To send my extroverted DC to a tiny village school?

[hibbledibble]

I'm thinking of moving rurally.

We currently live in central London and eldest DC goes to a 2 form entry school with classes of nearly 30 (school is undersubscribed). She is an extrovert and very social and active.

We are thinking of moving very rurally, where the entire school will have less pupils than in her year. There will be small (circa 10-15 pupils) composite classes.

To me this sounds great to have such small class sizes, but I'm not sure how she will find the change, and the social side. I also wonder what the reality of such a small school is.

Is this an entirely nutty idea?

we have had several hundred high profile murders recently

Blimey, the police have kept them quiet!

It sounds extremely stifling especially for an extroverted And sociable child. Won't she be at a disadvantage wrt to activities, meeting new people etc? Yes she may enjoy 'running in a field' but for a very short time. What happens when she's a teen?

nope they haven't. They have been reported on extensively!

Missp we will have the local city for teen exploits!

There haven't been several hundred murders in one bit of London, you're exaggerating because you've got a country fetish. It's fine, it happens

Lol, I'm guessing you don't live in London. Just my local high street has an average of one murder a week on a one mile stretch of it.

Though I said several, not several hundred. You are adding the exaggeration in this case.

I wonder if its Barking. I’d consider that to be the worst/roughest part of London. In which case, yes, leave.

Ok I'm seeing the hundred that my phone must have added! It is several.

Er, no i didn't, that's what you said. The stats are easy enough to look up.

My husband still shudders when he thinks about his ‘idyllic country’ upbringing. He moved to cities as soon as possible and point blank refuses to ‘do that to a child’!

hibble how's she going to get to the local city "for teen exploits"? Are you dropping her off and picking her up? You don't see how limiting and infantilising that is compared to being able to naturally increase independence in an age appropriate way by walking into town/ catching a reliable, regular bus from just down the road?

Small schools are usually mixed classes, so reception and year one, then year two, three, four and five, and then six alone. As a general rule. If your child is loud then they likely (in my experience with mine and my kids) won’t do great. But it depends on a lot of things

A bored, extrovert teen or pre teen stuck in the middle of nowhere on a rainy Saturday will have no fucks to give about whether her house is "stunning".

I would think very carefully about this. The grass isn't always greener. If she is extroverted now, a small environment will likely stifle that. in such a tight knit school, she will also likely be excluded for quite a whilst at first- it is hard to break into friendships that have been formed from pre school and upwards, especially when in a small year group there are no individual friendship groups as such.

My opinion is tainted by my primary school experience though- I went to the local village school, however I lived outside the village. There were 7 other girls and 6 boys in my year, and it was just horrific. I'm having CBT at the minute to undo the years of damage it did to me- because I didn't live in the village I felt like an outsider, and this has travelled through life with me and really impacted me. On top of this, once it got to year 6 and the girls began to hit puberty it was horrendous- if you fell out with someone there was no escaping it because there was no other 'group' to move to.

As a PP has mentioned, the country lifestyle will be fun for a few summers when she is young but once she hits teenagehood she will rely heavily on you for being ferried around, and this will likely cause some resentment as she won't be able to have the same levels of freedom and independence as if you lived in London still.

You mention joining a community- this will be much harder than finding a new community in London. Friendships are forged over years, a lot of people living there have grown up with eachother. Also there are far fewer activities as a way of meeting eachother, and villages tend to consist of very insulated groups which are hard to break into.

Can't be arsed to RTFT, but every time I read OP I think "Great, just great. Foist your dominant personality kid onto the small quiet community so that she's a total Queen Bee with no competitors and no chance of other gangs to form for the less confident fringe kids to join up with."

Maybe OP has answered that point 50x.

As for locals being friendly they generally are to all incomers at the start so that they can find out everything about you, remember the locals don’t need to do it to each other as they’ve grown up together.

Plus if you are going proper rural then be prepared for your teens having to live away Monday to Friday to go to secondary school.

If OP goes to remote rural Scotland then won't they encounter lots of anti-English prejudice? Lot of stories about that kind of thing.

Scottish counts as exotic where I live; I think there are THREE (count 'em, THREE) foreign born mums to kids in DS's yr5 cohort at our primary. Probably ONLY non-English born mums at the school (300 pupils). We feel like outsiders.

All the stereotypes apply about Life in small town... everyone knows everyone, plenty gossip about our teachers (eg., who had anorexia 30 yrs ago, etc). I joke that folk living in my area are avg only 1.5 degrees of separation from each other. NEVER fall out in a way that could impact your children -- your children will fall out with their children & no one escapes the rancour until you move away.

Don't slag off Jo Brown to the butcher (he'll turn out to be her brother) or to the sweet dog walking lady (she'll turn out to be Jo's mum's best mate).

shenanigans it's not that rural. There is a bus service to the local secondary.

Llj my op wasn't intended to come across like that at all. I'm sure rurally there are children with a spectrum of personalities, just like in London.

The home we are looking at isn't as rural as some posters seem to believe. It is under 2 miles to a small town.

I agree public transport is important, and originally we were looking at a house in a village with an hourly bus to the city. Unfortunately the house has significant issues though. I'm not set on any house yet, I'm still considering and researching the different options. Next time I will try to see some primary schools.

@hibbledibble

And how will your dd get back from evenings out in the town with her friends?

Do you want her walking back 2 miles in the dark when she's drunk?

Have you seen the BBC comedy 'the country'? It captures a lot of the sheer, chronic boredom and isolation I felt growing up in the very rural countryside. And I was in a village.

10-15 in a class would be a dream scenario, that's on a par with a private school. Beats classes bulging and teacher not having much chance to get to know your DC. Don't really get why everyone in school knowing you would be a problem?

I grew up quite rurally, it was very pretty, kids were bussed in from all over to our school it wasn't especially tiny. One lad in my class got done for badger digging and a girl died in a fox hunting accident

Growing up rurally was pretty dam crap once a teenager. More drugs were done in that rural idyll than were ever taken at parties I went to in London after I escaped.

Plus everyone knew everyone to a depth that was very intrusive.