Mixed age classes?

[nlr1]

I'm moving area and looking at two school both near to us for the DC who are 5, 8 and 9.
School 1- small, village type of school with mixed age classes (2/3 years groups per class). Ofsted rating outstanding (inspection was a good few years ago though) Seems like a friendly, close environment. More within walking distance

School 2- larger primary school, Ofsted rating good (inspection more recently). More facilities than the other school.

The main thing I'm contemplating is the mixed age classes. It's not something I've had any experience with before. I do like that the class sizes are smaller than average. My concern is reception, class 1 and 2 are all together and I'm not sure how well this works. If any of your DC go to a school similar to this how does it sort of work in practice, positives/negatives?

Have both schools got places for all 3? You'll get offered places, but the LA doesn't have to offer places in a school of your choice, or even the same school for all 3...

how close is school 2? smaller schools can struggle significantly with funding; i would generally look at a slightly larger one than your option 1.

It's not guaranteed of course but both schools have spaces and are local so if the option is there then I'm sort of thinking what the better option is as they're quite different schools. School 2 is just under 2 miles away

My daughter is at a school with 2 year groups per class and small class sizes (max 15 kids per class). It has worked well for us overall but because she's kept the same teacher for two years at a time, she's tended to get a bit fed up by around the middle of the second year. I think if classes are larger it might be more tricky for it to work okay

If it is a small school they will be well used to teaching mixed age classes. They will likely be far better at it than a school that has been forced into it recently to save money due to falling roles.
How would you feel about your 8 & 9 yos being in the same class?

I would go for the bigger school. My children went to a small, mixed year group classes. The classes were no smaller as they were made up of 15 from the younger year and 15 from the older year. I think it was harder to teach the curriculum properly as they basically had to teach the wrong curriculum for half the year, half of the time.
The main problem is small schools are very difficult for shy or quiet children (like mine were) - it’s very difficult to find friends/someone like themselves. It’s also harder to mitigate for a disruptive child - they can find it harder to escape them.

We have Reception, Year 1 & 2, Year 3 & 4 and then Year 5 & 6 together in my kids school. Works well I find, younger kids learn from the older ones, older ones can be the role model and help the younger ones. As it's a small school then if you don't have a 'best friend' in your year (through limited choice!) then there is likely to be a friend in the year above or year below. It's like one big family, everyone looks out for one another. Yes it doesn't have the best facilities, but that's not really a big concern for me. They'll get more of that at secondary level.
Plus because it's mixed and small, the teachers seem more flexible in levels - kid in year 1 excelling at maths - great can join the year 2's in their work. Kid in year 4 need more support in spelling - no problem can tag along with the year 3's. And because it's already mixed then it's not so obvious they are 'behind' or 'ahead' as they are together already!