Boarding schools range from day schools with a handful of boarders to boarding schools with the occasional day pupil. A large number now offer weekly boarding as a half-way house or flexi-boarding, which enables pupils to stay at school on an occasional basis to fit in with their activities or their parents' diaries.

What is on offer varies considerably. Quite obviously there is very much more time to present a full educational programme, including outdoor, sporting, cultural and community activities, than there is at a day school. Good boarding schools capitalise on this; inefficient ones, or those with few boarders, may ignore the weekends and evenings, leaving teenagers at a loose end.

Schools often have a certain number of exeats a term (that is time when pupils can or must leave the school. This can vary from, say, three designated weekends a term (when almost everybody leaves) to exeats any weekend. You will have to decide which is the most appropriate for your family: if you live abroad, your child may be happier at a school that does not empty at weekends, whereas if you live within easy travelling distance of the school, weekly boarding may be attractive.