To wonder when nursery and pre-school started being called "school"?

[RedskyThisNight]

As per title really. There seems to be an increasing number of threads where the OP talks about their DC going to "school" so responders naturally assume that the child is at "school" for 9-3 type hours, is at least age 4 and goes there every day. Only for the OP to reveal later that their DC is only 2/3 and actually goes to nursery/pre-school which quite often fundamentally changes the answers.

When and why did this change in terminology happen?

Probably about the same time as " graduation " became a thing with toddlers in caps with rolled up certificates

I dunno. I've always called it school. My DC go every morning until lunchtime. Term time only.l so follows the schooling calendar.

We live in an area with lots of international families and they tend to call it school so I just follow suit.

I bet they have adorable little uniforms though private schools take from 3 don't they maybe they are meaning that ?

I guess people call it school because nursery/preschool isn't childcare, it's early years education with its own curriculum. A lot of nurseries/preschools are based on school premises too, I know with my DC when they were in the nursery class I said they went to XXXXX School.

We always said Nursery but yes maybe it is to deiferatiate between childcare and preschool.

I think the distinction is between nursery classes attached to a school (open 9-3, with the same headteacher as the primary school, where the children are there primary for pre-school education), and private nurseries (which are 7 - 6, and primarily for childcare)?

I have wondered this before. A few of my friends have spoken about their children “starting school” and it has taken me a while to realise I haven’t completely lost track of the years, and they do in fact mean nursery/preschool.

Because it makes it seem their little darlings are so advanced they have been put into big school...

I think it's daft now when school children are recovered to as "students".

Around here DC tend to be "at nursery" or "with a childminder" until 3 then "at school" when they start school-based nursery and then "in full time school" once they start reception.

We only have one private nursery locally though so the majority tend to go to school-based nurseries where the nursery is a class within the first school.

We don't have Reception year so I used to get confused at just 4 year olds going to actual school.

I went to a nursery attached to a school so it made sense for it to be referred to as school.

I stayed there until I was 11.

I notice this too and think it's annoying. To me school starts in reception. Anything before that isn't school

Mine did childminder, private nursery, (older 2) younger 2 did playgroup nursery aged 3-4 then school nursery 4-5 then school

School is school you start at 4 1/2 - 5 years old. Anything else is childminder/nursery

We only use school nursery from 3 so I say they're at school like the older ones. Said nursery when eldest was in a private nursery from 1-4yr.

I thought exactly this earlier reading a thread about a child going to school only to then see said child was 3 and going to a setting for a couple of hours a day

I've never heard it on real life through, very confusing

I think school nursery is school.

A day nursery or pre-school isn't school, but tbh I haven't noticed people calling that school (other than to the child in question, which is fine if it makes them feel grown-up/happy to go).

People should include their DC's age when asking for advice though. Even if the child is at school there is a massive difference between 4 and 18!

Mine all went to / go to a preschool attached to the local primary school and all went / go full time.

Older two are now in school and DC3 is preschool but I say school for ease. If I say "picking kids up from school, speak to you later" I'm sure people get what mean.

Never heard of it referred to as school. Perhaps it is just when the nursery is on a school site and they dont realise they are not being clear enough for the question they are asking.

Again I've never heard it in RL. Everyone I've ever spoken to, or overheard has said, Nursery/Reception. I describe my 4 year old GC as in reception, but say school to her.

Sometimes people just say it to younger siblings who want to go to school like their big siblings.

I refer to it as school for DS. He is 3 and attends 2.5 days a week in the nursery attached to the school he will be going to in September. For me it's to help the transition for when he starts full time in September as he will be used to it been called school, he already wears his school uniform. He will only just be 4 when he starts as in 4 years and a number of days so he is the youngest in his year.

He goes to a childminder as well and takes the big kids to a different bit of the school before he starts it's just so people are not calling it different things!

And when ‘pupils’ turned into ‘students’.
I still go WTF? at 3 year olds being termed ‘students’.

High time to return to students being post 16 only, in further or higher education.

Because nursery class was an integral part of the school - they went to assembly, they ate a school dinner, they played in the playground… it was school and if I’d called it nursery people would have assumed a daycare type setting. My child would have been baffled if I’d said they weren’t going to school, given it was the exact same place older sibling attended!