School of 40 pupils, 25% SEN - things to consider

[Catsize]

Hello, our first child starts school next year and we really like a school that is very small. 40 pupils, over 25% have SEN. I don't think my son has any. He may fall into the G&T bracket (which may be classed as SEN) but am not uber competitive so no real idea. People I have spoken to about this are concerned that the teachers will be naturally inclined to focus more on those with SEN to the detriment of those who do not have such needs.
Whilst the size of the school will permit my son to work above his age if necessary, as there are several year groups to a class, that obviously can't happen in the last couple of years.
I was a bright child in a small school and ended up teaching myself as I was ignored on the basis that I knew what I was doing. I guess things have changed now though.
To me, if he is bright, we can help with that at home too. Primary school should be more about being settled, secure and happy. I would prefer him to develop an inquisitive mind than be pushed for 100% in tests etc.
He is incredibly physically able and I wonder if that might be a problem with sports provision etc. in a smaller school.
Your thoughts and experiences would be great appreciated please.

yrs6-7 DS went to a tiny private school (pastoral reason), but most the other kids there were below avg academically (typically tied to SEN).

Don't Do It, is my advice. DS is very lazy wrt academics & begged to leave so he could get some decent GCSEs. DS was also top dog in sports which he didn't care about, but he wasn't pushed either.

Don't.

I moved my DS - very bright as well as physically able - from a school of 140 pupils because he had no peer group and that was hugely damaging to him (became a school-induced selective mute). I hate to imagine what it would have been like if the school had been less than a third of the size.

The small school might look lovely when your child is 4. imagine them as a very able 8 or 11 year old - will it be right for them then?

IME as a teacher, i have taught in a very tiny school with 2 classes, 3-4 year groups in each class. Planning across the year groups is hard enough (particularly EYFS / KS1 combined) - when you add in 25% SEN, which I also had, that is 5 children out of the 20 in the class who need special individualised planning (because each SEN child, obviously, had slightly different needs and adaptations). However good the teacher, there are only a certain number of hours in each day. Planning from 2 different curricula, for 3 different year groups, plus 5 individual adaptations, is quite daunting enough without also differentiating for an exceptionally able child.

We moved DS, after a period of HEd to mend him, to a school with 60 per year group, with a largeish able cohort. he thrived. The speech damage was still there, as a tiny trace, for several years, but academically is was a MUCH better environment for him.

(Obviously, if it is the only school accessible without a huge drive, and is the one every child in the village goes to, then there are social considerations that, for you, might outweigh the potential downsides. We moved in order to be able to access larger schools. But my overall advice would be a very large 'NO', or at least not past the first year or so in school. DS was fine in reception, as the freeflow environment meant that he could easily access or create for himself the challenge that he needed, like tabulating world cup goals, or doing calculations with negative numbers in the maths corner. The trouble started in Y1.)

What about friendship groups? There's no escape if you don't get on. And the same applies with the teachers.

There are seven classes in my dds year group. They mix them up every year and now she's in year six so she knows so many different people. At the moment, she's in a double class with two teachers and 52 children. More than your whole school!

I was watching her at a sports competition last week when she didn't know anyone. She was quite comfortable talking to the other dc. I'm also pleased that she's had the opportunity to be friends with people from all different backgrounds.

My advice would be "no" too. My ds2 was in a class with over 40% sen in year 1 (simply an unusually high year group). There was definitely an impact socially and on friendship groupings. I helped with the Christmas party to find that he was dancing on his own the entire party (most kids weren't in groups either).

My ds1 has sen and when I had to move him I was actually relieved I had to move ds2 for logistics. He has blossomed socially with his new peers and has a wide friendship group.

It's a tough type of class to be in. Given at you have a choice I would chose in the best interests of your child.

I wouldn't if you have another realistic choice.

As a mum with a child with a physical disability I've noticed it is common for parents of children with a disability but no statement to worry about child coping in a class of 30 and deliberately seek out a school with smaller classes (we did) and then the school ends up with disproportionately high number of children with additional needs. On top of that a small school will not have the resources or staff of a bigger school to deal with this.

Whilst a small class may be nice at the start he will need friends, proper teams and some peers working at his level.

I used to work in a role that required me to visit schools. I saw many rural schools with 30-50 pupils and they were all struggling financially (apart from one which had received a legacy of ??millions, but that's very unusual).

The reason is this. With a number on roll of 40, the school will have to provide two classes (one infants, one juniors) and employ two full-time teachers. Schools' budgets are largely dictated by number on roll, so your school will get money for 40 pupils, whereas the school down the road with normal sized classes of 30 pupils each, will get money for 60 pupils to cover the same two teachers. Consequently, it will be very tight just to pay the salaries and any "extras" such as books, art resources, PE equipment, money to fund extra-curricular activities etc will end up being squeezed.

Now, maybe this is OK if the school you are talking about is a lovely village school that everyone in the area goes to and is financially supported by a very active PTA etc. But you are already wondering about whether your DC will have the opportunities to excel, and about limited friendship groups etc...so if I were you, I would think again.

Dd went to a primary that usually achieved slightly under average on sats, above average Sen and above average fsm. They got such a good rep for Sen provision that from being undersubscribed, kids with Sen sidelined by the high achieving outstanding primarys nearby started transferring. Even taking Sen out of it, her class as a whole would be described as a lower achieving cohort. ( handful of level 5's at ks2). Dd started primary as able/ ahead, and finished obviously so.
It was the best choice I could have made. They catered for her brilliantly. I never had to push them for it either. Once in y4 she ran out of older classes to join for maths, so they provided 1 to 1 with a maths teacher and mentioned it at parents eve to me. The differentiation in class was always brilliant too, not just here's the extension sheet if you've finished. Only issue was one crap teacher and the rare short term dodgy supply, and their crapness was nothing to do with Sen. And quickly stamped on by the school.
The reason I picked it, and the reason they did it, was they just seemed to care about individuals, rather than average results. Looking at actual individual figures, I could see they were teaching across a huge ability range, and doing it well. My theory was that if they're managing to differentiate for that big a spread then it's got to be a good thing. And I just liked it. And at the time I thought dd was just perhaps on the able side. Over the years I mainly thought she was just an outlier for a lower ability cohort, school never drew attention to either the fact she was more and how much effort they were having to put in as a result. They just did it.
However not everybodys experiences match my own, and usually there's safety in numbers. But I do know the high achieving naice outstanding primary nearby is crap at able provision. And a few others who's main and only focus is results tables and teaching the kids to fit in with them. I think in your shoes I'd be asking about what they provide for higher achievers, especially in the last few years.
Peer groups is slightly different. Dd gets on with most people and never had the social problems some able kids do. And academic low achievement doesn't always mean they aren't on the same wave length in terms of being quick witted in normal play/ conversation. She did occasionally get frustrated with some peers (not Sen), about silly things cos they were talking at cross purposes, but that was something that certainly didn't do her any harm.

The size of the school bothers me more than the proportion of SEN. My children were at bigger but still small school and neither really had any friends - more forced friendships.

The sports provision and extra curricula is also likely to be poor in a school that size.

I would reconsider unless impossible logistically.

I agree with Fatfree - the biggest issue is the tiny size.

The high proportion of SEN is secondary, but does compound the issue of size:

• Lack of peers (5 or 6 per year group) is worse if there are none of a similar ability.

Hugely mixed age classes are hard to plan for, with multiple children with different SENs the planning becomes even worse.

• Tiny budgets are a problem for all small schools - but even more so when large proportions of the budget need to be spent on specialist support for some pupils

etc

25% Sen is normal.

But I'm not a fan of small schools and would say no on that basis.

Thank you all for your thoughts and experiences. Lurked, I am glad you have had a positive experience in a similar school. The Ofsted reported that 100% of parent respondents would recommend the school, and it does seem very good in many many respects. For sports provision etc., they combine PE lessons with another local small school and there are a number of extra-curricular and after school activities. We will consider other schools too but at the moment, this one will be hard to beat. Your responses are really useful for putting into the equation. My son doesn't have trouble making friends, but I am concerned whether there will be anyone to spar with academically, particularly in the later years. Weighing against that is that I would rather he went to a school that developed him as an inquisitive and sociable individual than a robot driven to decent SAT results.

Well, he's 4. Could develop in any direction. Why not make the decision you think is right for him now, and move him in 3-4 years if need be?

"an inquisitive and sociable individual than a robot driven to decent SAT results"

All school comparisons have to be, ultimately, based on comparisons of the individual schools in front of you, and a school's ethos is (of course) completely independent of its size, and usually of its level of SEN.

A small school can be a SATs factory, because when each child is >10% of the overall SATs results, the pressure on an individual to perform can be intense. A large school can be a free and sociable environment.

However, if the schools you have in front of you, and have a realistic chance of getting into, are a large and extremely regimented, test-driven school and a small, particularly free and nurturing one, and you regard this as 'trumping' all other academic, social and financial concerns, then that is the choice that you make.

Bear in mind, though, that parents in a tiny school may well have had specific reasons for choosing the school, and may be 100% behind it (IME it is quite rare to have less than the high 90s in such surveys, because the parents are a self-selecting group and are likely to be there because they like the school - others will have selected a different school or will have left). What you are judging is whether it is a school that is right for you and your child.

(Catsize - also bear in mind that Lurked is describing a school with a similar ABILITY profile, but NOT a tiny school. Pretty much everyone else has said that it is not the SEN level that is an issue - 18ish percent is average for primaries, when including all those on the SEN list at any level - but the tiny size. So Lurked's positive experience is perhaps not quite relevant to your situation.)

Further point - I have taught in a school with much more than 25% SEN (and over 1/3 of pupils from the Traveller community) which I would recommend unreservedly to anyone, of whatever ability. Caring, nurturing, stretching, friendly ... but 20-25 children per year group, taught in single year group classes, and that made all the difference.

A class mate to spar with would have been nice in some ways. However she did find that outside of her year group and outside of school. And on the flip side, had an environment where she learnt personal achievement was more important than just besting someone else. So at 11 she still thinks she was a big fish in a small pond, and most schools have half a dozen like her, which at her age I'm more than happy about.
For me the short of it is that it takes excellent teaching to provide for a range of ability properly, whereas not so good teaching can get good results from an equal ability group.
I think I'd be asking about whether they have had older children do the primary maths challenge, level 6 work, outreach stuff from other schools/ activities etc. And even if the answers no, it would be the attitude and the reasons that would sway me with such a small number. Eg 'We don't believe they are in the childs interests at primary school age' is a very different attitude to 'They've not been in the interest of any individuals recently but they are things we have investigated for a few children and would love to do in future for any that would benefit'. Or 'well it's extremely rare for any child to do x,y,z, bright kids don't usually manage it' is different to 'well with such small numbers we've not needed to do x,y,z, our most able pupils have extra/ different support to do a,b,c, so there's no reason we can't also do x,y,z the same way if a child needs it'.
I'd also look at when and how the highest achievers are being differentiated for. Single outliers doing level 5 at ks2 in a cohort of level 3 or below during lessons only would indicate they can and will differentiate and cope with one. Whereas half a dozen kids getting even a* GCSEs catered for by lunchtime or after school extension sessions would have me questioning what those kids were doing during lessons.
Moving for the older years is an option, but that does depend on how difficult it is in your area to get places, so unless you are confident thats a definite option I would choose on the basis he'll be there till y6. And with the small numbers how much opportunity he's likely to have to mix out of school with peers.

Lurked - how big was your DD's school?

Fair point teacher and even with same numbers isn't necessarily representative of all lower ability cohorts. As you say what the alternatives are is a factor.

X post, usually about 30 per year group, allowing for undersubscribed years and the odd one over limits in later years.

So a school of c. 200?

That is a HUGELY different proposition from a school of 40!

I don't disagree, but it still depends on the alternatives op has. Compared to a big outstanding one not too far away, with about 90 per year group, and above average high achievers, I'd seriously consider a school of 20!
But yes if there's a reasonable alternative I agree the numbers are a big part of it.