City Suburbs or Village Primary School?

[marinerscomplex]

Hey everyone,

My partner and I have a 3 year old dd and as many of you will know the pressure to make a decision on her future nursery/primary school is getting closer!!,

We currently live about a 10 minute drive out of Leeds city centre in a suburban area where the primary schools are big with year groups of 40-50. However we are considering moving to a Yorkshire village where the year groups would be anything from 10-20, a lot smaller! We are torn on what would be best, as on one hand a bigger year group would mean more children to socialise with, greater diversity, classes formed according to ability rather than just sticking the whole year together, and as she gets older dd is likely to be more exposed to technology ( mobile phones, iPads etc) and general city life. However the village primary might provide a more personalised education for each child, but less tailored to ability grouping (I know they combine year 3/4/5 into two classes) but it would mean having the comfort of village life and a closer knit parent-school community. Another worry is that whilst being with the same 9-19 kids every day might be a great way of forming valuable bonds, it may become troublesome if dd is unable to fit in or if conflicts arise frequently. A lot of hypotheticals here, just recounting ny own school experiences!

What do you all think? There seem to be pros and cons either way and we just want what is best for dd!

Thank you :)

Assuming you are talking about state schools, I would be very concerned about schools that small - they are going to be significantly underfunded, and it's not getting any better. I can't see how a school is going to be able to sustain class sizes that small - they will inevitably have to combine years across all years.

And 40-50 kids in a year isn't a large school at all, it's actually on the average/small side! I would go with that, for financing reasons as well as social.

I agree with Patricia on the financing -( I also think the practical negatives of small schools out weigh the positive).

However I think you should mostly focus on the lifestyle you want - do you want easy access to the city or do you want a village. You are clearly a motivated parent who cares about your child's education they will be fine in any school - so dont base the next 10 years of your life on that.

They might have an intake of 10-20 children but it is not financially possible to run classes this small with one dedicated teacher. If they do, they will have severe financial problems. It will therefore mean mixed age classes and difficulties regarding how they are formed. As does 45 by the way! (90 over 2 years = 3 mixed age classes). I would look at 60 as being ideal or even 90.

Larger schools mean better sport, better music and often better variety of clubs. Not being stuck with a small number of teachers and a very claustrophobic atmosphere as DC gets older with fewer friend possibilities. In your case, I’d stay where you are. What seems great at 4 isn’t always great at 10.