Moving up a class in a state school

[Comfy55]

My September born son just started Reception at a state-run primary a week ago and already I am very concerned. The problem is that he's been in a private run nursery for the past two years and he is quite advanced for his year group. He reads competently, does very well at addition, subtraction and even multiplication and division, writes short stories etc etc. Since he's been at school all they have done is had a couple of books read to them, they have played in water and sand and done some colouring. Although this is all good for learning via play etc. I am very concerned about his academics and given his personality I know he will soon tire of this and start getting distracted. I am thinking he probably needs to be assessed by the school and perhaps moved up a year. His nursery school teachers advised me to try and pursue this before he left nursery but I have no idea what the process is and if it is even possible. Has someone being through this and what is the process? Or is it better to leave him where he is as he has started making friends.

bullethead my son is 26 so unfortunately gifted and talented programme was not the case then. Although at secondary school he was picked out and went on weekend course once. Yes I agree Ofsted do curb teachers.
mrz sorry not ignoring you , sorry refreshing page fast enough.
My daughter is year 3 and they have just started setting 2 and 5 timetables for homework, are yopu telling me to go into school tomorrow and ask why they haven't learnt them in reception?

MY ds1 has just started reception. He's been put on Able, Gifted or Talented register for reading. He is the oldest child, but is reading very very well (self-taught for the most part). The school picked up on it almost immediately.

His writing however..... Can just about write his name. Just. (Actually - being unfair. His writing is OK but nowhere near as fluent as his reading).

I would be very very anti putting him up a year. Reception class is important and if the school are doing what they should be, they should be identifying his individual needs and making a plan for how they will demonstrate forwards progress over the course of the year. DS1 would be completely out of his depth socially in year 1. I'd much rather he is the oldest and doing very well comparatively than the youngest and struggling to keep up.

Kitty my son left school at 16 which is ok but as he was picked out for gifted and talented program make me feel he didnt achieve his potential. Would it have made him happier ? I dont know he would have to answer that. He wasn't happy at secondary school.

I would be wondering why they are leaving tables until Y3 it isn't normal practice

as for EYFS goals for the end of reception
"Uses developing mathematical ideas and methods to solve practical problems"

which requires the child to demonstrate independently that they
solves or attempts to solve problems and
challenges by applying mathematical ideas and
methods. The child explores problems such as missing numbers, grouping (multiplication), sharing(division) and estimation, and responds to questions such as ?What could we try next?? or ?How shall we do it??.

and
In a range of contexts, the child explores and solves practical problems such as
doubling, halving, grouping and sharing, using her or his own methods.

It isn't too late for him to return to his education now, Florence, if he is interested. Lots of people do it that way these days...

pooka your school sounds great. But not all schools as good.

pooka your school sounds great. But not all schools as good.

I'm sure that's true, but equally, not all schools will be as bad as the one that your son attended. The OP's child has only been at school for a week. She needs to relax and see how it goes for a while.

mrz have friends with children at two other school in same eductional authority and they havent had table to learn at home yet. Maybe different authorities are different.DD has used table at school and yes I know they have done 10s 5s in class but not had to learn for homework until now.
magicmuummy son not interested in education, is working in a bank hates it and want to retrain as a plumber. Which is fine. But I wonder how he will feel later in life.

magicmummy sons school was not bad had other son who did well there. But it was not right for him. Teachers have 30 children to deal with my point is sometime a mum knows her child best. OP son may be better staying in reception but she is the best person to know that. If he is bored she must challenge his teachers. Yes agree a week is not long. I would wait at least a term.

Florence just because they haven't been sent home doesn't mean they haven't been taught ... we do teach things in school!

sorry not very good posting on here thread running too fast. Not meaning to be rude to any posters.

mrz I admire all teachers, am not trying to be critical. Yes I know teacher teach in school but was meaning that not many year 3s know table on testing. Im sure they could use them to solve problems my dd would just get her ladybird table book or google the answer if she didnt know them.

OP - I think some of the issue is that a child put up a year is going to be socially / emotionally younger, and if they're really bright, one year won't be enough - would you put them up again and again till they've left all their friends behind, they're years younger than their classmates and have nothing in common? That child won't belong anywhere - ever. Doing work that's still too easy in a class you know you shouldn't be in, and you hope the other kids don't find out, isn't a good way to go.

My son has just learnt to play in reception, and now has a solid bunch of friends. He's lucky there are bright kids in the class so a group can be differentiated together, but he plays with everyone, and is socially / emotionally happy. A year ago he was behind his peers socially - now he's not. He got 8's in his EYFS (yes I'm the kind of saddo that looked the bland comments up) for social/emotional development, and that meant so much more than than the academic side.

So reception was perfect for him. Longer term? I really don't know.

mrz just read back take back my comment a few teachers not good at their job, majority are very good. Sorry teachers.

has the OP actually been back?

anyway agree it's crazy to be worried about this yet, it's been a week FGS!

this is the last year your DS will actually be allowed to play as much as he wants. what's the rush to get him sitting in a chair all day? I was a clever kid, very advanced in yrR, but I had differentiated work and was very happy.

I've only realised as my DD started playing more (she's now 3.3) that learning through play is NOT inferior. I saw it with my own eyes last week when I was the rota parent helper at her preschool, playing with kids of varying ability.

e.g. imagine a table of bricks. one child just learning to build a decent tower, another planning different rooms, stairs etc for a house. another learning colours, another learning symmetry/patterns, a really clever child making square/cube numbers.

that's the beauty of learning through play, it is child led and a decent teacher, while obviously not being able to split themselves in thirty, will be able to slightly direct the play to encourage the children to discover their own challenges. IMO children should be allowed to make the most of this opportunity rather than being shoved into formal learning too early.

unless there was a condition like AS/ASD, I would be quite saddened by a 4/5yo who didn't want to play!

Algebra children play at home, before school, after school, weekends, long holidays, and at break times at school after reception. An August 31st child will be in year 1 the september before they are 6 , they are expected to cope. OP not been back, so agree thread a little silly.

Sorry, but I don't think a truly gifted child is going to get a huge amount more mental stimulation from 6-year olds than he is from 5-year olds. And a "merely" bright child is not going to be so unbelievably in advance of his peers that he will suffer in the long term from staying in a class with children of his age, provided the teaching is adequate (and if it isn't, then everyone suffers, the less bright probably more so...).

A bright child being turned off completely by formal education strikes me either as a child failed by seriously inadequate teachers, or as one who chooses to drop out not because of his intelligence, but because of the way he uses his intelligence and wishes to learn - ie however old the other people he is being taught with, he just doesn't suit formal academic learning in a school environment, but wants to play a different tune. If he subsequently becomes an Einstein, rather than a plumber, it's his choice, but he won't learn what he wants to learn at school, even if he is put with a group of 11 year olds at the age of 6.

Hi

my ds is now in year 2, I also like you was very concerned abt him being challenged as he was very bright, was Reading fluently, doing sums etc.

First, I'd like to say the main concern was from me, he absolutely enjoyed reception, as Hulabby said, bored doesn't have to be disruptive. Infact, I don't even think he was bored at all. Sen though he knew was Reading well, he still enjoyed sitting and learning he letter sounds with his friends. I was expecting the teacher to give him really tough work and all but that's not what reception is all about. It's meant for kids to get the idea that learning is fun, play, make friends, learn to share, manners and all kinds of social skills.

Having said that though, the recepton teacher noticed he was quite bright and gave him a bit of extra work to do which at that time I still felt was not challenging enough!

I did a lot with him on my own though. We went to the library often, we did a lot of writing and stuff. More importantly, we focused on learning outside of academics. Since he was advanced and there was no fear of him lagging behind, we took up extracurricular activities- swimming, football, piano, scouts, violin ( he asked for all of that!) he learnt to play the ocarina at school, also joined cookery club at some point!

Now, 2 years on, OMG! I'm almost screaming atthe work load! He gets to do some maths with the year above, he gets extra spellings apart from the ones for his class. He's now a free reader and gets these chapter books called beast quest- they're proper books and lots of homework. Now I feel like asking them to slow down!

My point it, most teachers know what they do, if a bright child becomes disruptive in reception- then the main aim I think in reception is to help that child be able to control himself. One of the things my ds learned in recption was that he still had to wait till he's asked a question or put up his hands before blurting out the answer even though he knew it.

Trust me, at age 5, they just want to play and have fun-

now 2 years on, OMG, I'm almost screaming about the work load! He gets to do maths with the year above,

Sorry! I thot I deleted the last part!!

To add, because I was so concerned about him not being 'stimulated' enough, I did some crazy stuff which were just ridiculous for a 5 year old! We started kumon( I'm sorry if any poster here is a pro-kumon), for my son, it was aweful, he hated it with a passion and after 2 months, we abandoned it after he said -in his sleep!- how much he didn't want to do it!

I also wanted to take him private. We viewed a really good private school and he told me how much he likedthe fact that they had a pool, the uniform waznice etc but he likes his school better!!!

He loved going to school everyday, it was fun for him. He would come home and insist on showing me the actions for the letter sounds- which made me think that was all they did. No! It was what he enjoyed. He didn't come home to tell me he enjoyed having to read ORT stage whatever. I'm glad start of school was enjoyable, and he still continues to be really bright but happy.

Just give it time. I understand your concerns and you're right to be but trust me, as long as he doesn't show signs of being depressed about it- enjoy the ride.

"And please dont tell me your children know all their table in year 1 . That great, but there are 45 children in my daughters year group and not many of them do. Your children are not average. Let face it mumsnet middle class above average intelligence"

Florence my DC go to an incredibly ordinary state primary. There is a huge mix of social and economic backgrounds, from families on benefits living in council houses to university lecturers. A good proportion of the children are not being taught in their first language, some are bing taught in their third. They are still expected to know their 2, 5 and 10 times tables by the end of Year 1 and are given it as homework over the summer holidays if they don't!

"that's the beauty of learning through play, it is child led and a decent teacher, while obviously not being able to split themselves in thirty, will be able to slightly direct the play to encourage the children to discover their own challenges. IMO children should be allowed to make the most of this opportunity rather than being shoved into formal learning too early"

Algebra I agree with you 100%.

thanks domestic - it's something I've only recently learned, I was always very academic, didn't really like playing, so I was convinced that formal learning should begin ASAP. can't believe I ever thought that now!

florence - yes, a child can do all their playing outside school but that's not the point IMO, they are children and that is what they are supposed to be doing all day - playing!!!

I do wonder about all these children who according to their parents are unable to learn through play but have to sit at a table and do the 3 'Rs because nothing else will stretch them.

How are they going to cope in secondary school where a lot of the work in science is lab work and a lot of the humanities stuff involves graphics and other practical stuff? Where they are expected to cope with resistant materials and cooking and graphics and design? If they can't do water and sand experiments as 4yos because they are already too advanced, how are they going to cope with physics and chemistry? Which is basically the same thing, just with a posher name. And science is a compulsory GCSE subject .

two of my nieces skipped some classes (abroad) and they did not have any problems socially etc. BUT, to be concerned about it after 1 week in reception?? I'll shake my head with mrs MRZ.
(ds in year 5 would probably prefer to be in reception because of the (lego) toys...)