Help for kids starting Primary 1 in Scotland?

[love2mum]

Hi, I want to help my DS get a head start before August as he just missed the opportunity to defer so will be quite young for his year.

Searching the internet I came across a Handbook for Primary Teaching in England and The National Curriculum guide for England, Wales and Ireland. Does anyone know if there is something similar available for Scotland, or if Primary 1 curriculum is pretty much the same as in the rest of the UK?

Many thanks!

The curriculum is completely different, it is now called the curriculum for excellence and you will find all the outcome statements online. BUT I honestly wouldn't bother!! Why dont you just wait and see how he gets on? Or speak to his nursery nurses at pre-school, they work with the same outcomes (early level spans nursery and pre-school) and will know how he is doing. If there were any concerns they would have let you defer him, the fact it wasn't granted shows they are probably not worried!

Sorry that should have said early level spans nursery and p1!

Hi Caz10, I do hope you are right but he does daydream!

I still feel as his mum it's my duty to help regardless of his ability.

is he not attending nursery? the nursery staff would be able to tell you about the curriculum

Yes he is and I asked, it was his nursery teacher who told me it was on the internet, but it's only outline statements as Caz10 states. I then wrote to the Head Teacher but haven't heard back yet.

Just thought perhaps the reading list and topics might be standard across all Scottish schools but no one I've spoken to seems to know.

Many thanks for your feedback!

the curriculum for excellence is not the clearest thing to follow but if he is at nursery they will be preparing him anyway and you should discusss any concerns there. otherwise chill, they are at school long enough without worrrying about it already

My dd2 is starting school in September. She is only 3 at the moment, she will be 4 and 2+ months when she starts. I'm just going to keep helping her recognise numbers and letters, shapes and colours and see how she goes when she starts. I do feel that she knows much less than her sister did when she started school as she was almost 5. We're in NI now but I'm from Scotland, if we were still over there she would be 5 when she started school.
She still seems so wee to be going to school!

If you want him to get the most out of school, then honestly you'd do better to make sure he has the skills to get the most out of the teacher, rather than trying to get ahead on the actual teaching.

Do talk to the nursery about it as they'll be doing this kind of stuff too, but he'll be helped by having skills such as listening when someone is giving him instructions, and focussing for long enough to have a go at doing what he was asked. Taking turns, getting on with classmates, asking for help when he needs it, but being able to have a go at what was asked without always wanting the adult to be paying attention to him personally. Also being able to sort out his own clothes, going to the loo, wiping his nose etc.

If he has those sorts of skills, he'll be in a good condition to be able to be taught!

I'd also try to talk to one of the P1 teachers about the daily routine, going to the toilet/having drinks/snack rules. Our DDs school is completely facist quite strict about those things in a way my DDs had no experience of.

We moved from England to Scotland when DD3 had just done Reception, but because of birth dates she went in to P1. The routine and rules in P1 were much more like we'd have expected in Y3. Of course that just might be the school my DCs are at.

The learning aspect I personally wouldn't worry about so much.

Tbh I would leave it to the school but if he is interested the Jolly Phonic Workbooks are good.

Amuminscotland and mustdash speak sense!

Reading schemes and topics are not standard across country, they are not even standard within LA areas. Even within your son's class there will be a core reading scheme but not all children may be on it. Plus why would you want him to do the topics before he does them iyswim? Far better that you support him while he is actually doing them in school. Whoever said p1 can be different from reception is quite right- depending on the school you might find it very formal compared to nursery.

Also can he do things like pack up his own bag, fasten coat and shoes etc?

Jolly phonics materials are good, but again as a support when he is actually doing them in school, you dont want to give him any complications by accidentally teaching the sounds wrongly or whatever.

Does he generally behave himself at nursery?

Ps the stuff you have seen on the Internet is all there is!! School will have developed/translated the outcome statements in more depth in their planning docs but they're not going to give you a copy of that!

This is a good site. Your local authority website might have a list of topics, ours does. I have a son starting school in August too, he'll be on CforE - I have an older child who followed the 5-14 so I imagine it'll be different, we have induction days in June so I'll see what they tell me there. Does your school not do similar? I don't really intend doing anything more than that apart from responding to issues as/when they arise.

Great, thanks for all your messages! I thought I just couldn't find the correct website!!

Sorry to be so niave, I was lucky enough to go to an independent school which prepared parents every year with a reading list, additional material and a guide to topics covered in each subject. I just thought this was the norm.

He's a carbon copy of myself at that age so I'm preparing to be told he's not listening to the teachers and he won't rather than can't when it comes to dressing himself in the morning!!! I'm not in a position to give him the education I had and at the parents/teachers meeting, parents were told that the school couldn't be responsible for teaching every child to read and write, it's the parents responsibility. Their reason given being because class sizes are being increased to 30 to 1 due to government cuts.

I'm more relaxed now I know everyone is in the same boat, but it does seem quite contradictory that the school expects parents to take it upon themselves to teach their children whilst keeping the books they refer to a secret!!!

Thanks for all your contributions. I never expected to receive so much feedback and so quickly!!

Thanks BadPoet, I wonder if that's the website his teacher was referring to. I'll have an indepth look once they're in bed!

I am that they said that in your meeting!! Would not be impressed tbh!! Can understand more now why you are so keen to be involved!!

It would be worth asking what phonics scheme they use, it's probably jolly phonics, and they have loads of resources so you could get a feel for it.

I thought p1 class sizes were still capped at 25, maybe someone else can clarify if this has changed?

the jolly phonic stuff is available in the early learning shops. a look at that might help u.

That's interesting, we were told 120 kids to 4 teachers!?! Doesn't give me a lot of confidence in the school if they can't divide 120 by 4!

I have Jolly Phonics books and DVD so that would be handy, but I will check.

Many thanks again!

That;s a pretty terrible thing for them to have said - when I went to school there were 30 to 33 pupils in every class, and the teacher still taught us all to read and write!

The LTS link up there is where you'll find all the curriculum stuff - but there it's all about what they should be able to do, not how they're taught it, there is no set topic list or reading list on a national level.

Agreed, 31 in my class and we were all taught to read and write by the teacher!

tabulahrasa - thanks I'm about to have a look at the site now. At least I'll know what's expected of him.

Cheers everyone!

I would imagine what they actually meant was that they can't teach your child to read and write by themselves, which is true. Your child will learn faster if you support their teaching at home, which does not mean getting all the same books, it means reading their school reading book with them; encouraging them to write, whatever it happens to be - their name, a story, just practising letters, a postcard; encouraging them to read other things, even if it's a menu, lego instructions, the back of a cereal packet!

Set topics, books etc just don't exist. Schools/teachers make their own decisions on what exactly to cover when. Hopefully they'll give you a guide to what they are doing each term though, which is good to have.

My ds is young in his year and his biggest hurdle has always been emotional maturity rather than academic performance.

The advice on turn taking, doing activities alone and so on is excellent.

The new curriculum is strongly based on learning through play. There are many ways you could gently get him used to the phonic sounds through games, writing in sand etc.

We also had a jolly phonics video from ebay which ds loved.

Counting with him and getting him to count things will also help.

We also use the Reading Chest to support the reading our ds does in school here

The main thing is to keep it low pressure, to stop when he gets bored and to make it fun.

Class size has been limited to 25 in P1 (see Legislation here - came into effect October last year, for the school year starting 2011).

So I don't know where your school gets the 30 class size form

When you say your ds just missed the opportunity to defer - when does he turn 5?

I agree with PatriciaHolm : I am sure that they meant that they can't teach them to read and write on their own - they need support from the home.