Awful Halloween costumes

x-no-archive:yes David desJardins wrote:

Banty writes:
But there are many more parents and children who want the costume
party, so their preferences outweigh yours.

Are you sure? There are many holiday parties and events which occur
only because the perception is that it's expected.
....
But IMO there's no reason to impose on instructional time to begin with.

No, I'm not sure. I think the large majority of parents like this sort
of school activity, but I could be wrong. (Are there a lot of parents
reading this thread who would rather not have Halloween parties in school?)

I didn't particularly care for Halloween parties, especially after the
first couple of kids. It was a drag. Even moreso as a teacher.

I certainly don't think children need even more "instructional time".
My feeling is that the school year is way too long, has too many hours
in it, and constrains families too much (since we can't really pick and

Well the length of the year and the length of the day is pretty much
set as to what the government wants. It would be fine to cut the
school year if all the students were there all the time, and if the
instructional time was not cut into for band trips, or school plays or
children's (or teachers) illness, trips, snow days, vacation, field
trips, etc. etc. The supposed amount of time for instruction isn't as
great as might be assumed from the simple computation of the time.

Every holiday, the day or days before are more of less wasted and
ditto the day after. It's just hard to settle the kids down to work.
How easy is it for you to come back to work and start right in after
vacation?

If it starts snowing during school time, it's hard to keep the kid's
attention on lessons when they might be going home early. If you have
multiple kids out for various activities or because they are sick or
playing hookey you have to repeat stuff that the kids that were there
have already had, so it's a waste of those kids' time.

And if you have a lot of mandated material to cover in addition to the
traditional stuff (teaching nutrition, frugal budgeting, map
recognition skills), then it might be hard to achieve student mastery
in the time available.

choose which days to send our kids to school). But I'd be pretty
pleased if the schools would focus more on instruction, have shorter
hours and fewer days as a result (with the same amount of instruction),
and leave more time for families to do things other than school. (Which
would often be at least as "educational" as school, at least in my
family, although perhaps not in most families.)

So I'd certainly be glad to get things like Halloween parties out of
schools, although perhaps not for the same reasons as you. But I still
think we are both in the minority, and a pretty slim minority at that.

David desJardins

grandma Rosalie

In article , Penny Gaines says...

Banty wrote in :

[snip]
This didn't fly this year because the efforts started much too late (which
to me tips off just how clueful the proponents of this idea are..), but
there is a movement of some parents that the school and town (for
intramurals, team sport
stuff, etc.) all observe a Tuesday Family Evening. The schools are to
arrange no homework, no team sports would be scheduled, scouts and other
common youth
activities would re-schedule Tuesday meetings to another day. So that
families can have one day of the week without homework and other
activities to spend time together as a family.

Let me guess: they chose Tuesday after polling all the families who would
be affected, compared all the conflicting needs, and concluded that
Tuesday evening would have the least detrimental effect on all the families.
When I say "all", I of course mean the five families who came up with this
idea, not the other 550 families in your town, or any of the leaders of the
youth groups.

Not sure actually - it showed up in the local newspaper at one point but without
many specifics - it was a word of mouth thing mostly that first hit me
concerning what night to move the scout meeting to. Then I started hearing
about it in other venues from other people. I may see a more formal effort for
next year starting in a few months. In which case I may spend some effort
opposing it. Or it may fizzle out as the obvious problems are brought up as the
thing starts to flesh out.


Let me predict: in a year or two, the school or social club would
start organising "family fun evenings" on Tuesdays. They might be discos
or games evenings, so that everyone can socialise together, without worrying
that the activities clash with homework or sports activities. Oh, and
whatever is arranged will assume that the child has two parents and one
sibling.

I think it was modelled more on the Family Home Evening that some religious
groups have encouraged. The discussion has been more in terms of what a family
can do at home (believe me - a 'family fun evening' would just end up being a
place where parents drop off the kids!) Where I've encountered it before this
instance, it was put for as something every individual family should do for
family cohesion, arranged within each family. Which actually I think is a great
idea. It's the "everyone does it so it's easy for us to do it" aspect which is
so onerous IMO.

Banty

In article , Rosalie B. wrote:
Well the length of the year and the length of the day is pretty much
set as to what the government wants. It would be fine to cut the
school year if all the students were there all the time, and if the
instructional time was not cut into for band trips, or school plays or
children's (or teachers) illness, trips, snow days, vacation, field
trips, etc. etc. The supposed amount of time for instruction isn't as
great as might be assumed from the simple computation of the time.

The biggest imposition on instruction time at our school seems to be
the 3-times-a-year individual assessment of each student. It seems to
take about 1-2 hours a student, so the teacher is tied up for 60-120
hours a year on the assessment.

Our school does not have band trips, school plays, or snow days.
Field trips happen, but not very often.

--
Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels)
Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed)
Professor of Computer Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
Affiliations for identification only.

In article ,
David desJardins wrote:
Banty writes:
But there are many more parents and children who want the costume
party, so their preferences outweigh yours.

Are you sure? There are many holiday parties and events which occur
only because the perception is that it's expected.
....
But IMO there's no reason to impose on instructional time to begin with.

No, I'm not sure. I think the large majority of parents like this sort
of school activity, but I could be wrong. (Are there a lot of parents
reading this thread who would rather not have Halloween parties in school?)


I don't mind having a party at school, *if* I don't have to help
prepare/finance a separate costume. I'm with Banty on the multiple
costumes though. What a pain. My issue this year is that both of my
big boys' costumes rely on face paint that they can't apply very well
themselves. We avoid masks because they are dangerous and
uncomfortable for trick or treating. They are supposed to bring their
costumes to school this year and put them on "quickly" for their
party. That's not going to work out so well for them. I'd be just
a s happy if they didn't bother. We seem to have lots of outside of
school halloween events to satisfy them. (fwiw, the preschool our
little one goes to does not do halloween or other holiday celebrations
at all -- it really simplifies a lot of things and the kids don't seem
horribly deprived for it)


--Robyn (mommy to Ryan 9/93 and Matthew 6/96 and Evan 3/01)

David desJardins wrote:
No, I'm not sure. I think the large majority of parents like this sort
of school activity, but I could be wrong. (Are there a lot of parents
reading this thread who would rather not have Halloween parties in school?)

I'd rather not have it. It may just be that I'm really lazy, but to
me, the school costume thing (in our school, that's a parade) is more
trouble than it's worth. On Halloween, I have to go to the school
*twice*: once in the a.m. to attend my kindergardener's party (no
costume) and then once in the afternoon to watch the parade (both kids
will be in costume). Though, fortunately, both kids are allowed to be
what they will actually be for Halloween they are not supposed to wear
the costumes to school, so we have to pack 'em up and hope they bring
all the pieces home. The whole thing is a huge PITA, IMO, on the very
day when they're already going to have enormous fun going out
trick-or-treating and getting loads of candy.

Am I the only one who thinks the Halloween celebration has gotten a
bit out of hand? I do love it -- the kids getting dressed up, the
spooky decorations, the old horror movies they put on TV. But it's
almost as big as Christmas now!

In article ,
Nevermind wrote:
(Robyn Kozierok) wrote

I haven't faced this particular issue, but I think I'd let my kid
do this if he wanted to. After all, they're supposed to be
something "scary" (at least, that's how many kids view Halloween)
and not something they aspire to be IRL. My 7yo is going as "the
devil" -- not any nicer a guy than Freddie... I haven't seen what
a "Freddie mask" looks like (nor have I seen any of the movies),
but maybe you need to clarify for yourself what you think is wrong
with him being Freddie as opposed to a devil, or a monster, or a
skeleton, or a vampire, etc.... (assuming you wouldn't have the
same reaction to those more "traditional" costume ideas).

Well, I'm sure that at one time in history, vampires and "the devil"
and the like represented real evil to people, but I don't think they
do for most of us these days. However, the movie serial killers, like
Jason and Freddie, do,

Well, no, not to me they don't. They're fictional characters, like
all the rest.

I think maybe your issue is that devils and vampires etc. seem to fall
squarely into the realm of fantasy, whereas a human serial killer
"could" be real, even though these particular examples aren't.

Anyhow, I'm glad the issue resolved itself to your satisfaction...

--Robyn (mommy to Ryan 9/93 and Matthew 6/96 and Evan 3/01)

In article , Robyn Kozierok says...


Well, I'm sure that at one time in history, vampires and "the devil"
and the like represented real evil to people, but I don't think they
do for most of us these days. However, the movie serial killers, like
Jason and Freddie, do,

Well, no, not to me they don't. They're fictional characters, like
all the rest.

I think maybe your issue is that devils and vampires etc. seem to fall
squarely into the realm of fantasy, whereas a human serial killer
"could" be real, even though these particular examples aren't.


That makes sense, thanks.

That was a head-scratcher for me, too - devils and vampires no-big-deal but
Jason and Freddy bad-bad-bad - - huh?

The "what's OK for school Halloween" thing really comes down to perception and
to some extent taste. Even the gentler requirement that costumes not scare the
bejeezers out of the poor Kindergarteners is pretty fuzzy. For example - it's
common for little kids to be terrified of clowns. But I doubt many parents
would stop their kids from being a clown for school Halloween.

OK Freddy's violent. It G.I. Joe violent? If so, how about a cop uniform?
Deer hunter's camo gear? How about as a parent I came in my Amazon getup -
better leave the spear at home? Or not? Is the school a 'zero-tolerance'
school? Would I then be suspended from all the Open House evenings? Say now,
that's an idea..... ;-)

Banty

In article ,
Banty wrote:

The gory scary masks are usually bought ones. Would you buy one?

Just curious..

We avoid masks for trick-or-treating. I also avoid spending much
money on Halloween costumes, other than generic reusable items.
(That is, I will buy a sweatsuit in an appropriate color, but not
a prefab costume.) I help my boys make costumes inexpensively,
and will buy cheap face paints and accessories.

If one of my boys wanted to buy a (presumably fairly expensive)
gory scary halloween mask, for use at our indoor functions, he'd
have to pay for it himself, but I wouldn't disallow it (unless
it was something I considered truly inappropriate, of which I
can't think of an example right now but I'm sure there are some...).
I would still be willing to help him make the rest of a coordinating
costume. (I made Matthew split the cost of his bought devil's
pitchfork with me this year, as I felt we could have easily made
one.)

--Robyn

In article , Banty wrote:
The "what's OK for school Halloween" thing really comes down to perception and
to some extent taste. Even the gentler requirement that costumes not scare the
bejeezers out of the poor Kindergarteners is pretty fuzzy. For example - it's
common for little kids to be terrified of clowns. But I doubt many parents
would stop their kids from being a clown for school Halloween.

OK Freddy's violent. It G.I. Joe violent? If so, how about a cop uniform?
Deer hunter's camo gear? How about as a parent I came in my Amazon getup -
better leave the spear at home? Or not? Is the school a 'zero-tolerance'
school? Would I then be suspended from all the Open House evenings? Say now,
that's an idea..... ;-)


The rule at our school is fairly simple: no blood, no graphic
depiction of violence.

There was not a ban on weapons, so a (non-functional) sword or spear
would be acceptable, unless it was decorated with blood. Similarly
hunter's garb, police uniform, military uniform, ... would be
acceptable, but not a bloody deer, a murder victim, or "collateral
damage".




--
Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels)
Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed)
Professor of Computer Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
Affiliations for identification only.

In article , Robyn Kozierok says...

In article ,
Banty wrote:

The gory scary masks are usually bought ones. Would you buy one?

Just curious..

We avoid masks for trick-or-treating. I also avoid spending much
money on Halloween costumes, other than generic reusable items.
(That is, I will buy a sweatsuit in an appropriate color, but not
a prefab costume.) I help my boys make costumes inexpensively,
and will buy cheap face paints and accessories.


For me, time is the biggest factor - I'll purchase rather than make, even though
I could sew just about anything.
Although I've gotten away with only buying one mask - a screeeum one (my son
isn't always for originality). Oh yeah, a football-head.

But masks do have problems. Visibility, comfort. Expense.

If one of my boys wanted to buy a (presumably fairly expensive)
gory scary halloween mask, for use at our indoor functions, he'd
have to pay for it himself, but I wouldn't disallow it (unless
it was something I considered truly inappropriate, of which I
can't think of an example right now but I'm sure there are some...).
I would still be willing to help him make the rest of a coordinating
costume. (I made Matthew split the cost of his bought devil's
pitchfork with me this year, as I felt we could have easily made
one.)

This year's idea of being South Park Kenny meant getting a pretty good orange
sweatshirt, which my son started wearing for cold days. And a bright orange
thingy for Halloween isn't a bad idea anyway :-)

Banty