a Health & Safety consultant who risk assesses the things we do. At festivals experts share their knowledge in fun activities and it is this authentic teaching that is often taken back to schools by teachers who have attended festival workshops. To be taught inside classrooms or in their own school grounds, adapted into their own unique format. What we do is meant to inspire. It is meant to enable everyone to be creative. Sessions are led by experts in their field (see what I did there ;o). It is meant to encourage you to want to have a go, in an relaxed, fun way.
Our sons like/d school and college and have no wish to be entirely home schooled. At school, they have great opportunities to do things they wouldn't at home, they have their school friends. Their time attending festivals has enabled them to learn skills, meet people that inspire and educate them in ways home or school could not. Music, art, dance, bush skills, circus skills, culture, socialising, working with others. Irrelevantly, all three of our sons are at or above their grades, because I believe ultimately they are happy.
"So, how do you get to take your children out of school?"- is a question we get asked a lot.
Initially, FLEXI-SCHOOLING was our ideal solution. We have been in talks since last June, 10 months. Emailing, waiting, chasing, writing, waiting, ringing, waiting.
Flexi-schooling is an agreement between the head and parents and is now made increasingly difficult with the pressure of having 'outstanding' schools or academies. Our flexi-schooling application was turned down by both schools. The council advising them we would increase the schools' unauthorised absence percentages, which means they would appear a bad school. What school wants that?
http://edyourself.org/articles/flexischooling.php
So the headteachers looked at solutions to support us and it was for us to stick to the maximum authorised allowance of 10 days for holidays for the May to July period.
But we have bookings to honour from 3 years ago!? This is not enough time to deliver what we promised.
We worked with the schools to meet tests and their timetable, calling on Nana and Pappy to take over childcare for those times. It still wasn't enough time.
Isn't a new business meant to grow? The system was stiffling it and us.
Ironically, the local Council's, Learning, Skills & Education Department is based in Old Gaol Block of County Hall. I expect most parents feel this is apt considering the restrictions placed on taking their own children on holidays during school time. The appeal of reduced costs, to experience the culture of an otherwise unaffordable far flung place often outweighs the cost of the fine. But most importantly, its a valuable learning experience, outside the classroom.
But our solution came at the end of Winter in the form of an email reply from the Council. We are now automatically considered 'New Travellers'. All we have to do is make this clear to those who need to know our label. We fall into the Gypsy, Traveller and Roma category.
As a child, I dreamt of being an art teacher, a dancer and part of a band of bohemian gypsies... it came true.
Please, don't give up on your dreams.
