Pre reception class can’t work for working parents

They’re graduate led, so each room has a graduate lead. It’s an early years teacher, I don’t know why you’re so shocked. They tend to work in early years settings 😭 it’s not like they’ve hired a geography teacher or something

Will have to be straight from private nursery to reception... not fair ??? Does it matter?

How do you even know which school your child is going to get into at this point?

DS1 has just started reception and didn’t know a single child at the school. It’s honestly fine. He’s made some friends already.

He went to a ‘private nursery’ (I guess? Not attached to a school) and they did loads of school prep, role play etc. Reception teacher came to our house and 2 settling sessions at school before summer holidays, then a week of just mornings at school last week. That’s plenty of help with the transition IMO.

YANBU though, I have no idea how working parents would manage that!

Dd went straight from private nursery to full time school. No issues. Many years back now.

I work in an infant school and we don't have a preschool/nursery attached. Most of our children come straight from private day nurseries. Some have never been to any form of childcare.

Your private daycare has a full-time qualified teacher, and you have no respect for their qualifications because they're easy to obtain...pull the other one!

This really winds me up it's completely incompatible with working parents and school should not be making you feel like your failing in some way by not being able to do it

It honestly doesn't matter. Might make you feel better if you get to know some local mums whose children yours will go to school with, our local primary has a year WhatsApp group and they organise meet ups over summer before they start reception so everyone gets to know each other.

Also look at wrap around care as early as possible. Our school has 90 kids per year group in primary and only a total of 30 spaces at before and after school club so you may need to have some alternatives in mind

Oh right, our nursery does have a qualified early years teacher. Not sure that’s that unusual as it’s not a difficult qualification to gain, our nursery is graduate led anyway

Qualified teaching staff and pedagogical knowledge. One is about education and the other is a childcare business - worlds apart.

@pigeononthegate can you expand on what you mean? What do you think pre-schools attached to a school can offer that private nurseries with pre-schools can’t? Not being goady, just interested in your opinion.

What’s the difference between a school pre school and a nursery preschool then? I mean I know they’re all different (round here school pre schools are crap) but what Is the generalised difference?

I've got two in primary. One went straight to reception from a private nursery. The other went to the pre-school as we were stuck with school holidays etc anyway by then. Both are fine 😁. Do what works best for you.

Local nurseries here call their oldest age group “preschool” and cover the same itinerary but have longer hours.

Being school ready is about developing independence and confidence. Sitting and concentrating for longer periods, following instructions and social skills. Plus developing a good pen grip, recognising numbers and some letters and other things like that

As an Early Years teacher my eyes are rolling so hard they may actually fall out.

OP I would look at getting a childminder to drop off/pick up. Private childcare is in no respect the same as a school nursery/preschool setting.

Schools sometimes run transition periods in June/July for little ones starting school in the Sept. If your little one is due to start school they should contact you with details of these sessions so you could attend them. It’s usually an hour a week for a few weeks. Then they can meet their new friends.

MileyWiley - the child's day in that scenario will have a huge amount of transitions though. Parent to child minder, child minder to pre-school, pre-school to child minder, child minder to parent.

Its up to parents obviously but I personally don't think it's worth putting them through that when a good nursery will get them school ready perfectly well.

My DS will be going from private nursery to starting reception in Sept 2020 as we both work full time so pre-school with its 9-3 hours and term time only wouldn’t work for us at all.
And our preferred primary school doesn’t actually have a pre-school so he won’t be missing out there either.
It is what it is

Private nursery absolutely isn't the same as a school based nursery - not even close. You use a childminder to do pick up and drop off, or find a preschool/ school nursery which does have an after school club/ breakfast club.

Childminder, nanny, family or sharing with other parent via flexible working or reducing hours.

I run a child care setting and we are not attached to a school, we get a lot of parents panicking about school transition and should they move their child to the local school's attached pre -school. Of course they then have the problems you describe, not to mention it doesn't have the best reputation.

Being school ready is about developing independence and confidence. Sitting and concentrating for longer periods, following instructions and social skills. Plus developing a good pen grip, recognising numbers and some letters and other things like that. We do ALL of that, plus we talk about going to school, call a register, have the reception teachers in for a visit. The only thing we don't do that the other pre-school does is to take them to play in the reception class room. It has been reported that all our leavers went into school very confidently this year.

Any good setting will do the same. Parents tend to think that going to pre-school with the children they will be in reception with is hugely important but in my experience they make new friends really quickly and change them like we change our socks.

I am willing to bet that, within a very few weeks, you’d be hard pressed to differentiate the children who have been to pre-school from those who went to a private nursery. It may be true that pre-school has advantages over private nursery provision, but equally the nursery probably has advantages over the pre-school - and I think that all of these will even out pretty swiftly.

You could use an au pair or a nanny. But we didn’t do this because our school didn’t have this. It doesn’t seem to have caused anyone any issues.

Where I live there aren't any preschools attached to schools, and the children joining in Reception seem to do just fine without