Parents Training hours during school time.

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How do you feel about elementary aged kids missing school for practice? My daughter will be training level 4 next year and one of her scheduled gym practices is a school day 12-4. I hate this. I expressed concern to competitive manger and they are not willing to change time, not willing to let her train with a different team 1 day a week to get her hours. The only solutions given were join a different team (still train level 4 but not as advanced of team), or miss that class and attend once a month or every other week. My daughters concern is she is use to training 16 hrs and this will drop her to 12. She doesnt want to slow down her progression but I'm not willing to put gym before school. I'm fine leaving school a hour or 2 early but missing a whole afternoon one day a week is crazy town for me. Let alone me missing work to drive her to gym. I feel stuck and frustrated the gym isnt budging at all on practice time. How do you feel about leaving school for gym?
 
While we didn't do this in elementary school, my son did an alternate high school schedule. He went to school until noon, and then he practiced 2-6.

Sometimes, doing a schedule like this is actually putting school first. It allowed my son a lot of time to focus on schoolwork, getting his work done after practice each day. It also taught him good time management skills and allowed him to have a life outside of school and the gym. It was never putting gym above school at all but finding a balance that allowed him to be very successful at both.

I am not sure if we would have done it in elementary school, as that was not an option for us at the time. I do remember the days of being in school all day, then going to the gym for hours, and coming home and going to bed, and it was tough.
 
It allowed my son a lot of time to focus on schoolwork, getting his work done after practice each day

The re-allocated timing makes sense, but what about the several hours a day of missed school instruction? Was that never an issue? Or did you work something out with the school so that he wasn't actually missing class time?
 
The re-allocated timing makes sense, but what about the several hours a day of missed school instruction? Was that never an issue? Or did you work something out with the school so that he wasn't actually missing class time?

He met all graduation requirements. He had a 3.8 GPA. He took all required classes. He did 1 online each semester. He never missed any instruction.
 
Thank you for the information. As you said, your son never missed any instruction.

Are there any parents who are ok with their children regularly missing instruction time?
 
Thank you for the information. As you said, your son never missed any instruction.

Are there any parents who are ok with their children regularly missing instruction time?

I do not think it is an all or nothing thing. It is possible to do school, leave early, and not miss instruction. Or to get the missed instruction in other ways.
 
I think it's ridiculous and I would not do it. I'm curious to hear from parents that are ok with this. What is the justification for putting gym above school? I wouldn't even let my level 9 regularly miss school for gym, let alone a compulsory gymnast.
I totally agree with you. This is the progressive level 4-6 group so basically this year and next year will determine if they start going elite route. The compulsory level 3-5 groups # of hours are the same but way better schedule. My daughter is only turning 9 but she wants to have her shot at being one of the best in the gym. I want her to be happy and fun. I am jonestlynknsulted though that gym would even suggest a training time that takes half a school day away at a young age. I was hoping more parents would speak up at our gym but I guess they are ok with it. My daughter wants to stick with the progressive group and miss the school time practice but I worry that 12hrs vs 16hrs which she is use to if she will get frustrated if team mates advance quicker. Also she has formed bonds with coaches and team mates I cant break. I do love her gym amd they do a fantastic job at training not only gymnastics but hard working, kind and independent young ladies. I hate these big decision moments.
 
I do not think it is an all or nothing thing. It is possible to do school, leave early, and not miss instruction. Or to get the missed instruction in other ways.
I'm ok with a hour or 2 early but with our school and gym schedule she would literally go to school for 2 hrs a day. I feel like that's too much for a grade 4. Wish the gym could compromise and have practice a tad later. She can still get 12hrs gym time missing that practice but she is use to 16hrs gym.
 
I'm ok with a hour or 2 early but with our school and gym schedule she would literally go to school for 2 hrs a day. I feel like that's too much for a grade 4. Wish the gym could compromise and have practice a tad later. She can still get 12hrs gym time missing that practice but she is use to 16hrs gym.

I get that, and she is young. My son missed 1/2 a day all through high school. Elementary school, not so much.
 
I would never do it. But it seems like a lot of people don't have a problem with missing school (based on facebook and other groups anyway). You also said she goes 16 hours a week at 8 years old, so I don't think it's that surprising that her gym would require that. It sounds like they are a higher hours, gym comes first type place.

When my daughter was on preteam and compulsory levels, our practice started at the same time our school got out. A lot of parents at different local schools checked out early so they wouldn't have to sit in carpool and then be late. But to check out early at our schools implied missing the last subject of the day (you couldn't just check out 10 minutes early.. no check outs were allowed in the last 45 minutes of school). I asked the then preteam director what we were supposed to do and she basically said figure it out, but that other parents made it work. :mad: I was not pleased to hear that. But I refused to check her out early for gymnastics, so she was 15-20 minutes late to practice every single day for about 5 years. Yes, she's missed a day or two for competitions every season, but we aren't changing her school or school schedule for a sport. Her gym has started a day group now and more than half the team seems to be home schooled or in alternate schooling and attends the day training. My daughter was adamant about staying in public school with her friends and staying on a traditional schedule, so that is what we are doing.
 
I would never allow that at level 4. My level 10s miss one morning of school a week and leave half an hour early. My level 7 recently began leaving school half an hour early too. 16 hours is a lot for a level 4! 12 should be plenty. Maybe compromise she can miss school once a month or so.
 
It does seem strange to schedule a team practice at that hour. I’m a gym owner and I would never schedule practise for school aged kids in school hours at my gym.

As you say as well, it’s not just the school issue. It’s transport. Parents missing work to have to drive their kids to a 12 noon practice.

Having said that. I do believe honouring commitment to school hours in important. As honouring any commitment is important.

But time spent in the gym can be just as valuable, if not more valuable than time spent in the classroom.

Recent research has shown that one of the key factors to success in reading is actually physical movement.

The types of physical movements done in gymnastics, mean that children need to make multiple body parts so many different things at the same time. It creates new neural pathways and strengthens existing neural pathways. This enhances their reading skills, math skills, complex reasoning and general cognitive ability. Gymnastics gives them a big academic advantage.

The life skills taught in the gym will be invaluable to any career they choose in life - commitment, effort, breaking down goals, breaking down fear, overcoming doubt, intrinsic motivation, attention to detail, seeing the rewards that come from hard work, determination, persistence, courage etc.

Most kids learn these skills in the gym better than they would through school. Because they are so passionate about gym.
 
I wish my gym did this. In fact, I wish all of my daughter’s practices were during business hours. We homeschool for many reasons and I wish our gym had a day program for JO kids.
 
I would not let my child skip school for practice. She has missed for travel meets but that is once or twice a year. An average school year is 36 weeks so if she missed a half day for a whole school year, that is the same as missing 18 days of school which is 10% of her school year.

Elementary school is a critical time for learning the foundations of reading, math, and writing skills. I think it would be different if she were older, but I wouldn’t want my daughter to miss that much instruction in elementary school. It’s hard for teachers to catch students up when they miss so she might end up with gaps in her learning if she is expected to miss school every season for gym.
 
I would not let my child skip school for practice. She has missed for travel meets but that is once or twice a year. An average school year is 36 weeks so if she missed a half day for a whole school year, that is the same as missing 18 days of school which is 10% of her school year.

Elementary school is a critical time for learning the foundations of reading, math, and writing skills. I think it would be different if she were older, but I wouldn’t want my daughter to miss that much instruction in elementary school. It’s hard for teachers to catch students up when they miss so she might end up with gaps in her learning if she is expected to miss school every season for gym.
I'm with you 100%. I'm thinking we will just train at 12hrs and miss that days practice. We may do 1 of those practices a month and see how it goes. She is a good student and currently leaves 1 hour early 3 days a week but her teacher has been great and saves art and simple work for the end of the day. Then days when she is ahead of her classmates she gets the opportunity to complete the work she missed. I told her teacher to send it home but my daughter always manages to get it done at school. At the end of the day though I hate that this is even a problem. I feel they shouldn't have to make decisions like this in elementary.
 
That type of arrangement would not even be an option here in NY. They don't make exceptions for that type of thing. You would just have to homeschool if you wanted to miss that much school. I personally would not do it for a lv 4 even if it were an option. She already misses too much for Friday meets.
 
It seems a bit ridiculous of the gym to do this, unless everyone else in the group is homeschooled.

That said, I think far too much emphasis is put on quantity of school time vs. quality. Four hours of classroom time simply does not translate to four hours of learning. Whether a kid can miss that much class or not depends on the kid. If a child is bright and motivated and already a little bit ahead of her class (as it sounds like the case with your child) it seems likely she could make up any missed material perhaps with a little assistance from you during her home time.

The school may not like her missing that much school and it’s possible this schedule could cause social issues. But if my kid was in a very good gymnastics program and she loved gymnastics and was v. good at it, and she was able to keep up with her classmates academically, I would be happy to have her miss class to do gymnastics.
 

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