> In most cases they are not, but you need to have a good relationship with your parents and they need to care enough to bother the school about it. Otherwise, they won’t listen to you, a child.
It's more nuanced than that: there's shades of grey in there, not just black and white.
I had a good relationship with my parents, they cared a great deal about anything related to education and would keep involved with everything academic (even though my parents both never finished school at all, not even primary school). Most kids I was in school with had parents with the same outlook.
Telling my parents that I had broken a school rule would definitely get them involved immediately, but "playing with toys when you are supposed to be learning" is unlikely to win sympathy.[1]
The reason that the schools could hold things until the end of the year (mostly they held them for a week, at worst) was because if you complained to your parent that you were playing with a toy during a time when you were supposed to be learning, the parent with likely confiscate the toy permanently.
At least when the school confiscated it, you eventually got it back.
I imagine, even today, with most parents who care about their kids academic outcomes (surprisingly, quite a few don't), the conversation is likely to go like this:
K: The school confiscated my $TOY today. They aren't giving it back until year-end.
P: Why? Was it switched on/used/making/noise during class?
K: Errr ...
At that point, the kid is now in trouble with both school and parents. Only if the kid is reasonably certain that:
a) The parent doesn't care if they were not attending to the lesson at hand, and
b) The parent will call the school to get the $TOY back,
would the child complain to the parent.
[1] Of course, when I was in school you could take anything to school; you just couldn't play with it until a break in classes. I expect that the outrage now is due to confiscation happening not due to usage, but for simply possession of the toy.
It's more nuanced than that: there's shades of grey in there, not just black and white.
I had a good relationship with my parents, they cared a great deal about anything related to education and would keep involved with everything academic (even though my parents both never finished school at all, not even primary school). Most kids I was in school with had parents with the same outlook.
Telling my parents that I had broken a school rule would definitely get them involved immediately, but "playing with toys when you are supposed to be learning" is unlikely to win sympathy.[1]
The reason that the schools could hold things until the end of the year (mostly they held them for a week, at worst) was because if you complained to your parent that you were playing with a toy during a time when you were supposed to be learning, the parent with likely confiscate the toy permanently.
At least when the school confiscated it, you eventually got it back.
I imagine, even today, with most parents who care about their kids academic outcomes (surprisingly, quite a few don't), the conversation is likely to go like this:
K: The school confiscated my $TOY today. They aren't giving it back until year-end.
P: Why? Was it switched on/used/making/noise during class?
K: Errr ...
At that point, the kid is now in trouble with both school and parents. Only if the kid is reasonably certain that:
a) The parent doesn't care if they were not attending to the lesson at hand, and
b) The parent will call the school to get the $TOY back,
would the child complain to the parent.
[1] Of course, when I was in school you could take anything to school; you just couldn't play with it until a break in classes. I expect that the outrage now is due to confiscation happening not due to usage, but for simply possession of the toy.