Moving state school to prep school

[EvilSidekick]

Does anyone have experience of moving their child from a state school to prep school? We have a DS who is coming to the end of YR. For various reasons we are unhappy with the school and would like to move him. A lot of this is centred around class sizes and poor behaviour. He has been hit, kicked, spat on by other YR children and despite several trips to the school the issue has not been resolved. Anyway, my question is not about that, but is really if we move him, when is the best time to do so? If we went the prep route we could not afford it for another year due to other circumstances. Have you moved a child in Y1 or Y2? How did you prepare them for the move? What assessments did they have to pass? Thank you in advance for any advice. We are also looking at trying to move to another state school but this seems very difficult.

When we moved DD in year 2 we found:
We had the grottiest car of all the parents (joy!!!!)
DD realised her handwriting was dire compared to everyone else
Her spelling was terrible compared to everyone else
She hadn't done homework before (but the homework was very minor)

The financial commitment is huge - for us it is definitely worth it because: the school has a really welcoming ethos, is small, doesn't have any girl bitch-groups and didn't care what a grotty car we had.

Moved our DC from an outstanding primary to prep ( lovely school, but coasting and complacent, DC bored) they were much happier being with others who were keen to learn - never heard of bullying, they flourished.

Hi. Considering moving my DS year2 from state to prep. We have his taster and assessment on Monday!

I will let you know what we decide.

The original question was more pastoral than academic, but lots of the replies talk about academics too, giving the impression that they are de facto of a higher standard at private. In practice, that's not always true.

This year, our "good" state primary had far, far more children holding offers from super selective grammars AND some of the most highly-selective independent schools in the country, than one of the well-thought of local prep schools to which a few of the former state-school pupils had moved after KS1. Tutors were engaged by many of the parents in both schools, so that's pretty much neutralized as a point of comparison. Year 6 parents at the indie were, by all accounts, livid when secondary school offers came out. Too late though and impossible to rectify for that cohort.

OP, although you can't pay fees yet, you could consider doing an in-year application for other state primaries. You never know when a place will crop up. Declining is easy if you do wish when the time comes. Having to remain in a school where your child is miserable, without options or hope, isn't great...

My DD2 went in year 4 to a non selective prep. Not all preps are over subscribed. We had a very weak Head at our state school and the school was on the slippery slope. I didn't to any coaching but the prep school was, and is, a top performing girls' prep. It had so many more things on offer and a wider curriculum. No SATs. The children there nearly all went off to top boarding schools, plenty with svhalships, so no interest in SATs, only CE. DD took her senior school's own exam so didn't do CE either. DD1 went from state primary to independent senior without any tutoring. Was in top 5 in her school year during all her time there. Her state education was not bad, just not inspiring. She did get the basics done though and in fact achieved better in French than everyone else that had studied French at prep school.

Children can easily move but you do need to consider finances very carefully before you commit. What will you do if you cannot stay at the independent school?

Thanks all. We would only move to a fee paying school if that was then the plan for the rest of their education. If we work it all and it's not viable then obviously state moves. On fairly detailed calculations we have done over last 10 days it seems manageable once our current major expense is over in next 12-18 months. We want disruption kept to a minimum so want to move him as few times as possible. It is miserable having an unhappy child and an unresponsive school.

I also meant to add that I have seen very poor teaching in my local ibdependent prep school in Yr, y1 and 2 with class sizes of 16. The state schools were nearly all able to get much better ks1 teachers. Small class sizes are not a good thing if you have poor teaching and there is plenty of evidence to show that teaching counts more than class size. I think also that you need to be more assertive in asking the school to deal with the poor behaviour but you may gave to accept that some children have special needs and these will not be resolved overnight. I would be confident a good school will be working on the behaviour of the pupils. Most children learn pretty quickly to keep away from the badly behaved children and form friends with like minded children. I have seen all of what you are describing in an independent school too (but not the spitting). Often very young children have behaviour issues when they are not really ready for school and lash out because they need more time to adjust. I would ask your school if they can get more classroom assistants into the class so there is more adult/children ratio.

It's many years ago but I found the transition very easy as a pupil.

However you may find things improve where you are. Both my 2 found YR a struggle with other children's behaviour, but it improved markedly year on year. Year 1 will be a bit stricter than YR, the children will be older and they'll have better language and understanding. We also got lucky in having a couple of teachers who had a reputation for being strict were skilled at controlling less desirable behaviours in the classroom. IMO that was brilliant for quiet, well behaved DD as she could feel safe and crack on with her learning undisrupted.

She is in Y3 now and it's not perfect, but the children she talked about as "naughty boys" in YR are virtually unrecognisable and she is even friendly with some of them. She is also much more resilient and confident. If you need to move your DS then of course do so, but keep in mind that the behaviour at his current school could improve a lot year on year. It probably didn't help that I thought DD just had to put up with it in YR, whereas now I realise she shouldn't have to. I'd be much quicker to step in these days, but I haven't needed to.

We have been back and forth to the school several times over a full academic year. I think we have exhausted all options there. Sadly.

You will only have to do 7+ for the more selective preps in London, elsewhere I think a move is usually extremely straightforward with just a small test perhaps to see what standard your ds has reached and a chat with the head. Good luck/