In your child’s class, how many siblings do most children have?

[Allswellthatendswelll]

Based on something I read about how the birth rate crunch is actually a lot to do with smaller families not childfree people:

In your child's class what's the main number of siblings? I totted up for my reception child and it was about 22 kids were one of two, 3 only children and 5 as one of 3. Having two kids seems very much the norm. Obviously it's reception so there could be more siblings later. We are home counties, reasonably affluent.

No idea but of my close friends, most have 1 dc. One is intentionally childless, one has 2 and one has three but the last two are twins.

Very few people can afford to have large families.

DS is in secondary now but when he was in reception it was a bulge year and our village infants was oversubscribed and we didn’t get in as we live too far out - we had to go to the next village which was also oversubscribed but we managed to squeeze in.

Both those schools are now hugely undersubscribed: our village infants, rated OFSTED Excellent and once hugely desirable now only has 12 children reception and numbers are going to be even worse in September. The infants in the next village (which he went to), which a few years ago had plans to expand into a full primary (YR-Y7), has 16 in reception where it once had 90.

People have simply stopped having children.

I wouldn’t know the exact numbers, however there’s quite a lot of children who are only children (at least 10 out of 30, that I know of) which surprised me. My child is in year 1 (Covid babies) and a lot of these parents do not want any other children.

Dd1 (11) most are only children
Dd2 (6) most are pairs of siblings. She's in a 3 form entry school and they have 4 sets of twins!

On average about .5 - quite a few only children, some have one sibling. Can only think of one who has multiple siblings.

Am not sure about this one. Of the families I know with 3+ children, it doesn’t seem to be related to money.

I have no idea for most of the class, but the families and friends we have are mostly 1-2 children. I have one friend who had 4 (her daughter died as a baby so 3 now), another friend has 3, and a handful of families at the school who I see on the school run with 3/4 children. Have never seen more than 4.

There's a real mix in DD's class. Mostly no siblings, one or two but there is a bigger family so he has 4 siblings, and a couple of blended families with more siblings but not sure how many are half, full or step.

3 is most common. Then 2. There’s a few 4s. Only 1 1.
He’s in year 4

I know one 3 child family where the last child was an accident and another where, while I don't know the financial situation, they have a big home. I do know a few people who said that they would have liked a third but didn't for financial reasons.

We have 4 kids. When our eldest (now a teenager) was in primary school, there were 5 kids in her class with 3+ siblings. I only know that because they were learning about graphs by the way! 📊 📈 The numbers are much lower in my youngest's class. Lots of much larger age gaps (4 or 5 years vs 2 years in my eldest's cohort) and quite a few onlies. The most common number is 2 kids, and I don't actually know anyone who is child-free by choice. Self-selecting perhaps as I had a decade of baby- and toddler-hood...

We are a working class community and lots of people (the absolute vast majority) have local family. A 3 bed semi can still be bought easily for about £175k. I think we are somewhat behind the curve in larger, "cooler" cities, but a change is happening I think.

Depends on the age of the children. Being an only child at the age of 5 is irrelevant. In 10 years time it could be that the child’s father has had 2 more children to other women.
In my line of work I see many fathers who have fathered children with multiple women. There seems to be a large group of women having children with older men who have already fathered children.
So a trend for half siblings/step siblings/blended families.
As far as I am aware the percentage of women aged 45 who remain childfree has not changed. 45 seems too low an age to measure this on as some women do go on to have children later than 45.
There is definitely a trend in older fathers. What the outcome of this will be only time will tell. On a personal level, I can’t see it being a bed of roses having to deal with an older father whilst still working full time and probably having your own children to look after.

It’s funny because I get what you’re saying, among middle class they seem to be limiting numbers as they can’t afford it, yet it’s still very common to have 3/4 in working class areas where they don’t have much money.

Vast majority of my kids classmates have one sibling. Out of all of close friends only two have three kids, one has five (includes multiples). I have several friends with one child, only one by choice - lots had fertility issues. No fertility issues here, but finances alongside our age dictated our choice to stop at two. I would have loved four!

Ours is an even split of 1 or 2 siblings. 1 set of twins have twin siblings and 1 only child. Ours is a affluent village school.
I think in the school my older DC went to kids had fewer siblings.

I think when you've grown up middle class you think of things like own bedrooms or annual foreign holidays as a base requirement rather than nice to haves. I think it's really hard for people to come to terms with a lifestyle that's less than what you grew up with and I suspect that's at least part of our issues with the birth rate.

My younger child, born 2017, has a lot of children from three child families in his class. There are no only children and 40% of the class is from a three child family.

Casting my mind back to my eldest teen DDs primary class parents at least 9 had 3 or more children, and there were no only children. She's nearly 17 now, her year group were all born 2008/9 so during that financial crisis.

Absolutely no idea

Definitely, makes total sense. Plus starting later, no help from benefits etc

My son is in Year 5 and is definitely an outlier as an only child.

The majority have 1-2 siblings, several have 3-4 siblings and then my son and one other are only children.

further to my first message my dd was in a class of 9 and they were
4 one of 2 siblings
5 one of 3 siblings

small rural village school in a well off area.

Year 1 class of 30. 5 only children, 2 families with 3 kids and the rest have 2 children. SW London. Probably be regarded as affluent if we’re adding descriptors. Definitely fewer 3+ children families than PP’s have described

I think there will be variability by school.

My niece is the same age as my son and was apparently one of only 2 children in her class not to be an only child. Whereas in my son's class, most had 1 sibling a few had more than 2 and there was only the odd child or two that had none.
She went to a private school which I suspect might be some of the reason; there are definitely certain societal groups that are choosing to stick with 1 child these days.

There are sixteen children in DS’s class.

I know there are definitely four only children. Most of the rest have one sibling but there is one with three children (so two siblings) and DS’s best friend’s mum has a younger boy and is also pregnant so she’ll soon have another.

My close friends all only have one. Life is a lot calmer for them and I had struggled with that comparison. I think part of that is a feeling of being out of sync though; I’m in toddlerland still while they left it over two years ago really.

Primary school, I don’t know every family but the total number of children in the families I know are

4 2 4 4 3 3 4 2 3 3 1 3 1 5

So average 3, 1 child is rare and usually you can tell there is a particular reason for it eg in DD class above one of the only child’s parents separated when she was a baby. The other I don’t know much at all.

The year below has an only child and the Mum was open about having IVF before her getting pregnant (without IVF) but at an older age.