can early reading mean free private school?

[amidaiwish]

DD1 is 3.7 and has taught herself to read.

A friend told me to get an appt with the headmaster of our local private prep school (we are on the waiting list but have very little chance of getting in) and tell him that he will want her in his school as she is clearly very bright.

This seems very pushy and alien to me. However i don't want to let her down by not having the balls to do this.

Is it a crazy idea?
How should i approach it?

and before i get flamed, maybe i should have put this in education?!?

No experience in getting scholarships into prep school but although very well done to your dd, is this particularly unusual? I have a few friends who have taught their children to read before school age. I think in this era of pushy parents trying to teach their children early you might find there is a lot of competition.
No harm in trying though.
(I am not by the way saying you are a pushy parent - I'm just saying there are lots out there. Two of my friends pay for their three year olds to have a tutor!)

'This seems very pushy and alien to me.'

dont do it then

I don't know what your financial situation is like (I'm guessing not too dire if your dd is already on the waiting list of a private school) but I was told by a private school headmistress recently (not apropos of our dd - we personally are happy with state schools at primary level) that these days most scholarships with serious help towards fees are very strictly means-tested, so only people who are very short of money would have a chance of getting one, regardless of ability (which seems reasonable enough). Don't know how true this is.

I also agree that reading at 3.7 is not by itself that unusual these days.

amidaiwish - could you find out if the school offers scholarships and if so, what age of children do they go to and how much fee rebate do you get?

Also, bear in mind that this school may contain the children of lots of pushy parents (not accusing you of this btw), but I think I would like my DS in a school where all round happiness is important, not just academic achievement, whether this is a state school or a private school.

If you want to go private, is there another one you could look at? From what I understand, some private schools have waiting lists and are ridiculously competitive (tutoring young kids etc), whereas, other private ones are non selective, but will still stretch a very able child.

Feel free to ignore as my DC not even old enough to go to school lol!

thanks for all your advice.
the school she is on the waiting list for is not overly academic nor that competitive. i have rejected the others for exactly the reasons you say.

i think i'll leave her where she is. i've only got her name on the waiting list as a back up - we're in Richmond and there is a desperate shortage of primary school places. I don't want to have to drive 1.5 hours round trip to get them to school like a few families on my road!

yes, maybe 3.7 isn't that young. It is more because she has done it herself. I'm just worried that she will be bored and disruptive if she isn't pushed at school. She's not a quiet studious type and can
already be fairly cheeky.

There are scholarships in private schools, but very often they are only for a small amount of the cost. the school mine go to gives out bursaries of 10% of the fees.

My dd also learned to read very early, and is (at 10) a prodigious reader who is now off the charts. She didn't get a bursary though, there were kids brighter then her, who got them

Feel free to try. Don't get your hopes up too much

Sounds like you've made a sensible choice already, so this is a bit late - but:

• free place, really really doubt there are any (for prep - different picture at secondary of course)

• bursary, tend to be few & far between, esp. not in London where there is competition for places so you can fill your school with full-fee-payers. The few schools that do do fees help (I think Bassett House in W10 does) make a point of letting people know about that, because it's so unusual & gives the school a USP

• preference for place, I'm afraid that is realistic if your dd is bright AND the sunny, mature, motivated, independent-learner-type child. As who wouldn't want that child? (Bright alone isn't enough - I have one super-bright child, that no private school wants; and one competently-bright plus all the independent-learner stuff above, that can name her own place. It isn't really fair, but it's life - well, London private school life).

thanks all.

Bink - so how should i go about securing her a place if she is on the waiting list?

Really just phone the headmaster and say "you want my child?"...??!

I'm not sure you'd be able to go from waiting list to confirmed place - but my somewhat-cynical-but-confirmed-by-experience view is that if a place becomes free (one of the confirmed places drops out) "discretion" may be applied as between the children on the waiting list - so if no.1 on the waiting list looks a bit of a liability but no.2 is a sweetie with helpful committed parents, well no.2 might just get offered the place.

So I think all you should do is just let the school know how keen you are to join it - say you'd be delighted to bring your dd in to meet staff if they'd be interested - ask them if there's anything else you can do - etc. Just keep the keen contact going.

(I should add though that schools will be quite used to this kind of demonstration of keenness, and if you're not absolutely sincere about it they will probably be able to tell. So I'd say only do the above if you really do want a place there.)

Amidaiwish - I am in richmond too and I would be really surprised if a prep school would take your DD on the grounds of her ability now.

It is so competitive around here it drives me mad

The time to look for scholarships and bursaries is at 11+ - if she is genuinely very bright then this is when it will play out.

None of the prep schools round us, albeit not down South or near London, don't do scholarships at all. They don't kick in until secondary level.

thanks.
that clears it up for me, i think i'll make some contact, stress how much we'd like her to go and drop in "she is already reading, loves Little Gym and swimming" and leave it there.

After my friend told me they give free prep school places to bright children in her borough, i just wanted to make sure i wasn't missing a trick!

In addition if the school does give bursaries at infants school age, it will tend to be for infants school only. there will be scholarship exams during year 2 that will determines who gets the scholarships for the next 4 years. And then another set of exams at age 11.

getting one early on is no guarantee of keeping it for the whole of the school years. and the scholarship exams are open (as they should be) so competition is stiff.

I have another self taught reader. She is now 2yr8ms and has been assessed (by a teacher friend) of having a reading age of 9yrs+. We have found her a school to go to, the local head told me 'I dont think we can accomodate her'....really???? I was very surpised by that, but living out in the country we dont have amny alternatives. DD will be off to an independent school part time soon, we are paying for it. I wasn't expecting anyone else to pay for her to go. The main draw for us was small class sizes and a well balanced curriculum- PE everyday, music, drama, French, art etc. The school we have picked for her welcomed her with open arms and are already planning what to do with her...a bit premature I feel considering she hasn't started yet!
Good luck, I hope that you can find something.

Amida, I think I know which school you mean and the waiting list there moves very fast when state school allocations are made as LOTS of parents use it as a backup and sit on the list for years. I know of a child who got a place in June of this year to start in September.

You could go and see them and ask how they would deal with a child who starts reception fluently reading already. That should do the trick, if there is a trick to be done.

I wonder whether our paths have ever crossed at Little Gym?

Twickenham Prep?

We go to Little Gym on Thursday afternoons....

You're unlikely to get any scholarship before Prep age (7/8+) and increasingly these are becoming bursaries which are means tested. Ours operates a first come , forst served allocatoion of places with siblings getting priority. There is some room for discretion but not sure your dd would be considered exceptional enough . You might be better waiting until she is 7 when class sizes tend to increase and academics are used to allocate places, if she isn't allocated a space now.

Twick Prep is a fabulous school. We have friends with a child who goes there. It's not a pushy hot house like so many of the others round here - they seem to genuinely value every child for who they are.

I think if you're looking for a school that will gasp with wonder, that's possibly not the one!

(and quite a few children start state school reading and are perfectly happy!)

My second daughter was reading at 3. It's not that unusual. Just depends on the personality of the child. She did get into North London Collegiate at 7 but I don't think anyone was on scholarships at that age. Due to this stupid Government's new silly charity laws most private schools are being forced to slash all academic scholarships and only the poor but very clever children will get any help if it's a school that offers. As most of the better private prep schools have many applicants per place many of whom are very bright they don't really need to be offering cheap places but schools that may be want to increase the IQ level of those in them and are keen to get a few more very clever children in might be different.

amidaiwish, I live in Richmond, too. If your daughter is really bright, she will probably get into one of the better private secondary schools round here regardless of prep education. I went to a local state primary and then onto a v good school in Hammersmith. I could read at two and a half and was perfectly happy in a state primary - tbh, I think it's nice for children to have some unpressured years before the round of exams etc.

Nobody should reply to this - I know I am on a hiding to nothing even posting but I do get cross when people assume that if their child is bright, private school is the only way to go!

Better to learn French, have specialist teachers at a relatively young age, do games every day etc., rather than doing yet another set of worksheets, Seeker.

Not sure why you need specialist teachers at 6 - and no, we don't do French til year 4 at our state primary.

But we do have games most days and not sure what's wrong with worksheets. How do you find out what work you're supposed to be doing at independent schools?