To think the Reception settling-in period is way too slow?

[MerryMarigold]

It struck me today as I work in a preschool and had 2 of my summer leavers come to visit me, who are starting Reception and neither of them were in school! Chatting to mums they told me of the very slow start to Reception and I was really surprised. I had a 2 year old start today (about 28 months), who was in from 9am-12pm. The only time she cried was at pick up time because she didn't want to go home! Now, I'm well aware not all kids are like that, and sometimes we call parents to pick their children up if they are very upset and they build up to longer periods maybe over a week (max) but to be honest, this is quite rare. Others who are a bit older, like two 3 year olds who started yesterday, will stay till after lunch for a couple of days and then do a full day (no tears or clinginess from them either), just having loads of fun.

So why is the default Reception settling-in so ridiculously drawn out? These children are 4 going on 5 and the majority have been in a preschool or nursery for at least a year already so used to being in a setting for a decent length of time. I said Goodbye to my 4 year olds in the Summer and they were more than ready for school, yet for Reception they are going in for 1 hr a day for several days then 2 hours, then lunch, very gradually building to a whole day. I'm just shocked it takes so long (sometimes 3-4 weeks) to go to a full school day. I'm sure kids are well able to handle much more than this so it feels like really low expectations to me. Obviously if a child was really struggling the school could be flexible on hours, but I believe the majority of children could go all day within a week without a fuss. My own kids are now in Y10 and Y8 and it definitely wasn't that slow for them.

Is there a decent rationale for this? Do other countries do it so slowly? Do parents prefer it this way? What do you all think?

I'd like to chip in here and relate this problem to school being overly formal for 4 year olds

In other countries 4 and 5 year old are in kindergarten ie. Play with led childcare so it van be all day because it is focused on the CHILD not the system.

Reception although it has some play is far more formal and is very tiring for children.

If we followed the idea of a later start fir formal schooling we wouldn't need such a gentle start.

My summer born 4 Yr old used to fall asleep on the carpet in reception. It was too much for her

Just insist on your child’s right to a full time education. Schools will have to back down

DS started reception on Thursday, and it was a full day from the off. He's been fine, in fact, he's loved it much more than he did nursery half days!

When dd started reception we could choose whether to do a week of half days or whether to go f/t straight away. As dd had been in nursery since 11 months we went with f/t as it felt like a backward step…. Her days were already going to be 3.5 hrs shorter than at nursery!

It seems that this years reception intake are doing an hour a day this week, then half days next week, then f/t from week 3.

Ds starts in 2 years and he will have been at nursery for 3.5 years and I’ll not be very happy if we get no choice in it. We both work and having to find more time off straight after the summer holidays will be a nightmare!!

My DD started school last Thursday. She did 08:50am-12pm then Friday she did 08:50am-1pm (included lunch). She started full time yesterday. Thankfully this worked really well as I started mat leave and didn’t have to rely on other family members to collect her. I think drawn out settling in sessions for reception children over a period of weeks seems a bit excessive).

I personally think we start kids far too young in formal education in this country and it’s sad for them that they miss out on the years of a freer childhood they’d have in lots of other European countries. So anything that makes the process softer for them the better IMO. Also surely it’s nice to spend a bit of time with your kids before they head off into the full time education system for 14 years?! Can’t really find it in me to begrudge that!

Hmm no my kids school is not like how you described, it’s 9-12.30 for one week only. My daughter needs it as she didn’t go to nursery

As others have said, the Schools Admissions Code states that they're entitled to a full time education right from the start so you can challenge this nonsense.

At our school we offer an optional pick up at 1.15pm in the first week, but only a handful opt for it. The vast majority are in full time from the start.

I've had to take the week off work as DD started this week on just 1-3pm every day! Thankfully it's full on next week. I'm not sure who it's good for really because I think the kids would do better if they just went in for the full day from day 1.

My DS started last year and didn’t do a full day until 28 September! There definitely seems to be an assumption that one parent, or at least a grandparent/ other family member, is around all day to facilitate these arrangements. Primary is hard for working parents!

@juliainthedeepwater

I personally think we start kids far too young in formal education in this country and it’s sad for them that they miss out on the years of a freer childhood they’d have in lots of other European countries. So anything that makes the process softer for them the better IMO. Also surely it’s nice to spend a bit of time with your kids before they head off into the full time education system for 14 years?! Can’t really find it in me to begrudge that!

I’m sure many parents would love to spend more time with their young children, but have to work. You speak from a position of privilege when you talk about the luxury of spending time with children before they head into the education system. Also, there is a lot of misconception about what the UK does vs other countries. Reception IS a soft start - under the Early Years scheme I didn’t notice any particular difference from nursery. More formal education really begins in Year 1 and even then it’s a steady progression.

Full time from day 1 here. Day 2 included wrap around care. No way in hell would I be using annual leave for accommodating this.

Doing this now... it's awful!
Half an hour (yes half a bloody hour!) yesterday and Friday afternoon this week
2 random mornings next week
2 random days the week after!
My child attended nursery 8-6 for 3 days a week.
I've had to take parental leave - which my company were not happy about at all!

Gosh, no we didn’t have any of this last year. Full time from the start, taking home reading books and reading records from day 2 etc - they started everything pretty much immediately.
Don’t know how on earth two working parents could cope with what you have described.

Ours was a 2 week process and that was a bit of a faff logistically but actually it was quite nice for the children because they had a smaller group for assessments and to get to know the teacher. I wouldn’t have minded 2 weeks of one day off, one day on if it had been full days. We did some lovely days out on the full days off. The thing that was a pain was it started with half days which were actually a bit unsettling and also meant we couldn’t do much else.

One local school was sodding about until October half term. That would have killed anyone’s chance of maintaining a job. That to me is largely unjustifiable.

Our primary in Scotland used to do half days for 6 weeks then 9-3 they scrapped that 3 years ago now the primary ones go 9-3 from the get go
It helps a both that nursery hours were increased to 1140 hrs per year and the kids were going 9-3 there too though
I don't see the point In Dragging it out it's a pita for parents and childcare

You can ask for full time from day one but yes vvvvvv slow always been

STTE: We've had a slow introduction to Reception as our school decided with Covid they couldn't do inset days before Summer Hols. All the kids that are the same age as my LG that have had inset days have hit the ground running - all the others like ours have had staggered starts and a few hours - Thursday is my LG's first full day! I do wish it had been a bit quicker though - I'm glad I managed to book the time off work for it all x

I'm in London and our start full time right away

My daughter's just started FS2, straight in to full time, day 1 of term. It was the same when she started FS1, and with my son's school. I think all the schools local to us, both independent and state, just throw them in at the deep end?!

Do other countries do it so slowly?
NSW, Australia had orientation in the last term of the year before school, children and parents shown around the school, a play session and so on. Then at the start of the new year the first week was starting school assessments to see where each child was at. First day of the second week had staggered start times to settle children in, then full days from the second day. Children slightly older, 4.5 to just turned 6.

3-4 weeks is too long, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with spending it out over a week or two. They are still very young when they start school and it only happens once. A slow start definitely doesn’t do the children any harm, so I can’t see the issue apart from it being a bit inconvenient for parents.

Mine went mornings only
March birthday for a whole autumn term
October birthday for half the term
I wasn't working luckily
This was a few years ago ....they are late 20s now !!

Not in the UK but when my 3 year old started school I dropped her off at 8.30 and picked her up at 4.30. 3 hours hardly seems worth it!