SW London primary school choice at year 3 for g & t DS

[Schoolgifted17]

Hi all, seeking views/advice please
DS is 6 and currently year 2 at pre prep. He is easily top of year at Maths and reading age of 8+. Loves school work and studying, also good at music /puzzles. However has diffucult irs with social interactions and is incredibly perfectionist, gets very anxious when makes mistakes

for various reasons, he will be leaving the prep as will his peers this year, but he will be going to a state school from year 3 until at least Year 6 (I may apply for 11+ at grammar/private then).

my question is, can anyone recommend a primary school(s) in sw London which will support his abilities and help him thrive? From my research very little available on school websites regarding stretch/extension for the most able. Also any specific questions to ask the schools?i don’t want him to be bored if the schools teach from the bottom (so to speak)

looking at schools in Richmond, Putney/Wandsworth

thank you !

As a school governor I can say that all schools should be creating differentiated work for students. In practice this is typically designed to stretch the top 10% of the ability range. After that, resources typically don't allow for further differentiation.

Your best bet on this is to look for a school with a relatively high proportion of high achieving students so the baseline teaching is high and then differentiation can then stretch beyond the norm. Look for high value add scores among the top cohort.

Judith Kerr fits the bill though its in Herne Hill not Richmond Putney. https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/139907/judith-kerr-primary-school/primary/results-by-pupil-characteristics?accordionstate=1

https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/139907/judith-kerr-primary-school/primary

The government website at the link will have this information for all state schools so I'd do a search for your target areas and troll through the information from there.

@MusicMum80s thank you for your response.
quite a few of the Richmond schools I’ve considered are high achieving in terms of high % of pupils achieving at greater depth. A lot of these children go on to private schools at 11+ so I think tutoring is rife, which may or may not a be a reflection on the teaching. When I’ve spoken to some of the staff re differentiation they seem fairly vague or don’t seem to like it.

but I agree that teachers at such schools teach from a higher baseline.

ivr heard of Judith Kerr school. Such a shame it’s not in sw London 😞

Won’t it depend which school has a place? You might not have a huge choice.

As your child will be classed as an in year admission, your choice will be limited to schools that have places available in the year group he will be going in to. You need to contact your local authority school admissions department to find out which schools in your chosen area does have vacancies. The only plus is that as he will be entering Year 3, schools are more flexible regarding admissions numbers so they may well admit a child even though it takes them over the class size limit of 30.
Once you have this list, you can then start checking them out.

@Soontobe60 exactly what I am doing. I am interested in actual experiences of these schools from others whom have been in a similar situation. A lot of these schools seem good academically but I’m interested in experiences

If you are in Richmond, go and have a look at Darell. It is not one of the schools where there are tons of high achieving children. But my very clever child absolutely thrived there because they are so used to teaching to a wide range of ability. She had amazing opportunities and differentiation there plus the irreplaceable experience of learning what the real world actually looks like. She got into Tiffin and St Paul's, so being in a lower achieving primary did not hold her back.

@BonjourCrisette thanks for your insight, very interesting! This is the first positive thing I’ve heard about Darrell. Ds has now been offered a place which has been accepted for September - I won’t say which school as it’s outing, but we liked what we saw and fingers crossed ds will be happy there. The school have a few going to Tiffin this year.

I think Darell, much like St Paul's, is one of those schools where 95% of what you hear about it comes from people with no personal experience! Hope your DS has a fab time at the school you've been offered.