Robinw,
Was it the EWO (Educational Welfare Officer) you spoke to at the Council/LEA? I was interested to see that you considered educating at home - what were your arguments for and against? Our six-year-old is educated at home, after he'd spent a miserable year at our local school. We had already considered home education, but this experience decided it for us.
Having 'sin bins' for three-year-olds is a pretty horrifying prospect. The reason the school can't exclude the 'pupil' is because s/he is not of compulsory school age. All the school can do is lean on the parents to withdraw the child.
I thought it was significant that this 'bad behaviour' problem was linked to nursery classes attached to schools. I wonder if the school set-up, with its larger classes, its teachers and the early emphasis on 'proper' learning rather than playing, might actually cause these behavioural problems. I don't know of any 'traditional' nurseries which have problems of violence like this.
In my humble opinion, much bad behaviour has fairly immediate causes to do with the child's desires, needs and frustrations. These days, experts all too readily look to involve psychologists, to give diagnoses and put the burden on the parents to 'solve' the problem. Perhaps we should listen to children more and make them fit the system less.
Anyway, if you want to discuss these or any other home education issues, please pop in at the 'How about home education?' discussion I've launched.