Mixing nursery and reception classes?

[CroissantAndACupOfTea]

just had a letter from school saying they’ve decided to mix nursery and reception class next year to make one giant super class. Not sure if they’re doing it because of a teacher shortage, or just because the two classes are small groups. My PFB is due to start reception next year and I’m not sure and I’m not happy about it! Most annoying of all, the letter has arrived by email this morning, and we have been invited in this afternoon to discuss it. There’s already a school event, so being invited in hasn’t been sprung on us, just the invite to stay and discuss it. Any ideas of questions I should be asking, or concerns I should be raising? Has anyone else’s school done this, how did it turn out? This is my first one to start school and I want to make sure it’s right for them. Thank you for the help

What will the staffing be (including whether the adults are teachers or not)? How do the ratios work? (This may well be what is driving the change.) Who will have overall responsibility for each child?
What do the school see as the advantages and disadvantages of this arrangement? (Hopefully they will be honest about any potential disadvantages, and say how they will try and avoid problems.)

Thank you. The staffing has been explained in that they’ll keep the two teachers they already have and add in a couple of TAs?

I’d be wondering how they plan to teach reception all the things they need to teach, and differentiate appropriately for the most and least able children while also caring for the preschool children. They will potentially have summer-born pre-school children who have just turned 3 in the same class as autumn-born reception children who have turned 5 - their physical and emotional needs are very different, as are their abilities. If they’re intending to keep them separated then what is the point of merging the classes?

@SBAM i asked them. The plan is to have them together some of the time, and separate them to teach. There will still be two classrooms but the playgrounds will be open so they can run between

They do this with years 1/2, 3/4 and 5/6 with a 2 year rolling curriculum but I'm not sure I'd be happy with a mix. Some of the preschool class will have turned 3 in August and some of the receptions will be 5 in September!

I wouldn’t be happy at all with this and would feel extremely deceived having this announced after school places are set. It’s important enough info that parents should have been given the chance to factor it into their decision making before applying. I would complain formally to the governors and encourage as many other people as possible to.

You send your child to school for a step up, a bridge year into formal education. Not to be held back at nursery level by being in a class with three year olds. Even if they’re sometimes separated this will influence them. I’m astounded this is even allowed.

I think my concerns wouldn’t be so much around the reception year so much as how this impacts the transition to year one. We’ve found preschool up to reception is a big jump, then reception up to year one is a big jump. Would this lessen the first jump and therefore increase the second? How much interaction would reception have with the rest of school, will it feel like they’re part of “big school”?

I’ve taught Nursery and Reception together. It’s absolutely fine. It’s known as a Foundation Stage Unit. It’s totally teacher led meaning it’s very well planned and resourced.

The EYFS is play based so there are interactive activities around the learning required. Each year from 2 to 5 has a rolling curriculum that is language focussed and children are taken out in groups by EYFS practitioners or the teacher to do these.
It’s NOT a free for all. It’s NOT chaos, it’s a learning environment run by qualified teachers .

My childrens school does this and it works really well. Both nursery and reception have their own base for carpet time and they do small phonics, numeracy group and interventions etc but the rest of the time it’s mixed free flow play. It’s lovely. My two kids in reception and nursery at the same time and loved that they saw each other!

They did the same with my DD’s class and she absolutely thrived. It was such a positive and fun learning environment. In our case it was the reception to Y1 transition that was more difficult and I’d be asking questions about how they’re going to manage that.

I think EYFS units are a brilliant concept, and wish more were available.

But the admissions arrangements (main application round being for year R) mean they're not common. Which is a shame

Honestly, as a Reception teacher, I think it’s totally fine. What I’d do in this situation would be to separate the Rec children for whole class teaching such as phonics and let them have free flow alongside nursery children for their child initiated play in continuous provision.
I think it’s far easier to have mixed classes in Foundation stage than at any other age. I’d have been absolutely fine with this sort of set up for my own children. Lots of settings have a Foundation stage unit rather than separate nursery and Rec classes and it actually works really well.

My daughters school does this, there is no issue at all.

I wouldn’t like this because of the vast cognitive and physical abilities between a just turned 3yo and the kids just turning 5.

if they are splitting them out for learning and just having one big class for free play I’d probably be more worried about the younger ones then the older and the 3yos getting sufficient care and attention. The reception kids will probably get their learning when they separate and then crack on with challenges when they’re playing but I would be asking questions about transition to y1 (presumably a bit harder) and how they will manage behavioural expectations (eg you’d expect higher expectations for the 4/5 year olds but how do you enforce that when you’ve likely still got what essential are toddlers at the lower end in the classroom with different skills and abilities.

My daughters school does this, and my son is joining next year. If there are two qualified teachers plus TAs it works really well, and if smaller classes gives them a bigger group for play / child initiated activities, and the older ones chance to show leadership.

Her school splits them out for curriculum based stuff like phonics and maths but they shared the space for things like free play, yoga, forest school.

It may also be based upon the age profiles of children they have - if there are lots of ‘older nursery’ and ‘younger’ reception it could be an effective way to meet everyone’s need.

For me as long as 2 qualified teachers I think it’s fine - if there was only one I’d have more concerns re how effectively phonics etc would be taught.

I can see why you feel worried especially as it wasn't made clear earlier. DS had this and we were a bit hesitant but it was fine to be honest. I would be more concerned about mixed classes further up the school, but for foundation stage he really enjoyed it and learnt a lot- I have friends whose children were the younger group and none had any complaints either.

My children's school only has 3 teachers as it is a small school, age range for the school is 4 to 11.
Reception (which is the pre-school year but can't start until 4th birthday) P1 and P2 always together and are all EYFS so more play based anyway. The children get a lot from having peers of different ages and for the older children I find they all learn at different levels anyway, so it helps that they can learn at their level and not taught at a level that is either too difficult or not challenging enough

I teach a mixed nursery and reception class. The lowest ability child in my class is not a nursery child and several higher achieving nursery children join our reception phonics sessions.

it works very well.

Yes, lied an FS unit like this too. 120 children aged 3-5. Learning was active, created independence, used indoor and out and also included directed teaching sessions of maths and phonics. It does take a skilled early years team to deliver learning well across the age range and across a larger number of children. Organisation is key.

Check for ratios - adult to child. Some schools are having to put classes together because of lack of money. Ask about their key worker system under safeguarding. How are the larger numbers of pupils split into smaller groups? How well are staff going to know and plan for learning, for each child.
There is a huge focus on early reading, ask about the phonic sessions.

*led

My DD had this. Sometimes Yr1 joined them as well. It meant they all had access to a better range of resources.

This makes perfect sense and if any two year groups are to be merged, I would merge those. They are following the same curriculum! As long as they are following any legal ratios, this wouldn’t bother me at all. I would imagine the reasoning is down to funding-if the two classes aren’t full, it affects the funding you get so it’s not financially possible to run separate classes. My cousin’s school had two classes of 35 Reception children last year as there wasn’t enough funding with a cohort of 70 children to run the usual three classes. They had an extra TA floating-the LA weren’t overly happy but obviously couldn’t magic up any extra money so it went ahead.

Early years "units" were all the rage when i first qualified 15 years ago!

As early years lead I do think nursery and reception are better kept as two separate classes! IMO reception/year 1 would be much better mix as year 1 is usually far too formal!!

I'm a Reception teacher and EYFS specialist. This will be absolutely fine. It is not 'holding back' any children as all teaching will be targeted at the appropriate level. The continuous provision element (free flow) will be equally broad. I actually see a lot of benefit in this model.

Our school changed to a foundation unit in September last year and it works really well.
The ran it as a hybrid unit for a couple of years and then made the transition this year.
They have 3 teachers and 4 TA and 2 HLTA for 90 students.