4 day week in Reception

[emanjay]

Hi has anyone asked or currently got their child attending Reception part time? I would like to take my son out one day a week to have time with grandparents or do other activites - he started Reception on monday and haven't plucked up courage to ask teacher yet - feel bit silly like they will think i'm strange - school not compulsory until age 5 so don't know where i stand?

You can do part time but you need to let them know as it might affect their funding.

Going part time does not affect their funding. You have the right to ask for your child to attend part time until the start of term following his or her 5th birthday. However, the school do not have to agree to your request.

I'm a bit confused by all this (and prh47bridge - as you seem to be the font of all knowledge I hope you have the answer...). On the application form for schools it says children can now attend part time - or defer - until their 5th birthday. It does not say that this is at the discretion of the schools - is this implied in some way? I assumed it might be a new change because school entry is now all september only. But when i asked two of the schools i toured around they both knew nothing about it - in fact, when i called the council - who have written the brochure - they knew nothing about it either (everyone has promised to call me back - no one has. It's a bit dispiriting).
I would like my children to go part time until January (when they would have started - they are late march births) or even defer until January and then go part time until their fifth birthday. Is this still entirely at the schools discretion despite what it says on the councils website?
Thanks

It says: "Parents can defer their child's entry into the reception class, or ask for their child to go part-time until the beginning of the term following their fifth birthday"

I suppose 'ask' suggests it is at the schools discretion - although it also implies that it's a reasonable request for hte parent to make (and therefore for the school to agree to).

I cannot imagine this ever being approved- you have a legal duty to educate your children and if you have chosen a school that's school hours - other option is to home educate

part-time education until 5 may be offered by some schools but means shorter days not weeks

I think it's a bit like the right to ask for flexible working patterns - you have a right to ask but not to get.

I think that him missing a whole day every week means he will miss out on the same things each week which seems a pity.

That seems odd to me. You have the right to ask for anything really. Saying you can ask, implies that the choice of full time/part time etc is up to you.

Go for it. After all, they're only young once and he will benefit from a day to unwind. In my experience (my DD went part time for one term), my DD ended up asking to stay on the other days because she wanted to be with her friends and felt she was missing out. Fair enough and at least we had a full term where she wasn't so tired and didn't get ill all the time. Once she was full time she picked up so many ailments!! Good luck and enjoy this time with your son.

It's not always true that part time means shorter days not weeks; our local primary does Monday, Wednesday, Friday as part time.

You'd be allowed at our school.

kattyo - The Admission Code gives you the right to defer the start date for your child. The only restriction is that they must start full time school no later than the start of the term following their fifth birthday. It is not a good idea for summer born children to defer for a whole year as they will lose their allocated place but it is your choice.

The Admission Code also gives you the right to request that your child attends part time. However, it stops short of saying that schools must comply with such requests. The previous government seems to have intended to give parents the right to decide whether or not their child attended part time but that isn't what they actually did - they only gave parents the right to ask.

So you definitely have the right to defer whether the school likes it or not but the school can reject a request to go part time. Having said that, if the school rejected either request I would recommend appealing to the LA. If they also rejected the request and the parent felt strongly enough about it I would recommend an appeal to the Local Government Ombudsman. It would be interesting to see whether they enforced the previous government's intentions.

Thanks so much for that brilliant answer. I have been trying to get an answer like that for months. Very much appreciated.