Children across the West Midlands will be in school for as few as four days over a four-week period during April and May due to a series of holidays and special events.

A combination of Easter, the Royal Wedding, May Day, local elections and teacher training days will create a bumper holiday for pupils and teachers — and a major headache for parents.

Easter holidays start on April 11 and some pupils, including those in Wolverhampton and Walsall, do not return to school until April 27 — two days after Easter Monday.

There will then only by two days of lessons before schools take another day off for the Royal Wedding on Friday April 29.

Then it’s back for just two days for some the week after, with May Day on May 2, schools closing to become polling stations for the local elections on Thursday May 5 and then some schools taking Friday May 6 off as a teacher training day.

Lobby group Mothers Who Work, which provides information and advice to working mums, said that the days off will put parents through unnecessary stress.

There are also fears it could affect pupils’ learning in the run up to exams.

Joycellyn Akuffo, of Mothers Who Work, said: “The school calendar is hard enough for working parents without having these extra holiday headaches.

“It’s a difficult position for parents to be in. It’s three days here, two days there and then three days here again. Parents can’t take that much time off work.”

She also said childcare could be “very costly”.

One parent who isn’t looking forward to next month is mother-of-four Denise Bona, aged 45, of Julian Road, Deansfield, Wolverhampton.

Mrs Bona’s younger children Amy, eight and Nathan, seven, go to East Park Primary, but older son James, 12, attends Deansfield Community School.

“I already have to work nights and my husband works days to look after the children,” said taxi firm worker Mrs Bona. “I simply can’t afford childcare.”

Wolverhampton City Council spokesman Paul Brown said: “For 2010/11 and 2011/12 the standard school year has been reduced by one day for the additional bank holidays for the Royal Wedding and the Queen’s Jubilee respectively.”