Moving back to UK (Colchester). How to choose a primary school?

[lostinthought]

Hello all. I'm new to MN and looking for some advice on Colchester primary schools.

We are currently living in Jerusalem and will not move back to the UK till the summer. I may need to choose a primary for my DD without having visited it so would really welcome any advice on good primary schools in or around Colchester and what to look for when choosing a primary for DD, age 6 currently year 1. I am looking at SATS results and Ofsted reports, but nothing is jumping out at me and its hard to get a feel for any particular school. I would love to hear anyone's personal experiences of schools in Colchester.

DD is Arabic/English bilingual, but is also taught French in school (five lessons a week) and is making good progress. Will I find any Essex primary schools that teach French?

All advice welcome. Many thanks.

I think you may have less choice than you think if you are talking about state schools. Do you know where you are going to live yet? That more or less determines which school you get offered. Generally the local authority will offer you places in state schools that have them, but many will probably be full - look at the Essex council website for details on admissions outside the normal round. It might be a good idea to ring them up to and ask about the likelihood of spaces.
No French here in London, but maybe Essex do, though in state system that level of learning sounds unlikely.
Sorry to be so negative - hope you get something sorted out.

We had two children to place in October. It really depends on subscription etc. If you have a rough idea where you are going to be you could call and get a feel for which schools are oversubscribed etc.

When we moved back we looked at the option of moving back before the kids had the summer holidays. This would have meant that they would have been at the top of the waiting list should anyone drop out over the holiday. This obviously means having somewhere to live before you apply. In the end we moved back in September. We had to wait 3 weeks for the kids to get places (we took the chance that one child on the waiting list had 7 days left to start school otherwise my child would be allocated the place so it took a little longer but we got the school we wanted).

If you call the schools and they are very subscribed it might just mean that you chose a slightly different area / side of town etc and hedge your bets. Our authority was quite good about telling us that there was basically no point in trying for a certain area due to the number of siblings links and distance from school criteria already being met by kids on the waiting list.

Hope my waffle makes some sense.

As pp said -Have a look on LA website about procedures - I am moving not in Essex - and the LA told me which schools had places and which had waiting lists - this gives me at least a feel for where is viable . probably a mumnet local page for colchester or essex - so maybe post on there
some primary schools teach french I don't know about essex but normally not in y1 - there are often out of school classes that teach french around and about

I live in Colchester and it's well known for having a variety of schools, most of them are considered pretty good from what I've heard. I don't know what languages they teach, but generally what schools you are offered will depend firstly on what area of Colchester you end up living in (your catchment area). If you aren't specifically bothered about what area you live in then I guess its worth checking out the schools first and sorting out accommodation second.

Thank you all for your replies. Lots to consider. I don't think I had realised how much it comes down to waiting lists etc. I have been in touch with the LEA to check which year dd will be in come September, but I will have to get back to them to see which schools are likely to have spaces.

Minibmw, I lived in Stanway previously, but had thought that if a school in another area of Colchester stood out, then that could decide for us where we move to.

Thanks again for all your replies and advice.

Hi there

We are also moving back to the UK. We have been residing in Sydney Australia for the past 3 years and will be back in Essex in June. We are quite keen on moving to Colchester, anyone have any suggestions on nice areas with nice primary schools? So far, we have been calling schools and were advised we need to be in the area before we can apply (although most have waiting lists for year 3!). We were thinking of finding good schools first and then heading for the accomodation second.
Any help would be appreciated!

I used to work in colchester and i think it is called the hamilton primary school is a very good school but i wouldnt know what sort of chance you would have getting your children in their.

There are many good schools in Colchester, but there are also a number of good schools in surrounding villages.
Look on the league table website to draw up a shortlist, look at the schools' own websites (that will give you a bit of a 'feel' for the school) and take it from there.

Oh, and look at the secondary schools they feed into too as they vary somewhat.
Although there may be the 11+ option if your children are academic.

Looking for a place in year 2 is going to be tricky in a good school although places do come up. If you are planning on staying in Colchester for some time then I would strongly recommend you check out the secondary school catchment as this is more critical in Colchester - there are definately some I would want to avoid. Personally I would go for Stanway or the Gilberd at secondary level and both have some good catchment primaries.
I believe alot of primaries are now teaching some languages from reception up. My Dc's do Spanish but it is only an introduction. Interestingly my DS1 who is at secondary and started french last year has discovered he is no worse at it than children who have been taught it since age 5, (and better than some!) - I'm not sure if this is an indication of how bad primary language education is or just that you pick up a second foreign language quicker than the first.

Good luck with the move.

Thank you for all your advice! Will start looking around and getting in touch with schools. Only 8 weeks until we arrive back in the UK so it would be better when we can actually see places too.

Post again if there's anything else you want to know about the area/schools.

Hi! Timtam4,
I know this thread is really out of date, but I wanted to check what School you ended up sending your child to?
We are moving back to the UK from Belgium, where my little girl, who’s 5 years old, has been totally immersed in French since she was born - School, Creche, clubs etc.
My husband and I are both English, but we really want for my daughter to continue learning french preferably at school.
Any advice please?? Thank you so much:)

Meant to add that the area would be Essex.