What age do you think children should start primary school?

[sarahht]

What age do you think children should start primary school?
Is four too young for children to start school?
Are children ready to start school at such a young age?

I think 4 for the majority of children.

Between 5 and 6. I am resigned to barely four year olds starting full time school but still have an issue with the long days. My summer born dd loves school but there is no time or energy for anything else by the time she is home. Not a popular thing to suggest for working parents but lessons in the morning only would be quite enough. My entire school 'career' took place between 7.45am and 1.10pm and I did not learn less than children on the UK.

'in the Uk' -on phone

At least 6.

DD1 will be starting in September. She is 5 in November and will be one of the oldest. She can do most of the things required of her yet I still think she is too small to be away from me all day, and I will miss her. Not helped by the fact that I work 3pm-7pm so feel I won't see her in the week once Sept. arrives

Purely selfish I know, but they are small for so short a time, I want to enjoy as much of it as possible.

She absolutely loves going to nursery in the mornings and I don't think being there for another year would do her future any harm at all.

I think the teacher makes all the difference. If the teaching is based around play then 4 is fine.

I think it all depends on the child.

The nursery my DD (2.9 years) goes to is from 9am - 4pm or from 8am - 6pm. DD does the first option and finds it very easy to cope with - never overtired and still doesn't go to bed before 8pm.

Then again, she hasn't napped since she was about 4 months old and doesn't seem to need the same amount of sleep as her same age cousins or our friends kids (even if I do!)

Having seen the Panorama programme on Monday night though, I'll happily sign up for the £250 a month max, full-day nursery care they have from 1 till they start school in Norway!

5 is okay, 6 would be better.

I'd say 6 if the UK had anything like the nursery provision that the Scandinavian countries do, with well trained staff who are able to really teach the children real, skills like cookery and crafts and woodwork and outdoors skills. Oh, and fewer health and safety rules so nursery staff could really take the children out and about. Swedish children do not start formal education until 6 or 7 but they never seem bored: they are just learning different but equally valuable skills before then.

1. I think 4 is way too young and that the people who say they are "ready" are miguided. Yes, they are often ready to mix with other DC and to learn some more stuff...but formal learning is started way too early. I think it would be better if there was a choice...those who felt their DC were ready to begin learning full time could send them...those who wanted longer could keep their at home legally and with no bother..and maybe supplement with some kind of part time learning.

I bet there would be no gap by the time the kids got to 8 or 9.

Presumably though, most children starting school in Scandanavia at 7 can read, so where are they learning that? Probably at nursery, so isn't it just a case of what we call reception, they call nursery? If they havent started reading by 7, I'd think that was a bit late, not because it would mean they started secondary school behind, but just because it's a shame not to be able to read until then.

When I started school (1979) there used to be something called "rising 5's" where you went mornings until the term in which you were 5. All the "lessons" were in the morning so you didnt really miss out, but it was a longer transition for the younger children. Of course the real bonus was that the summer babies managed to dodge two terms of completely foul school dinners.

The problem is YR is supposed to be part of the foundation stage and a continuation of preschool.

Unfortunately competitive parenting and the emphasis on teaching DCs scarcely out of nappies to read wrecks it.

My Jan born DD1 had no problem with full days, but she really missed the freedom of nursery especially the bikes and out door toys. More sociable DD2 minded much less.

Neither gained anything from learning to read at that age. They would have both learnt their phonics much more easily a year later.

The more I find out about the local system here (NZ), the more I am convinced it's the way to go.

Children start the Monday after their 5th birthday. In the school my DD will go to, they go into a 'foundation' class for about 6 week or so, which brings the children to a similar level (following directions, getting used to school day etc). A group then will move into the Y1 class together. (and moving at the start of the next school year to Y2 has an age cut off, so they get to spend enough time in Y1).

Seems to work & also avoids the do I/don't I agonising for parents of children who are just over 4 at the start of school year that I see at home (Ireland)

Personally I think age 5.

DS started school at 4yrs and 2wks (31st Aug) and really struggled with the work and tiredness until the end of the Easter term.

DD is now 4yrs and 2wks and there is no way she is ready to go all day yet, she is tired from just doing nursery 5 days a week from 8.50-11.20.

Maybe part of the problem is that starting formal education earlier is seen by the government as a way of closing the social gap. Isn't that the theory behind nursery provision?

If they changed the system so that children dont go to school until they're 7, I imagine that a high percentage of children will have been taught to read by their parents. Many will be reading fluently. Others won't even have started. It means that as soon as they start school, there's a massive ability gap.

Dont know what the answer is btw. Just thinking around it.

Mine started at 5.6, 5.6 and 4.9 IN THE UK! but in Scotland, where no one starts before 4.6 and the youngest have the option to defer without having to skip a year - so my dd1 and ds still net into primary 1 when they began.

My gut instinct would be between 5 and 6 is good, sadly we were not able to defer for dd2 as she is a November birthday.

Reception is not counted as formal education. It is play based!

agree with picnicprime, 5 ok, 6 preferable IMO

DD1 started YR aged 4yrs 1 month, part time from September - Easter. She was more than ready for it.

DD2 started P1 (moved to scotland) aged 4yrs 10months and would have probably benefited from staying at nursery longer, as still struggles with her reading and writing as we near the end of P2.

DS is due to start school this year. We will be moving back south, so will start YR in September aged 4yrs 10months. Im not sure he is ready to be honest, he is still very much a toddler, and is undergoing SALT to help with his speech issues.

The one bonus I see by moving the kids back south this summer, is that in effect DD2 will repeat a year. She would be going into P3 this summer if we stayed here, but she will be going into Y2 in England. I think she needs it! It will hopefully give her a chance to solidify the skills she is learning at the moment, without the "rushing through the syllabus" that her current teacher admits to!

In an ideal world, I think there shouldnt be an "age" at which children start school, more a "level" at which they will be able to deal with what is expected of them in school.

Exactly the age they start at already.

I think 4 is way too young and that the people who say they are "ready" are miguided.

You could also say that those who say their children are not ready are also misguided because it is the parent who is not ready to let their child go!

My was a slow to read boy, never really got reading until yr7 where he passed a lot of children who were reading fluently in reception. That doesn't mean he didn't get a lot out of school for the two previous year. School is so much more than learning to read

My was a slow to read boy, never really got reading until yr7
OOPs [grin}

That should have said
My DS was a slow to read boy, who never really got reading until yr2.

I think informal mandatory schooling, something like kindergarten, playschool not sitting down and learning formally from about 4 is good.
formal learning to start from 6years or just under. many children, especially boys seem to struggle with the formal part (and sometimes just sitting still for a while) at age 4.

also to change the cut-off date maybe to february, so that the youngest are not just 4.

"Presumably though, most children starting school in Scandanavia at 7 can read". Why would you presume that? My dcs have been educated in the French system where children don't learn to read until they start compulsory education at the age of 7. The vast majority can't read (and indeed there seems to be no expectation by their parents that they will be able to), but they all learn very quickly (by Christmas in their first term). I would just add that although compulsory education doesn't start until seven, most French children start school much earlier than that. Mine were in Maternelle from the age of two-and-half - not learning to read and write certainly, but in a quite a rigid formal situation. I'm not banging the drum for the French system, in many ways it is far from perfect, but one advantage is that there is a degree of flexibility over when your child starts - Bonsoir mentioned the possibility of doing half days - though the reality is most children start young. The fact is that children develop at different rates and the year difference between the youngest and oldest in a class is less pronounced at 7 than it is at 4.

7

I think 5 is a good age, so start of year 1. I would like to see kids in nursery and reception though doing very play based learning with the option of having more flexibility of part time hours etc so that they are well socialised though. I know this is not a million miles away from what happens at a lot of schools anyway but I think I would put back the more formal reading, writing and numbers to Y1.