3princes+1princess said:
I respectfully disagree. I am pulling my son out and he will be missing a jazz band concert. This may or may not affect him getting in to the honors jazz band or his placement in the band. But I DON'T CARE (however, I did try to plan around the thing I thought would cause the least disruption)......and to say that we are less of moms because of that I disagree. I think I am a great mom that realizes these things our kids in school are NOT their lives. This is not going to make or break their careers, unless you truly believe your child will be playing pro ball! Life is short, and you never ever know what will happen tomorrow and family bonding time through vacation means more to me than one silly game/performance. And to say that they should join doesn't make sense to me, because I believe the practice is more important than the short performance time and learning is important no matter what happens in the end.
Kids these days have activity after activity with no time for family or to be a kid. There has to be a break, and if it works for the family to take time to spend time together, even if the kids have to miss a competition, then so be it. I wonder which they will remember 20 years from now. Something tells me it will be the vacation.
Actually, you read into that...I never said anyone was less of a mom, but now I will say this:
I believe it wholeheartedly and am not trying to be mean, but pulling a kid out of a sport like football or any other team setting during the season kind of does make one a bad mom (or dad) in the regard of commitment and follow-through, in my opinion, becuase if you are *that* mom (not specifically YOU, just a mom in general), its your kid that is hurting the team, not just making their own life hard with missing schoolwork. You sign a kid up, you are responsible as much as the kid for making sure they get there. My boys have played football for years now and DD cheers, and never once in the past 8 years have we taken a vacation between the last week of july through november. Not because I think my kid will be the next Jarrod Allen, but because there are 30 other kids depending on him to be *their* defensive end. Parents of real football players, and by "real", I mean kids who take their commitment seriously, understand this and would never plan a vacation during the season because they know what it would do to the team if their kid was gone. Depending on many positions, too, a key absence would even increase the liklihood of injury to someone else since football players have to work so closely in unison to protect each other. You throw a new center or guard or tackle in there that doesnt know what they are doing, and someone (like the QB or running back) is going to get hurt.
I don't know how much other kids depend on your kid in jazz band, but I can tell you right now, if i were the leader of the band, I would not have warm and fuzzy feelings toward you or your kid. As a cheerleading coach, it is really irritating when girls who knew up front about the commitment they were making, don't show up for practice and their whole stunt group has to sit out because one girls mom decided that her daughters life/vacation/activity was more important. And like football, we can't just fill someone else in a cheer routine. We would write a girl out of the routine altogether if she told us she can't come to a competition, which would then make it silly...yes, silly, to join in the first place since she would be sitting around for most of the 2 hour, 3-5 days a week practices.
Obviously we disagree on this. My opinion will always be: sports and activities are not mandatory. If you can't/won't/don't get with the program, don't sign up. Stick to individual sports or activities if your child or you dont feel you can commit to a team for the season. There are plenty of activities out there for kids whose parents "DON'T CARE" about anything other than their family vacation. On a team, the goal *is* the game/performance/etc, not the practice. A parent should care about that if they decide to put their kid on the team or in a group activity.
Eta: football/cheer *is* family time for us. We love the atmosphere and camaraderie of our league and commit as a family and play/coach as a family. So, if one of my kids were to miss a game or competition, they would remember it. And, my kids are asked at registration time Every Single Year if they would like to sign up again or if they want to try something else. it's their choice. But once that choice is made, it's 100% commitment. That's how we roll
