Reception

[Mbl1234]

An only child going into reception this year.
Just got an email from the school that the school year for the reception class starts on 10th September and then the kids will have a few hours a day at school until the end of September. Is this normal?

Yes it's normal for our school. My daughter did a week of mornings, then went til 1pm and stayed for lunch, then after 2 weeks started full time. She already went full time to the schools nursery so she was more than ready!

It is normal, but you can also request a full time place from the start, and the more parents who do this, the more likely school are to offer it from the beginning. The vast majority children do completely fine with full time hours.

Lots of schools do this because they think it helps to settle the children. Legally, however, your child is entitled to a full-time place from the start of term, so if it's for an unreasonable length of time you can insist they attend. A school close to me used to make the summer-born children attend part time for the whole term until a parent contacted the Local Authority.

I'm a KS1 teacher and have two primary-aged kids. In my experience, anything longer than a week, or maximum 2 weeks, really isn't necessary for most kids and separate arrangements can be made for those that genuinely need the extended part-time attendance.

It can be difficult to be the only parent raising the issue, so if you know any other parents with children starting, you could see what they think.

Yes, it took 3 weeks to finally get to a full day!

Pretty certain both mine went full-time from the start (and one was only just 4). They were knackered (snack on the way home, early dinner and earlier to bed for a while), but they settled quickly.

I now TA in that same class and a minority of children just go for mornings by the parental request. Some hadn't dropped their nap in the last intake. But the teacher here prefers to have them all day from the off.

Thank you everyone. My daughter already attends preschool until 2 pm everyday and I don’t a single child around here who is not attending preschool. They are all used to being away for half/full day. We both work so this will be fun...

I don’t know...

Alot of children will have attended nursey and preschools for fairly long days. However they are being placed in a new situation ,new building ,unfamiliar adults, new rules, classmates they dont know ,a new routine. Even as adults we feel uncertain when we start a new job and tired at the end of the day because we have to take in so much new information.
That is why many schools take it slowly. It makes it so much easier for the children to settle. They are still so young.

I have heard it happens but at our school they have a few half day sessions in July (happening this year). They start on normal school hours from day one.

Yes it's completely normal to do many weeks of part days as 'settling in'.

DS was like 'erm why am I going home already?' as he was used to being in nursery 8am-6pm some days 😂

It's a PITA for working parents and I think probably a bit unsettling for the kids too.

I requested 3 weeks parental leave (you have the statutory right to request this- but sadly it's unpaid!) as I couldn't manage it with working too.

Ours faffs about with teacher and TA “home visits” for several days at start of term so they don’t even start until a week to ten days late, then half class/alternate days for a bit, then two weeks part time, so it take pretty much until the end of September. I’m a total cynic, but i have suspicions that the real reason why is so the TAs etc from that class can be deployed elsewhere for a few afternoons firefighting at the start of the year for all the other children and the reception teacher gets some extra preparation time. It’s hardly necessary for the reception children - three quarters of my oldest’s class had been in the nursery a few yards down the hallway. They’d been in their new classroom dozens of time, knew all the staff, half of them already did 30 hours and had lunch there - they really didn’t need a “home visit” from someone they saw regularly anyway and several confusing weeks of piecemeal sessions. It could all have been done in the first week, with any parent who wanted to allowed to request part time if they wanted after that. From conversation at the gate I don’t think anyone would.

We then spent the rest of the year being lectured about how every moment at school counts...