Should we change my daughters’ school?

[Tsc2011]

Hi,

We have a big dilemma regarding my children’s primary school, and no idea what’s best.

We previously lived in an affluent area of the country but moved back to my home town a few years ago, partly because the options for education where we’d lived was a low performing comprehensive or private schools. Where we live now is not so affluent, the comprehensives are really not great, but there are two grammars (one of which I went to) and options for bursaries at a private school if the children meet a certain academic level. I know not everyone is a fan of grammars, which is not what this post is about, but we wanted to give the children a chance at a good education.

The local primaries are generally small village schools and we chose one which seemed to do well and had a lovely family feel. The children have lots of friends and generally love school but cue lockdown and we were not impressed. There were no online lessons, books weren’t provided, there was barely any work (half an hour a day at most of very repetitive worksheets) and a lot of the work they did went unmarked. Our eldest particularly struggled with this lack of structure and interaction with her teacher.

Going back to school nothing noticeable has been done to help children catch up and in my eldest’s class there are now 7 year olds with the reading age of 4 year olds or lower. A large proportion are not meeting expected levels and to put this in to context, there are only 11 children in her class.

The school had a short Ofsted inspection in December and received a damning report which was in line with our concerns. The Head’s response was to send us a 3-page letter of excuses and reasons why Ofsted is wrong.

Thankfully, through a lot of work on our part (and some expensive purely post-lockdown confidence-boosting tutoring for my eldest) my children are “exceeding expectations” in reading, writing and maths but at a recent parent’s evening we were told my eldest has very recently started to struggle a little with writing and may get “meeting expectations” in her SATs. We’re not bothered by the SATs but I am worried about my child who has been getting worried and upset about it. The teacher’s reaction was to get frustrated and effectively wash her hands of helping her in any way. The issue was passed to us to solve which appalled me.

Cut to one week later and we’ve had some pretty bad news. The school currently has 4 classrooms, each housing 2 year groups. Due to decreasing numbers of pupils they are removing the nursery and 2 members of staff and reducing to 3 classes. One of which will be taught by the Head (who currently teaches a little but parents aren’t impressed with) and my eldest’s current teacher. This class will house 3 year groups! It will also mean my eldest will have had her for 4 years! She isn’t managing to effectively teach her current 2-year group so we’re really concerned.

There’s possibly the option to change schools but none particularly stand out. The one closest to us is more child-led but I’ve heard mixed reviews.

Any suggestions as to what we should do? I’d hate the girls to miss out on the chance of good secondary education because we made the wrong choice but it would be heartbreaking to move them from their friends who they’re incredibly close to. My eldest also has issues with change and finds it very stressful to say the least.

It’s possible that if they stay where they are we’ll have to pay for tutoring for both throughout (not something I agree with or ever envisioned but the difference between the tutored children and those that aren’t is very stark).

I would probably look at keeping them where they are and having tutors. I made a similar decision for my DS who is taking his SATs at the moment and it seems to have worked for him. Socially staying at the school was best but he struggled to get the academic support he needed hence the tutors.

I don’t see how a teacher could ever effectively teach 3 year groups at a time so I’d leave for that alone.
But then I don’t think you can teach 2 year groups effectively and meet all the childrens needs

Yes I would look at other schools. Mainly because the staff don't seem open to improvement and are just making excuses.

It's normal in small schools for a class to consist of multiple year groups. I guess you need to consider whether you want your children to go to a small school or not. personally I think they can be great for younger children as more nurturing but not so good for older children, and would move them for this reason alone! If it's a local village school presumably they can still see friends out of school?

It's worrying that your DC is getting worried and upset about not doing so well in writing though, particularly as it sounds like she's actually well ahead of her peers. Perhaps you need to consider if you are putting too much pressure on her/putting your own worries onto her? 7 year olds should be oblivious of SATs and school standards!

Why would you leave you dc in a school that's essentially a childcare provision not a place of learning?

Do you have the option to move again?

Could you home school?

If you leave your dc in school with such little ambition, their education will not easily recover.

I world definitely move, I can't see how that plan is going to close the gaps given that the previous 2 year class didn't

DS16 went to a one form entry primary and just scraped a pass in GCSE due to gaps in his learning from a torrid time with teachers at primary, not closing the gaps more can have an exponential knock on effect.

I wouldn't be surprised if others moved theirs too so they may end up together with friends at the new school.

I world manage DC with levels though, they shouldn't know what their levels are at that age

Thanks everyone, just for clarification, she doesn’t know what her levels are. Her anxiety is coming from struggling in class, not getting help from the teacher but also listening to the teacher sing the praises of another child. She’s a generally anxious child anyway and very highly strung.

I had lots of doubts about tutoring but it does seem to have relieved her maths anxiety and we check in with her weekly to see if she wants to continue. As soon as she doesn’t, we’ll stop.

Talk to the school about your concerns. They may be able to reassure you a little. For instance, if the class are going to be taught by current teacher and the head, it is possible that they will actually subdivide them for maths and/or literacy. You can ask how they are going to manage the foundation subjects so that nobody misses out. It's also reasonable to ask questions about the issues raised in the Ofsted report, and ask what is going to change to address them. Their "excuses" may have some validity (I guess mostly "covid") but there still needs to be a plan to move forward.

Bear in mind that if your child is generally anxious, she might find it rather more stressful to move to a school with larger class sizes and more high-achieving children.

Some small schools are very effective.