Choosing a Primary school, what should I be looking for?

[Lauren82000]

Hi Ladies,

I'm wondering if anyone can help me with what exactly I should be looking for in a Primary School for my DD. I'll be going to the open days next month but I have no idea what makes a school a good school or not. I don't really believe in league tables as a major part of the results are the children themselves not just the standard of teaching. The two schools that are closest to me are pretty much the same Ofsed level so that doesn't help either.
Are there any specific questions I should be asking when I go round the schools? I feel very clueless about the whole thing.

I found it helped to have a quite 'open-ended' question to ask, like 'How do you teach them to read?' or 'How do you handle children with different levels of ability?' and just see how the teacher or head responds to the question. Do they seem happy to talk about it, keen to have parents involved and understanding their approach? Or do they seem irritable and defensive about you even asking?

You are going to be interacting with the school a fair bit, and their attitude to parents will have more of an impact on how easy or difficult it's going to be than how they actually do things.

Not something to look for in the school, but it's worth knowing your realistic chances of getting into any given school. In our case we had only one realistic option, so we went round the school with a view that we would be sending our DC there unless we absolutely hated it - which put a different perspective on the visit.

Do they do streaming, settings, mixed abilities? If it is a big school that do sets how do they teach each set eg each set in a separated classroom? May check the school website to see how many fulltime class TAs and specialist TAs they have? Compare the school website with other outstanding schools' websites. Is it a feeder school to a particular comp? How do they support children who are very able and less able? ................

See how the children interact with the teacher and the head. If you go to a primary chances are the Year 6 children are showing you around. Ask them what they like about the school, see how they describe when you ask them about trips or clubs or what is going on during the school year.

We saw one primary and it was very difficult to get anything out of the pupil than a Yes or No and they hardly interact with the teachers in the classes they showed at all.

Last July we were given a tour at DD's new Junior school and these children couldn't stop babbling and pointing out various things by themselves, they were joking with the teachers, telling stories and you could see how proud they were off their school.

I also think it is important what the head's views are. School 1 was all about their results, their achievements but hardly anything about the pastoral care and how to make the children love learning and school. School 2 was a lot more how to make the school a happy place as the head firmly believed if a child loves to come and has a good relationship then the rest will come as well.

A few more to consider:
do they offer any before / after school care?
How do they manage transitions between years?
Do they have male teaching staff? How many?
How do they deal with bullying?
What's the PTA's involvement?
What lunchtime / after-school clubs do they offer for what age groups?
Do they do forest school? How often? Which years?