wetherby pre-prep provision for gifted and talented students

[chuppachup]

Please could former and current parents or teachers tell me what they think of Wetherby Pre-Prep's provision for gifted and talented students, especially in Year 2 and Year 3, and the strength and weaknesses of the school for such students. Please, no slating of school's poshness. We need a suitable school for DS in Reception who is very able (IQ in top 1% assessed by Potential Plus) and is not sufficiently challenged at current prep and is behaving badly.

I think you will find they are generally just a higher standard all over, so all pupils work at a higher level, are pushed slightly more etc. They have the ethos that they are aiming for every child to be talented , so I don't think they have a separate ' gifted and talented section'

If you sons reception age now though, how are you going to get a place? People put their children on the waiting list at days old

I just wonder how somebody can assess the potential of the reception age child if they change so much and everyone develops at a different pace. My DC. started talking quite late and we always thought he is not as bright as his sibling, but when he was around 6, he surprised us by winning serious chess tournament.

You might want to work on his bad behaviour as a priority.

My children have various different strengths, but there's no correlation between their varying aptitudes and their behaviour. In fact, the one I think is the smartest (at the moment) does all tasks with enthusiasm and causes me a lot less grief than the other two.

There is no special "provision".
The purpose of the school is to get boys ready for 7 and 8+.

Brighter kids get differentiated work, appropriate for their level. And, they mostly sit 7+ and move on to other schools.
Wetherby is quite tough on bad manners and misbehaviour is not really tolerated.

Getting a spot in the current Reception class won't be easy, unless someone leaves and you are on top of their lost.

Good luck

Wetherby is a great school but I don't think that individual catering for flair is their thing. They are by far the best school at getting boys into westminster under and Colet court, so if, as I imagine from your comments, that is where you want him to go, they up the chances. However, there is a bit less breadth there as they are so strongly focussed on that target (although with the prep school going from strength to strength, more boys than previously stay , if they aren't WUS or CC destined)

However, your chances of a place are I would think v slim indeed at this point, so I wouldn't pin your hopes on it

Perhaps in parallel to getting your name in the waiting list , tackle the issues at his current school, get an alternative plan for 7+ and get him into the London chess circuit

Thanks MM and michaelapurple. DS is not so much a bad child but is bored stiff as school work is far too easy. He is several years head on maths, English, etc. We can fill all the extra curricula hours with challenging projects but he still needs to find ways of managing being bored for 35 hours a week at school.

How can he be several ?ears ahead on English and maths in reception when he wont have covered those curriculums yet? For example, take decimals or angles that are normally covered in maths year 2-3, your son has already done them? How? Does he have a tutor at home? If so can you make that a full time arrangement and ditch school.
in English, operating at several years appear is unusual as children don't normally have the ability to produce writing of a standard of several years ahead even exceptional readers. Their hand writing is also often not as advanced as their reading.
It's unusual to children to spend time in reception being bored especially bright children who can design, invent, make , build to their hearts content which is perfect for little geniuses!
Teach him another language, chess, sport, cooking, science, a musical instrument.
But above all work in his beahviour and social skills or finding a suitable school could be a challenge.
Good luck

Have you thought about contacting one of the educational consultants like Gabbitas? They will know which schools are best at dealing with this kind of situation - and our experience is that its not always the obvious ones.

Reception is partly about learning how to cope in the school environment so no matter how bright your DS is he has to understand that the school day at any school is tailored for all the children not just him.

I agree that you should look at CC or WUS and the pre- preps that feed into them. Also look at the pre-prep / preps that feed into W and StP at 13+ It partly depends on where you live as well.

Heels, my DS did this. His reception teacher advised us to stop teaching him fractions.
We were mystified, but it turned out that he'd found a homework site on the internet with reminders on how to do it and worked it all out for himself. Same with the rest of the curriculum stuff. Then he got bored and found himself another site - think it might have been the NRich one.

Once they can read, there's no stopping them