To not understand why children start school so young in the UK

[Alisvolatpropiis]

Just that really. In lots of countries children don't start school properly until 6 or 7 whereas in the UK it is 4 or 5, depending on where in the school year their birthday falls. I know some in the SW Valleys area who have started school (not nursery) at 3.

Britain doesn't appear to be topping education charts from what I can tell so what is the benefit?

School isn't mandatory, you can choose to home school if you disagree with the current system.

Well, sure. But I disagree with 4 year olds being in "formal education" full stop. I'd have to submit paperwork and presumably document that I was actually homeschooling them.

But the point is academic, mine are older now.

"So, no, I disagree that children start school early because school is a good alternative to other child care solutions."

But you have to pay mega for private day care with wrap around care and open all year round. School is free and is when many parents start getting back into some kind of work.

I started school at 4 years and a month, I was so little I couldn't touch the floor with my feet even on the tiny reception chairs. I was really not ready socially or academically.

I think a big problem in the uk is that childcare is so pricy and the people working in nurseries are often quite young and not highly qualified.

My ds will start school at 7, he will be the youngest in the year and they send out specialists to asses if the children born in November and December (those who will be the youngest) are ready to start school, if they are not happy or not ready to start school they start a year later.

My ds is already in what is called preschool with a teacher who has trained for 3.5 years and he's only 1, he'll stay there until he's 7. I see the older children running around, making fires once a week to cook their lunch on, ice skating and sledging in the winter and I'm so relieved he won't have to start school at 4 like I did.

I have thought about this a lot - my DD is at a Steiner school, so she won't be starting formal education until she is 6/7 anyway.

She does go to Kindergarten every morning, and has begun asking to stay for afternoons too. Some of her Kindergarten friends don't want to be at school all the time. There is a flexibility which allows the parents and school to respond to the child's need, rather than forcing the child to fit.

I'm quite sure some children are ready and thriving under early years education, but I'm also sure there are others that would be better served by a more gradual approach. Unfortunately there is not the funding to do that in the UK.

I wish that there was more flexibility. Dd1 would have benefitted from starting later, although she was 4.5 when she started it was a huge shock to her system. Dd2 was the same age but was ready to start when she did. Ds has just started, he's nearly 5 and would have quite happily started last September and has achieved most of his yr R and some yr1 goals. All children are different and hopefully the children who would benefit from delaying would be evened out by the MN genius children!

Forcing the learning of reading and writing on children who are not yet ready puts some of those children off reading for life. No one was ever damaged by having to wait a bit. We should wait until at least year one, ideally year two before starting to teach reading. Scandinavian countries, France, Germany etc have higher literacy rates than we do. All of these countries start later.

BUT in lots of places (including Denmark) children are in Nursery from a very young age (96% of children 3-5 attend a pre-school).
How formal the learning is does vary - but for instance in Wales the curriculum is play based I believe.

Of course in England politicians like a "rigorous" and "testing" curriculum, and often don't value "play". Which is an issue.

We did see a lot of flexibility in the Netherlands.

The first class was mixed Yr1/2. This allowed the children to progress through that class much more at their own pace. The school also seemed quite happy to hold back those children who werent ready to move on to the next year. My DS was held back as he was the youngest in his 'correct' year and not ready to move up.

A friend of DD1 was held back to repeat year 3. She had always looked out of place in her 'correct' year. Too small, too physically immature. When we saw her with her new year group she fitted right in.

In the UK I think that the age based testing (rather than year testing) forces schools to be rigid when as parents we know that children develop at different paces from each other.

Not in the UK, but mine all started at 5 1/2, some of the children in their classes would have just turned 4. Mine are older now and being amongst the oldest in the class has always been an advantage, academically and socially, while the younger ones always struggled.

I'm from a country where we start school at 7. We get great results at PISA tests.
But - from 7, you will start proper, serious school. You will be sitting at your desk and learning, there's no learning through playing, story times etc. And while it's not mandatory, almost all children go to pre-school from the age of 3, that also has a curriculum and will teach reading, writing, maths etc. So it's actually not that different.

I'm in England and our nursery provision is fulltime throughout the LEA. Always has been. My dd turned 3 less than 2 weeks ago and started full time school last week. School uniform, school dinners, spanish lessons, PE, school trips etc. She loves it so far. I don't see the difference between this and full time private nursery

Flexibility would be good. When my youngest started reception he was just turned 4. You had a choice of half days or full days till after Christmas - don't think they offer that option now. 4 is very young to force full time education - some children just aren't ready.

In my experience, Reception is not particularly formal. In our school Reception is part of a separate Foundation Stage School so it doesn't even feel as if they're starting school -- they're still not wearing uniform, learning largely through play, and mixing with children of nursery and pre-school age. They start school proper, with uniforms and desks and formal learning, in Year 1. It seems to have been just right for my two.

Your friends who are starting school at 3 are not in 'formal' education' but FS1 nursery classes that are attached to the main primary school. in my experience school-based nurseries are infinitely better than private nurseries, because the teachers are fully qualified primary educationalists, unlike private nurseries, where the capability and motivation of the carers is highly patchy.

In our area, FS1 is optional (and places are like gold dust) FS2 (also called Reception) is the first compulsory year, which is for the year children turn 5 in. There isnt a huge difference in the classroom setting between the two in our school, both FS1 and 2 are laid out like nursery, with masses of toys, age appropriate playground etc. The proper, table-based school room is not until Y1 (age 6).

I'd be interested to know what these Scandinavian preschools are like, I suspect not all that different to our FS1-2 system

I used to think this too but my DD really enjoyed reception and learnt a tremendous amount she was only 4.25 when she started. The lots of play aspect of it was great with some reading, writing and numbers added into the mix. My DS is starting next week (late I know) and he'll be 4.5 and is really looking forward to it. I think he's well ready for reception which is fairly informal. I'm going to miss him but that's not the same as him not being ready to go.

Just to add, our area = London

I think 4 is too young. Ds started school in UK and on numerous occasions he fell asleep at school. Now we are no longer in UK and schooling starts in January the year that the child turns 7. For those children turning 7 in Nov or Dec then they can start the following year and repeat a year at preschool. My dd started schooling at age 6.5 and by age 7, both she and ds were at the same levels of reading, math etc, so I cannot see the point of making them start so much sooner. Dd spent her years of age 4 and 5 playing all day, no formalities that ds had with school uniform, set start and end times for school etc. Ds has had a lot of emotional issues, seperation anxiety, school anxieties etc since then and I honestly feel it is due to him going way too young. Some 4 year olds cope really well, but some don't.

I believe the answer is basically, that once upon a time, people expressed concern about the educational level of school leavers. They decided the problem would be solved by offering the opportunity to start school earlier. And then earlier. And then earlier.

And so now, although education is still only compulsory the term after a child turns five, you will experience lots of social pressure to do pre-school and then reception before year 1, and people feel very worried their child will be held back if s/he doesn't do pre-school and reception.

Oh, and I await the first picture of a 18 month old in a polyester logoed school sweatshirt. I give it 15 years.

I used to think it was better that they started later but I see now the stark difference between a German kindergarten (very close to a British preschool or nursery with much more outside play, not really any formal learning at all, no reading, writing or maths) and a German primary school (sitting down at desks working from age 6, writing short essays in the first class) and I have a wistfulness for the slower integration of the British system.

What I don't like is the fact that 4, 5 year old children are expected to be in school for 6 hours a day every day and there are penalties for taking them out. I think that's too much and I like the freedom of being able to give DS a day off if he's too tired (which in reality has happened about once in the last year).

Most countries which have a later school start have preschool programs or daycare that is used almost universally.

In Japan, compulsory school starts at six. But the vast majority of kids go to kindergarten or daycare before that. Trouble is, while kindergarten teaches the beginnings of literacy, daycare usually doesn't, so daycare kids start school lagging behind unless their parents take them to weekend classes, get tutors or teach them themselves (which not everyone is able to do--not everyone is good at teaching their own child or can afford private tutoring). It's actually unfair, and they are talking about changing the system because of this.

If they raised the mandatory school age to 6 or 7 in a country like the UK (which is class-ridden AND has a lot of families where English is not spoken at home), I can tell you what would happen: all the middle class parents would make sure their kids were reading by the time they started school anyway, while the kids from the deprived backgrounds would not and would start school about two years behind in terms of reading and maths--and some of them would still not be speaking very good English and would be even further behind.

You would have no alternative other than to introduce streaming and separate classes from age 7. It would hugely increase social inequality in this country, which is already bad enough.

See also: Don't Use Finland as a Case Against Early and Baby Reading

learnthingsweb.hubpages.com/hub/Dont-Use-Finland-as-a-Case-Against-Early-and-Baby-Reading

No one has to send their DC to school at 4. Or indeed at any age .

If you feel very strongly then why send them?

It's true Tilly, my stepmum was urging me when DS was about 18 months to send him to (private) nursery because "then he will be more prepared when he starts nursery!" I laughed about it privately because I thought, well, nursery is already a preparation for school! Next they'll be saying to send them on a taster day for university at birth because it will magically prepare them.

I thought that he would probably be ready for nursery by the time he was 3 and he was.

The official age to start primary school in Japan is the April after your 6th birthday, so a lot of children are nearly seven, and Japan usually comes out way ahead of the UK in educational league tables.

BUT it is much the same as in Hazlenutt's example - nearly all children go to kindergarten from age 3, and by age 4 or 5 a lot of the kindergarten activities are very similar to what they would be doing in reception class in the UK - it is just that they are not doing it in a building called a 'school'.

Many kindergarten-age Japanese children also attend cram schools and extra classes, or are made to do workbooks etc at home by their mothers, in order to pass entrance tests for primary school or just to get and stay ahead in a fiercely competitive education system. DS went to a fairly relaxed Japanese kindergarten, where most of the day was spent in outdoor play or craft activities, but nearly all his classmates were being taught to read at home by their mothers, and some were going to English classes, abacus classes, Kumon-style maths and so on.

So it might sound lovely and relaxed to have a school starting age of 6 or 7, but the reality is not quite as you might imagine.

I think perhaps we are lucky (?) but in DS' s school Reception looks more like a nursery than school really. Loads of toys, amazing outdoor play area just for the little ones, learning through play etc etc.

I used to think that it was too early to start school, but now it just seems like a continuation of preschool tbh. DS will be almost 6 when he starts slightly more formal school in year 1, which feels about right to me.