to think if my 4 year old wants me to take him to his classroom that shouldnt be a problem?

[firefly78]

he's 4 for goodness sake. he loves school and if he wants me to take him to his classroom door rather than go all the way in on his own i dont see why that's an issue. Teacher shouted over to him today saying "come on ds otherwise mummy will have to leave you at the gate". Its irrationally upset me. silly I know but i think they are still so little. Hes coped brilliantly with school, loves reading etc and we have just had a great report. he has an older sibling at school who runs in happily. Oh amd im most definitely not the only parent who does this. He ran in happily before half term cos they got a sticker but dont know so he doesn't see the point! i just think they are still little and i dont know why school tries to make them grow up so fast!!!

Two

I don't know what is the best age to start school. But given the vast majority of 4 year olds used to be able to do those kinds of things, I suspect changing the starting age for school to 7, would just mean some children would be struggling instead to learn them for 7.

Many places where you don't start school until 7, virtually all children do go to a kindergarten. So it isn't as if they are at home with their family instead.

Delta that sounds amazing. My DS started school this year and I'm struggling with the difference between nursery and school. I loved that the nursery class was open and we had access to the teacher. DS used to love showing me what he had done everyday. Now it's like a secret society!! Teachers barely make eye contact when they drop the kids in the playground, in case a parent...shudder...speaks to them.

YAB a bit U, but I can certainly sympathise :)

I was glad when our school stopped the 60 reception parents all pile in with the kids, it used to be an absolute pain, confined space and 120 people

This with bells on. They've stopped it at our school because parents carried on doing well into KS2. And of course, there's always that parent who thinks it doesn't apply to them.

As a teacher I used to find it frustrating and difficult when parents brought their children into the classroom. Quite often they were the very same parents who would then want a little impromptu 'chat' about DC's progress/ argument in the playground/ school bingo night in the middle of the class full of children! I know this is not you OP but it used to be so awkward that I can understand a blanket rule on no parents

Although this was Primary aged children so not quite the same!

It's not strictly true that they start at 5 in scotland. Both mine under 5 when they started. The age range in primary 1 is 4 and a half to 5 and a half (for children who were deferred).

it's tricky because kids are different. My kids would have been way over by 7 and where are they for that 3 years? I need to work so childcare costs would be astronomical. All 3 of mine were ready and relatively smooth transitions into school which I appreciate is maybe just lucky.
I can understand anxious kids being a real worry as a parent. I guess if you're unhappy with the school rules it's home school or move them. But I don't think 4 is too young at all. Or certainly not with the way it has been managed in my area...
OP maybe treats at home like stickers or him bringing home what he has done to show you would be good?

Bollocks to that. He's my child, if I want to stay all day I will!

Good luck with that, Athrawes. Schools are perfectly entitled to say that adults can't come in, after all it's their premises and they have a safeguarding duty to other children. If you insist on staying when they are asking you not to, in the final analysis they can ban you. Of course they don't, they generally aim to wean parents off gently, but ultimately it's in the children's interests to learn independence.

its a tiny village very family friendly school. 16 reception children in his class. The teacher is always sat down doesn't get up to greet the kids. He loves his male TA who is normally at the door but wasnt this morning. he seems to do more of the handover. maybe i will do a sticker chart at home for going in on his own.

Yes sometimes it is best and sometimes it isn't! I agree, but the OP has already said that her DS is capable of going in on his own, as he had done in the past. So he can do it, he just doesn't want to. Allowing her to the go to the classroom is a backwards step.

At our primary, there are two gates, one we are allowed to go through, the second leads to the playground and only children are allowed through. After the first couple of weeks of reception, all children are expected to leave their parents at the second gate and go to play in the playground until the bell rings, when they line up to into school.

If the child is reluctant to leave at the gate, the teacher on playground duty will come and collect them and take them to the classroom. They are alway very kind about it, but allowing the parent to the classroom wouldn't make a difference, the child still has to say goodbye at some point.

We could never take the kids into their classrooms, not even on their first day in reception. Things worked for us as it's a large primary school with 60 / 90 children per year so it would cause havoc if every patent had wanted to take their little darlings into the classroom!

DS1 cried every day for the first couple of weeks at school and um so glad this wasn't prolonged by us having to go with them into school. The teacher would come out, peel the upset kids from their patents and the school day would begin. Much better IMO.

I started school at 4 and a half in Scotland. I was not the youngest in my class.

At Dts school they have a 'guardian' in year 6. We leave them at the gate and the guardians take them in. Makes sense to me.

keeptrudging my ds started at 4 (and a bit) in Scotland and I knew he was too young.
I was told we had 'no choice'.
Our school is not secure, either.

The cut off is the end of February in Scotland so the youngest you would start is around 4 and a half unless a child was sent early. Certainly don't start just after your 4th birthday like they can in England..

January and February birthdays can defer for 1 year automatically but you may need to have a strong case to defer for birthdays before that. (Scotland)

Demented, my own daughter started before she was 5 (in Scotland), but generally children are 5 (or nearly), and if they're not ready (if under 5) they can defer. They're also starting school having had 2 years of nursery rather than 1 then reception, so are perhaps more ready.

boredof I really LOVE that idea! Am shamelessly going to steal it for our school

Our primary also uses a buddy system for the new starts. Primary 7 children are buddied up with the new primary 1 children so they have a named child to look after them in the first few weeks

In response to IceBeing's post on the previous page...where I live, children don't start formal education until they are 6, sometimes nearer 7.

BUT, prior to that they have ALL done 3 years of full time nursery (generally from 8-ish to 3-ish) and will be able to read and write before they start school. That's why they start later. The learning they do is exactly the same at each age group, it's just that it's done in a different place. The nursery isn't obligatory, but obviously there isn't anyone who doesn't do it, otherwise their children would be seriously behind when they did begin full time "proper" school.

And parents weren't allowed to hang around at nursery either. So in many of these "civilised" countries, the education system is actually far more rigid than any UK school not wanting mithering mammies in its corridors.

Scotland is a bit more flexible. Children can start at 4 1/2 but if children are at the younger end (i.e. they are born in January or February) they have the absolute right to defer and will usually be entitled to further nursery funding. If the child was born in December they can still defer but will need to prove that deferring would be beneficial. In my son's class there will be a child who turns 6 in December and a child who doesn't turn 5 until February. But this was the parents' choice.

This is one of the reasons why I love my dd's school so much. Dd2 is in yr 1 and parents are allowed into the classroom for the first 15 minutes of the day, everyday (and was the same in Reception). It doesn't cause a problem, yes it's crowded and busy by the coat pegs but not so much that it's a problem. My dd loves showing me what she's been up to in school and pointing our her work up on the wall. There was never any problem with her settling in, and she has plenty of independence. I don't go in everyday as I'm often rushing off to work but it is nice to go in a couple of times a week.

My dd1 is in yr 6 and we are allowed in her classroom for 15mins twice a week, I rarely go into her class though as she doesn't particularly want me to.

There is also no school uniform, and they call the teachers by their first names, and they even let the children chose their own learning level so it's not everyone's idea of what a school should be.