Am I wrong in thinking that they are entirely inappropriate? Exactly what are they trying to assess in a toddler of 25 months? I ask because DS1 attended an assessment today at a nursery/school that we were thinking of sending him to. Admission is subject to an observation session at the school. DS is in the midst of the terrible twos and when we tried to bring him into the classroom for the "observation", he threw the biggest tantrum ever as he wanted to stay in their excellent playground playing on the slide and the toy boat (to be fair it was his playtime and he must have felt we were trying to drag him away from the park without a proper play.) Despite trying to calm him down he screamed for about 20 minutes and we were asked to not bring him into the assessment for fear of disturbing the other children. None of other toddlers had tantrums and were happy to go into the classroom and play so DH and I are left feeling like failures especially as a number of the other parents looked smug/shocked at DS's antics. Needless to say, I don't think DS1 will have passed their test and won't be offered a place! Annoyed we even tried to be honest and am left wondering exactly what the school was looking for - no tantrums presumably??