Will the school say my child is not ready for school in September?

[Skate12008]

Skate12008 · Today 14:09
My son is due to start school in September. He is not 4 till August but I feel he is absolutely ready for school, but I am worried they will say he is not.

He currently goes to nursery 3 days a week and does not have any problems there. At first they did say he had a tenancy to not listen, but this has improved.

Yesterday he had a play and stay session for an hour, he got very over excited and did not want to sit down as he was keen to play. (He happily sits down at nursery for story time and nursery rhymes)

He had a some visit today with a TA and teacher I believe. He would not dona drawing task they wanted him to do(he is very capable of coloring etc) and they also had a puzzle they wanted him to do- this puzzle was very simple (a baby one). My son loves puzzles but he is into more advanced puzzles . He did go and get his own puzzle and completed the whole puzzle in front of them (to their surprise I think)

He got a bit over excited when they were here and showed of a bit . He tends to act silly when new people are around.

I am now worried they will say he is not ready. Is there enough reason for them to say this? Am I being over dramatic?

He is a very energetic child , but it also a very able child and I personally feel he needs to routine and structure from the school environment

Err......they cant refuse him. Isn't the home visit just a sort of meet and greeting thing?

He has a right to a full time school place from the September following his fourth birthday. You have nothing to worry about.

You are being overdramatic, its not an interview. He has a school place.

@BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz I thought so! But when we had a meeting with all other parents a few weeks ago, they said some children are not ready to start full time and may have to go part time?

But I'm unsure if that wild refer to chidlren who are SEN, or are not toilet trained, or are unable to be away from parents with out being distressed ?

I'm hoping I'm being over dramatic and worrying for nothing

They can’t refuse a school place. He’s entitled to start regardless the september after he’s 4. Unless it’s a private school. Maybe they have different rules.

Our school does have some kids on a part time basis but these are children with significant additional needs and this has been agreed with the parents

Well legally they can't say he's not ready 😕So yes, you are being silly.

Some schools have a lengthy settling in period where all kids attend for half days for a week or two maybe that's what they are referring to?

Bit no - other than the usual phasing into Reception class he has his place so will be going.

No, school cannot say any child isn’t able to start school. Even if they have SEN that means they are non-verbal, not toilet trained, etc etc
They can say that they are not really able to meet the child’s needs and recommend alternative provision.
Nothing you’ve said her would suggest that your child is not ready for school. He sounds like a fairly normal 4 year old, I’d a bit lively. You

It doesn't sound like anything unusual, you have nothing to worry about. If he was very distressed at being left for the day or was too tired (some have only just given naps at that age) then they might want to do a phased start, but neither of those applies here.

I think you will need to help understand about making good choices. Sitting down and listening to the teacher is s good example here. Not doing an easy task such as a puzzle but then doing your own puzzle suggests he isn't yet able to understand he might have to tasks he finds easy in order to do more complicated ones and that he likes doing his own thing. He will be young for his year but there's no reason why he can't keep up or go full time.

I'd spend the summer trying to start teaching him to read as this will put him at a huge advantage academically.

@pollymere do be careful and ensure you know what you are doing if you choose to begin teaching your child to read in the few months before they start school.
Especially check the font that the school uses in their reading books and displays- all letters may look the same to you , but for a beginner the difference between a letter with a little tail on and one without is huge and until they are really secure in the familiar shape they can be easily confused and put off. (Until now they have spent time learning that e.g. a chair, is a chair whichever way up it is… now you need them to believe p b d and q are different !)
Also make sure you are very confident with the phonics (sounds that the letters make) Don’t start with letter names (Ay, bee, see even if they know them. Use the sound by itself. Again, with a beginner it really matters about putting a schwa (uh type vowel sound) at the end of a sound- for example cuh ah tuh blends to make a northern pronunciation of Carter, it doesn’t make cat! And don’t begin with capital letters- they’re all a similar shape, (blocks!) but lower case letters have very different shapes so are much easier to distinguish, and that’s what they will learn first in school.
I’m sorry if this is really obvious to you, but I have had many a child in tantrums or tears because they’re not secure in their learning and the letters and sounds in school are different to what they have begun to learn at home so they have a huge loss confidence.
This doesn’t apply when the child has been reading for a while and is actually ready to explore different ways of writing and reading obviously. It is just important in the first few months.

Yeah, more important that he can put his coat on and use the toilet.

It’s good if they can recognise their name.

The school will teach them to read, probably using ‘Jolly phonics’ which is used on tv on ‘Alphablocks’. As mentioned above it’s about the letter sounds and trying to avoid adding an ‘uh’ sound afterwards. So it’s ‘mm’ not ‘muh’ and ‘c’ not ‘cuh’.

But there’s no real benefit to him being ahead.

Just to add, recognising their name in different fonts and in capital and lower case letters is actually a very useful skill and won’t confuse as it’s usually learned first as a sort of giant mix of shapes rather than individual letters.

Don’t forget to show them words in the environment! (Again font etc isn’t important here, it’s more like learning their name) Words in the supermarket when you shop, matching the words on the shopping list to the ones in the display or the display to the tin, words on adverts, on the road, road signs… play “find my letter” looking for the first letter of their name in words around them… All fantastic scaffolding for learning to read (and easy to do on the hoof, like counting stairs as you use them, one number to each step.. we all do it and it is brilliant learning !)

The absolute best preparation for learning to read is being read to. There have been so many different studies about reading over decades, the one thing that they all find is that children who are regularly read to are always at an advantage. Reading to children isn’t just fun in the moment. They are learning how books and stories work, you start at the front, you go left to right in English, anticipating something new on the next page, the structure of a simple plot, the way to turn pages, that reading opens new worlds, it’s enjoyable, you find things out by reading, reading is a grown up thing… all the scaffolding required to become a confident life long reader.

I wouldn't worry at all about teaching him to read.

Teach him to do his shoes, his coat, to listen, to take turns, share etc.

3 mornings at nursery to 5 full days at school will be a big jump, so prepare for him to be exhausted at first (with all the delightful behaviour that tired 4 year olds exhibit). Remember that some will be a year older than him and used to five full days at nursery, so if he takes a little longer to settle that's ok.

@Riv My nine-year old brother taught me to read. I was three. We got on fine without worrying about phonics, letter sounds and word blending.

My own was reading books by four without phonics etc. They still passed their KS1 SATS and know what a split diagraph is. They also understood prepositional phrases, adverbials and determiners.

It is so sad that parents are scared to read with their child - either reading a book or teaching them to read words themselves - because they feel they are not teachers so therefore don't have some necessary skill. I've ended up having to teach children to read in Y3 and seen some of those students then struggle at GCSE. They're not stupid - they've just disengaged from learning due to not being able to catch up after learning to read so late.

thank you for all your advise

We do usually read every night before bed time which he enjoys, (if I forget he usually asks if I can read to him) but I think with regards to learning to read, I would hate to teach him one way and the school teach him a different way and I do not want to confuse him.
Obviously when he starts doing this at school, it is something we will then do at home to in the way he has been taught to do it

He is certainly about to identify letters, and after receiving his work book from nursery yesterday it seems I lack a little faith in him! (which i feel terrible about) there was lots of work in his journal from the year, with pictures of him sitting down doing paining/ drawing etc , writing the first letter of his name etc.. - so he obviously is able to sit and concentrate

he is very capable of dressing himself, putting shoes on, doing coat up, going to the toilet independently, using cutlery etc - so I feel I may be worrying over nothing! I think he is just a typical active, energetic 3 year old

@pollymere , you should note that I did not say don’t teach your child to read, just that different approaches during the early months can be confusing and potentially put children off reading for a long time-
Some children are read and many are good readers by the time they start school . I think that is a good thing. Parents should not be put off.

Like you , I have also taught far too many (verging on hundreds) of mainly secondary age children to read who were unable to read their own names. I personally do not favour the current synthetic phonic approach , but as you will know, not only is it one of many useful tools, it’s also the recommended government method and state schools are obliged to teach it (unless they want a very major “deep dive” and endless, time wasting, tedious arguments with OFSTED)
You learned at 3, so by the time you were in school you were already secure. Any difference used in school would not be a problem to you. If you were just beginning the basics a month before you started school, then you might have had a different outlook.

It’s not reception that’s so much of a worry; it will be year 1 when he’s expected to start the year fluently reading aged just 5 that will be the rude awakening. Suddenly required to sit and comply for much longer etc. it’s when you start to see a lot of the august born boys start to spiral and be unfairly labelled SEN by the teachers rather than acknowledging that born a few weeks later and they’d still be practising phonics and writing their name in reception. It’s madness forcing little kids to start so young. There is literally zero research that shows it’s good for them.