to be unhappy with school's decision?

[OiHeadNooooo]

I have name changed because of the details in the post.

Dc2 is currently in Yr2. School are telling us that in September, when the year group are Yr3 & become KS2 pupils, they are going to divide them and keep roughly half in a shared class with Yr2, in the same classroom they are in now, whilst the others will move to the next class & share with Yr4.

We, along with most other Yr2 parents, are not happy about this as the year group will be split over the 2 key stages. This is bound to mean there will be differences in how they are treated and the level of work they will be exposed to. One major difference, that I think will mean a lot to the kids themselves, is that those with the Yr2s (as they are still in a KS1 classroom) will get an afternoon playtime, whereas the ones with the Yr4s (in a KS2 class) will not. This seems a very unfair way of treating children who are in the same year group. Particularly as friendship groups will no doubt be split & some kids will have to watch their friends go out to play when they cannot. Additionally, when KS2 or Yr3 group activities are planned the pupils in the younger class will have to leave their classroom to join in but then go back when finished. After Yr3, the year group would then come together again in Yr4, be split again in Yr5 (but possibly with different pupils in the 2 groups) & then be together again in Yr6. Essentially creating a complete lack of continuity for the rest of their time at primary school and having a differing effect on them educationally & socially.

There was a meeting for Yr2 parents where the Head gave a presentation about how this cohort split would work and it seemed to be to gauge opinion but, since the majority weren’t happy with the idea and the decision has been made to go ahead with it anyway, it would appear to have been presented as a fait accompli. It would also appear that financial considerations are more important than what is best for the children, as there are potential alternative solutions to the issue (which is an imbalance in class sizes) that could prevent splitting the year group but they would mostly create the need for an extra teacher &/or classroom space.

How would you feel if this was going to affect your dc? What would you do in response to being told about this decision?

I ask because we have a parents’ evening tonight where we will be speaking to the Head (as they are one of dc2’s teachers). Some parents had their meetings yesterday and have told me that they were informed that the decision (which was originally couched as an option albeit without any other options put forward) will be going ahead – so, never mind what the parents’ opinions are then! From what others have said, in the meeting tonight, the Head will be asking us where we would want our dc to be placed whilst telling us which class they will be placing them in and why that will be best for them.

Dc2 just told me this morning as we were going out the door that they were asked yesterday which class they would want to be in, but it sounds like they were being sold the benefits of staying in Class 2 to encourage their decision in favour of Class 2. I'm thinking they are trying to make staying put an attractive option to the kids b/c they know most parents will opt for the move up

As it is unusual to split a key stage I'd say the HT must have given it careful consideration. Maybe it just needs to be communicated better

At one time my DC went to a smallish school and they did do this on occasion, it didn't affect me directly but seemed to work OK

We moved town and school and DS1 was put in a composite class. Since he was younger he was in the top half of the class. They did it purely from an age point of view.

On one hand I was fuming because DS1 is gifted so he thought everything was so easy. On the other hand the teacher was very good, whilst the teachers in the older half of the class were not so good and they had to tolerate two whole years with the same teacher.

DS actually loved it and was very happy, so I can't really complain.

I really feel that the ones that are in the older/higher half benefit the most. They are exposed to more academically earlier. But it depends on the teacher and on the child's ability.

The argument of more playtime is redundant. Just think what is right for the child. They will get used to it pretty quickly anyway.

But I would be annoyed, so I understand.

It looks like they are going to divide them by ability. During the presentation the Head showed which pupils would be in which class if they divided by age order & also by name alphabetical order but then said that they wouldn't split them using either of those methods

Sorry, I meant to say DS was put into the bottom half of the year group - not top!

This was supposed to be happening at our school, and then it just didnt. I dont know why, at the time my 2 werent in the classes affected so I dont know the details but I do know that a lot of parents werent happy about it and there was a large group that were going to moved their children if it happened.

I suspect that that had a lot to do with it being dropped as an idea because of the amount of money the school would lose if it lost half a class worth of children. Its a small school with only one class per year, so it would have had a massive impact. I suspect that if you really dont want it to go ahead then making it clear that your child will be withdrawn maybe the only way to go.

OP, what does the current composite y2/3 class do at playtime. do the year 3s also go out to play, or do they stay in?

If they stay in (as they should, being in KS2), why would you expect them to get extra play next year?

I can see the need to split but can't understand splitting between KSs. At DDs small village school they look at total numbers by KS.

So for example, they can have 60 in total in KS1. There are two classrooms and one break out classroom. The classes are as follows:

YR/Y1
Y1/Y2

The Y1s are split dependent on various things, emotional maturity, ability, friendship groups and sometimes by age. It totally depends on the children involved.

I thought the targets for KS1 and KS2 were totally different so can't understand how the children would benefit by being split between the KSs. Having said that, under the new curriculum the expectations are so way above what an 'average' child can be expected to achieve, that maybe too many are expected to finish KS1 without the proper grounding in subjects and would therefore fail to move on in KS2. So maybe they are giving additional support to those who may struggle.

There is a very small intake for YR in DD's school for this September so they may even do something like that there... Although I haven't heard of it...

[Points out cynically that actually, if they lost a couple of children from the current Y2, as long as the overall financial health of the school was OK, they probably wouldn't have to do the mixing at all.

It is the 31 in a future mixed 3/4 class - because of the large current Y2 - that is probably the main driver of this move, because it is a big jump up from normal class sizes of 20ish. If, say, 3 of the current Y2s left, and there was general negative feeling, they would probably stick with the status quo. In terms of teachers, the status quo and the new split cost exactly the same.

Financial considerations do drive the school, they have to, and no school can conjure an extra teacher and classroom out of thin air, particularly in a school with such a small roll and therefore income.

What is the ratio of teachers to children in the school, including the Head and Deputy, but not counting TAs? I taught vertically grouped classes for a number of years, including a Y2/3 one; the KS2 classes were eased considerably by setting by ability for maths, English and science, with the Head and Deputy taking groups.

Friendship groups and playtimes are less important than academic provision, and all Y3 children will have to receive the same number of hours of education.The bonus is such small class sizes . My experience, and that of my children, who went through them in KS1, was that they made little difference to the standard of education delivered. (A lot more planning & preparation for the teacher, though, but the school is doing that already.)

Letus,

Looking at the numbers, the OP's school is faced with either splitting 2 year groups (Year 1 AND Year 4) to give:
16 R / Y1
16 Y1/Y2

25 or 26 Y3/4
26 or 25 Y4/5/6

or what has been proposed, with only Year 3 being split. the proposal as tabled gives:

• MUCH more equal numbers in each class.
• never more than 2 year groups in a class (4/5/6 is not a good mix, especially with the changes in curriculum - it would be really quite tough for the few Y4s in that class to spend 3 years in there)

Goblin, the way i read this was that it was cost neutral, as there are 4 classes and wikll be 4 classes? The only staff cost might be that the 'big' class using the existing split might need extra e.g. TAs if the needs of the children were very high.

I think a lot of your objections will depend on how well the school handle it.
For the playtime issue: Ds would probably work better with an afternoon playground (which incidentally mine never have had even in infants) as a bit of a run around mid afternoon would shake the fidgets off him. Dd1 would not have worked well with it as she liked to concentrate for a long period. Dd2 would have worked with what she got. Assuming the school takes that sort of thing into consideration when considering it could be good for a number of children.

On the ending up in a different class to their friends, so having different playtimes, well mine are at a large school where they mix the classes up every year. My observation is that is unusual for friendships to continue for long once they've been split classes anyway. the school likes to deny this, but the number of friendships that have survived this I can count on the fingers of one hand over a number of years. And those that have have usually had parents in the background making sure that they do things out of school too.

The way the school is doing it is fine, and to a certain extent you do have to believe they are doing their best for as many children as possible. I'm not a fan of the mixing classes up every year, but when they first produced the idea there were many very opposed who mellowed when they saw it in action and either became broadly in favour or indifferent.
They cannot suggest it to parents and let them discuss it and decide by that. It isn't a parent decision and parents do not have all the facts. Plus a couple of vocal parents with strong opinions can overrun any other opinions.

I used to teach French in Primary Schools and most of the schools I went to were rural and had split classes. One school even had the whole of KS2 in one class. It seemed to work fine and the teachers were very used to this and adapted classes and homework accordingly.

It's the psychology of it that would worry me - our school only has two classes, infants (R to Y2) and juniors (Y3-6) and being one of the ones left in the infants class would be a real issue, I suspect, even if they did benefit from the extra playtime. It was a big deal for ds to move into the junior classroom..

This would be very new to any one living in the city or town but in rural community's this is the norm as they don't have enough children of each age to fill classes so you can have

2 , five year old 6,seven year old and 4 ,ten year old one teacher and TA

this happened to my ds in his small village school, out of 16 in Reception 4 were kept back and blended with a KS1 class. To make it worse he was the only boy and he took it very badly seeing all his friends move on. In fact he made new friends in the new class and had his old ones

I felt like you at first but in hindset it was for the best, he was very immature and had not developed sufficient Read/Write skills. He still has an IEP but is making good progress. I really would trust the teachers judgement

I had a joint class in year 7+8 but it sounds like you need to know how the play time issue would work.

I wouldn't like it OP but it's more of an obvious split at our school eg, infants yard/junior yard; infants lunchtime disco/juniors lunchtime disco. I don't think our schools DC would like the idea of being told they weren't yet juniors when those they'd grown up with were

Agree that splitting across Key Stages seems the most problematic aspect.

I was in a split p3. I was with p2 and half the class were with p4.
Ours was split so the higher reading group were with the younger class and the lower ability readers with the higher class. This gave the teachers more time for guided reading with the less able readers.
When the p2s had afternoon break and went home earlier we did special grown up p3 work or sometimes the other half of p3 cane into our room.
We were joined up again the following year with no lasting effects on friendships as it was a small year group anyway.

I taught several joint classes and I'm sure it will work out for you. However I would question the playtime organisation.

I'm not sure splitting across the key stage is the relevant point. I think it is that 21 kids (by far the majority) will be in Y3, and 10 'left behind' still in Y2. Who is going to volunteer their child to be in that 10? And what parent is going to like being told their child is in that group of only 10?

Also, depends if the Y2 teacher is any good because some kids are going to have her 2 years running.

These situations are always tricky but I'm sure the head and governors will have thought this through carefully and will make decisions based on what is best for the whole school. These days you can't dissociate 'what's best for the children' and 'financial considerations'. There is generally no spare money in schools. Whatever the number on roll, divide by 30 and that's how many teachers you can afford, it is really that simple most of the time and in small schools the head and any other leaders are also likely to have partial teaching commitment

The key is ensuring that teaching is excellent and still meets the needs of all children irrespective of group split. As other posters have said mixed age classes are very common and many schools manage it brilliantly and the children still do very well.

I hope it all works out well for your child.