Pressure to send 4 year old to reception

[Jenro22]

I'm dealing with a situation with my 4.5 year old daughter. She'll be starting reception next week and I am set on my decision to send her only part time until its compulsory for her to be in full time I'm already being pressured by her teachers to send her in full time as they fear she'll fall behind her peers in maths as I intend to send her only in the mornings mon-fri meaning she'll miss maths in the afternoon. I mentiond that surely the level of maths she may miss can be easily caught up to when she joins in February (when she'll be of compulsory age). even suggested i can do bits of learning with her at home as we already do when the opportunity arrises. such as counting, adding and subtracting whatever is at hand for example sweets etc. They tried to argue that its not in her best interest to fall behind. in my opinion age 4 is anyways to young for formal learning and if they expect 4 year olds to ingest what they intend to teach I feel is abit far fetched. as some kids might excel but many won't as they are not mentally developed for learning in such a way. they should be playing, as for learning maths theyll learn through play and real life scenarios like couting sweets, fruit , toys etc. and if anything I think it may leave a negative impact on them and turn them off school. which is the opposite of what we all want. 🤔

I would rather my child begin full days In reception when it's time play based learning then do there first full days in year 1 when it's all desk based learning.
Year 1 is already such a difference for them to add in full days seems to much to deal with as well.

There's more to the reception curriculum than maths and phonics.
Did she get her KUW in (science/tech/RE)? Her EAD (art/drama/music)? PSED (feelings, social and behaviour)? PD (gross and fine motor skills)? Or only the maths and literacy were important?

Hi OP

I wouldn’t hesitate to send your DD to reception full time.

For a different perspective from what i’ve heard from my friends, children born in the first half of the academic year can start to get incredibly bored if they are either in a nursery or home setting as the need better stimulation nearer the age of 5, and it can quite commonly impact their behaviour.

When my friends send me photos of their kids in reception, it’s mostly play like water tables and dinosaurs.

Your post about it being bad to send kids away for 30 hours is also disappointing. Most of us have to work.

This stood out to me too, that she prefers adults despite a younger sibling close-ish in age and having a level of nursery experience. To be quite frank she sounds like a child who would benefit from more contact and familiarity with other children, not less. These are kids she’s going to be spending the next 7 years alongside, she needs to have a level of attachment with them too or else her school experience is going to be a bit shit. I don’t see why you’d risk that for an extra one or two hours at home with Mummy everyday, doing pretty much the same stuff you’ve been doing with her for the last four years of your life.

But hey, my (4yo this month) DD just started pre-prep and the hours are 08:15 until 16:00 despite me being on mat leave, so my opinion is probably worthless.

This is just confirmation bias because you already cling to your child and can't let her be independent in any way. Of course you're going to think this drivel is worth listening to.

if a young children in my opinion have a stay at home parent that it is in their best interest to be with that parent. it's our job as parents to raise, teach, discipline our own children.
And yet you're sending her away 15 hours a week. Why aren't you teaching her the things school teach her? Why aren't you giving her equivalent experiences and helping her make friends elsewhere? Honestly I think you should parent to your beliefs and keep them both at home with you until they're 18. Longer of possible. They can do OU without having to leave you.

If you continue to be this suffocating to your child as they continue through life, keeping them from learning things and life experiences other children have, please don't be surprised when they go off the rails in their early teens.

If this is in regards to your child preferring to talk to adults than her peers, I don't read it the way you do.

Orientate towards the adult, yes. Children will look to the parent or teacher or worker for guidance, for clarity on what they can and can't do, but it's like a plant pointing towards the Sun. It's still a daisy in a field of daisies wanting to hang out with the daisies and talk about daisy things and play daisy games whilst turning their faces to the Sun and closing their petals when the Sun says it's bed time. One daisy isn't disengaging from the daisy field to go and talk primarily with the Sun.

I guess some of us just love our children less than you so and just pop them out to push them onto childcare workers until they're old enough to buy the drinks.

yes sad that so many parents who have the option to send their children part time to reception and have an opportunity to spend more time with their little ones before sending them away for 30 hours still choose to.

Oh the old 'isn't it sad' tripe 🙄
No, it isn't sad.
You know what? I chose to go back to work full time when DS was 10 months and I lost count of the number of people who said that to me ( nobody ever said it to my husband though 🤷🏼‍♀️)
10 years later I have a confident, articulate, sociable boy who speaks fondly of all stages of his education and childcare. We're super close and thanks to my job he's travelled the world with me experiencing things I could have only dreamed of as a child.
There's nothing sad about the we've chosen to bring up our child.

Nah @GCSister , you're mistaken, we just don't love our DC as much as OP.

On the contrary, I think it’s bloody marvellous that so many children have a secure enough attachment to their parents at 4 that they can happily go off to school for 30 hours a week and academically, socially and emotionally thrive.

I would love to see any evidence available that suggests summer born babies have attachment issues with their parents versus autumn born babies.

Hope this Maté guy gives you a refund on your cult fees when this all goes belly up.

My 4yo practically bounces onto the school bus in the morning (driver and escort directly to special school, I don't go with. Shock, horror!) I get sent photos and videos, they settled in on their first day happy as anything and cannot wait to go to school each day, was the same at nursery school when they started at 3 for 4.5 hours per day. This year has started an after school club a few days a week too that the bus drops them at and could stay as late as 5pm, again, bounces off that bus and is happy to go. As a lone parent, it was only ever us from a young age and I've never had a break, so I don't feel guilty as it's good for us both. Flame me if you want OP, my child loves it and I won't apologise for acting in their best interests.

On the contrary I knew a mother who followed similar principles to you. The child is my own child's age and is one of the nastiest kids to their peers i have ever seen. Bullied mine because they were non verbal at the time and couldn't tell me. Has been pulled out of a school because they dared tell them off. I cut contact but I'm not surprised to see that they still cannot settle at school because parent can't accept the sun doesn't shine out of their arse. Will likely end up homeschooled.

There should be a Gabor Mate klaxon on here like there used to be for Gina Ford.

Sending part time before compulsory school age is a perfectly valid and legal option. You have a legal right to be this as outlined in the Schools Admissions Code, page 25, section 2.17 C. They legally cannot stop you, though a few link to try.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001050/School_admissions_code_2021.pdf

You know your child better than anyone.

If you’re concerned about maths speak to the teachers about what they’re covering and do it at home. There should be a curriculum overview on the schools website.

My top tip is to count at home, as much as you can. Count steps on the stairs, count forward, count backwards. The order of numbers is something we must learn by rote. You cannot count too much. There’s not a huge amount of time to practise counting g at school. I used to get my class to count as we walked to PE, etc. A key thing that stood out to me in teacher training was that, especially in maths, you need a really strong foundation to build future learning upon, and in my experience, that foundation is solidly knowing the order of numbers. Yes there are patterns that develop, but you have to learn a certain amount by rote before the predictable patterns emerge. (Ex Primary School teacher here).

It is far easier to teach a child one to one, through play, than it is to teach 30 children at once.

It’s my personal opinion as a teacher and as a parent that we start school to early in this country. Some of the expectations in the first few years of school are not developmentally appropriate for all children. If you have a legal right to part time, grab it with two hands and give your child a gentler start at School.

Trust your instinct. Listen to your child. You got this!

Gabor Mate is a medical doctor / self-publicist who has never worked in pre-school education and is regularly criticised for his poor attitude to evidence. But OK.

Montessori is what this thread needs: "Play is the work of the child."

The irony of taking your kid out of (play based) formal education to do counting by rote at home.

Thinking back to DC being in reception there was barely any learning that you can't do yourself at home and if they give homework you will be aware of what they have been doing in the week. Reception is more about learning through play and that's what they did. They played learnt about how school works lunch time rules, behaviour points and dojos sitting still in a group to listen to the teacher. It required them to actually be there for the experience. One you can't reproduce at home and as such she will be behind. You can do as you please but when other children have formed relationships and she feels left behind or out of place she won't be thanking you for keeping her home for half of the week with you.

@Jenro22 what about doing 3 full days then she doesn't miss the maths ?

If you are determined to teach her yourself, you might want to learn how to use capital letters.

Everyone saying oh reception is just play it’s fine seen to forget that they move onto year 1 which is not play based in some instances nearly a whole year earlier than their peers. As someone who worked in Reception and year 1 I can tell you whole heartedly there were some summer born children who were absolutely not ready for reception and were especially not ready when it came time to move up to year 1. It’s not just about academics it’s also about emotional development, some of the children coming into year 1 were very emotional and found the days draining and exhausting because they just weren’t ready. We do push our children into school in this country far too early and it’s very sad.