Why would / did you choose prep school?

[Staplesandglue]

If you can (or, theoretically, could) afford it, did/would you send your child to private school at primary level? And what are your reasons for that decision?

I also find it depressing that locally we are looking at paying £20K+ annually for DD to access what I had at a standard state primary in the ‘80s/‘90s - sport, drama productions, choir, orchestra, extra-curriculars run by qualified practitioners and academic challenge for able kids… None of this now at any of our local state primaries.

None of this now at any of our local state primaries.

There does seem to be such a variety in states. Our primary offers extracurriculars before school, at lunch & after school plus wraparound care. They have external companies that come in & also their own provision. Over the years my dc have done coding, gymnastics, tennis, debate, sewing, chess, art, futsal, rugby, orchestra, dance, drama, radio, chess & others I can't remember.

We used state primary. We had a nanny so easy to take to music and sports clubs and we took to swimming at the weekend. We didn’t supplement languages but it doesn’t seem to have mattered ( eldest studying 2 language A levels and off to do an MFL degree)

Better facilities, amazing sports grounds, smaller classes so therefore more personalised teaching + pastoral support - any issues were always recognised and addressed early, weekly extracurricular classes like French, drama & music with specialist teachers. I could go on! Putting DD in prep was the best decision we ever made.

@whattodoesIt really does seem to vary hugely by area and demographics. Our current area is very socially mixed, but we are in the process of moving to a more uniformly middle class town and the state schools there do seem to offer a bit more in the way of sports, music and so on. I think it’s because there is a critical mass of parents who will push for this stuff and commit to things like instrumental lessons outside of school, which makes in-school orchestras etc more viable.

DD does have weekly piano lessons at her current primary but they are viewed by her class teacher as a huge inconvenience and she makes sure DD misses break or lunch to do them, rather than any lesson time. This is basically how music and any ‘extras’ are regarded across the whole school - a bit frivolous and unnecessary.

As a former primary teacher myself, I’ve volunteered at the school and seen lessons in action, and I’ve been genuinely shocked by just how static and dry they are - towards the top of the school especially it’s all 35-slide PowerPoints and no movement at all outside of break and lunch times. SEND pupils in particular can’t cope with this, and behaviour is deteriorating as a result.

When prep pupils come up to state secondary school in year 9, they sink rapidly. They struggle with friendships, cannot cope with the harsh reality of large competitive classes and often can’t fit into any of the friendship groups. Stay in private or move when they are younger. Year 9 is a challenging year, sexual relationships and illegal substances not uncommon. It’s trying to navigate the huge step up when you have been sheltered for so long. Many of our pupils will sit GCSEs early, from year 9 and they can feel inadequate if they haven’t had such a demanding curriculum. Our years go up after the June half term, so if you arrive in September, you already are a few weeks behind.

Thanks again. We are thinking of trying to do what you seem to have managed, but not sure if we can do it due to very minimal flexibility with work and no WFH. So it’s either going to be cut back hours and go state and we provide the extras, or ramp up hours to afford prep and rely on them to do it all.

@Vivienne1000 But who uses a prep for a bog standard comp school? My area has preps hearing to the state grammars (and they go with friends) or other preps to top independent schools such as WA, CLC, Eton etc.

I’m not aware of anyone in y7 or y9 being unable to make friends or cope. Why pay for small classes and then go to a bog standard state school with huge classes and all the issues you wanted to leave behind? Very very few schools allow dc to sit GCSEs early now. It compromises results and the best unis want them in one sitting. Not spread out over years. Most schools work on Sept to July or late June in state or private.

There’s also a huge misunderstanding of the NC on this thread. Dc don’t just “cover it” they are extended within each component if good enough or consolidate the expected curriculum if not. State schools are capable of doing extension work or no state school dc would ever get to Oxbridge. Plenty do - even for maths!

On the point about school extending the top learners, I think it requires parents to push and be involved though. It must be vary rare that a child with averagely interested parents makes it to Oxbridge. I say this with bright children in state.

I was talking to a parent of a child who is very bright (think top 5%) and they were saying they were considering a scholarship to a private further distance away (personally I think it's too far but whatever). ANYWAY, these parents hadn't done any tutoring, didn't know the entrance exams were VR / Non VR and thought he'd be fine "because he did well in his Year 2 SATS".

You only need to look on Mumsnet to know there are some seriously invested parents tutoring their average to bright kids for specific entrance exams for YEARS (on the basis each secondary has its own entrance requirement and tests and they know being bright won't be enough).

So my point is that primary schools do extend some brighter pupils (not all - some kids can't be extended by state or private and it becomes about their own ability to self determine their learning which can be a taught skill) but unless you know how to play the system, it's a moot point.

(The fact OP is asking shows she will probably be very system savvy when it comes to it - welcome to the club 🤣)

I feel seen! But unsure if it’s being savvy enough to navigate the system or unhinged enough to seriously overthink things. 🙈

I was one of those state school kids with parents who were loving and supportive but far from academic or pushy. I suspect it’s harder to push yourself to Oxbridge these days as so many parents are steering their children and I think expectations are so high.

Now, we could afford prep for 3 children but it would involve seriously compromising on time, savings, pension contributions, holidays. Im interested to know how others have come down on either side of such a decision!

Private education wasn’t in my thought processes at all, until we realised we live in an area where the state choices were go to church every Sunday to get a place in the ok village school or else be allocated a place in a less good church school we’d have to drive to anyway.
Fortunately we earned enough we didn’t have to suck up either of those unacceptable options. And the private school was very good - our DD was shy and a ‘late developer’ who might have struggled in a large split-year class but by the time she left primary was flourishing.

The stories I could tell in both state and privates.

Parents reading other children's reading records and saying to the teacher "Why is John on Level 6 when Bob is on Level 4" (erm because John can read)

Parents TAPING their kids reading records together so they can tell if another parent has been trying to sneak a peak during playdates

Parents doing their kids online spelling challenges (and the end of year trophy having to be given back when school realised it was unlikely the kid was doing at 11pm at night)

It goes on.

I think it's quite important though, when you are talking about "pushing children on" that sometimes private prep can push a child on through early years reading books because the parents expect progress and results for their investment and want to see little Jonny reading "above his age group". But actually, then have to go back at junior level to work on comprehension / inference etc.

I think you kind of just have to go with your gut and realise that you might make the wrong choice but kids will do well anywhere if they are bright, their parents are engaged and they are given extra curricular opportunities to develop themselves and build resilience.

Hmm. My experience is that state schools don’t push clever kids. My daughter started reception already able to read (and by the end of reception was reading chapter books). Despite me speaking to them multiple times throughout reception and year 1 they continue to send home books which are the level for her age. They said they can’t move her on any faster - lack of staffing, lack of books, ‘not allowed’. I’ve pushed her myself obviously and she can now read very well, but wastes loads of time at school reading very basic books

Maths is a similar story. The stuff in her book now (y1) is stuff she could easily have done at preschool. Her teacher says he takes her separately to do ‘reasoning’ (which all children should be doing!) but according to her this is fairly rare.

This is a ‘good’ school in a nice area which is over subscribed, when most schools in the area are half empty. They just do not have the capacity to push more able kids, and the national curriculum no longer encourages it anyway.

I don't know how old your DD is now but it sounds like she might be Year 1?

That was a low point for us but I found it gets better. I mean, it is teacher dependent but generally speaking, Year 1 is about teaching the kids to get used to their learning environment and just sitting.

Both my kids were assessed free readers and had finished the schemes by end of Year 1 so it depends on the school I think. Comprehension and interpretation and all that VIPERS stuff is given more weight by the school than comprehension so might help to focus on that?

But actually reading is the one subject where, comprehension aside, kids can do what they want. I'd be arguing with school about development in other subjects which are more important in terms of teaching and experience e.g. I would say having a computer says no approach to maths is worse than English.

I'd be asking for standardised score or assessment results at end of year. There's a big difference between exceeding and being in the top 20% and exceeding and being in the top 0.5% so I'd be wanting to know where in that boundary your DC was sitting.

@JustMarriedBecca That’s not entirely true. DD got an Oxford place for MFLs. I have no MFL O level and DH is pretty ropey. No MFL at primary school at all. Other DCs we know were totally state educated and went to Cambridge for maths. We couldn’t tutor dd ourselves and no one else did. Some DC can do it themselves with good teaching.

Some schools don’t have difficult entrance tests. It’s mostly a London issue. Why does everyone think state teachers cannot teach the brightest even when Oxbridge has 70% state? Preps and senior private schools are not just about top universities. They are about broad opportunities.

For the longer holidays and more respect for family life. State school holidays are too short for our family as we like to visit extended family on both sides who live at different ends of the country. Especially at Christmas (which is super-busy), that's too much to cram into a 2 week break and still have some time to chill as a family. It might not be a major consideration for people who live close to their families and can see them regularly but for us, the extra time off is really important. We find that private schools are much more respectful of the demands and benefits of family life than state schools, with the push on attendance and the insistence that being at school trumps everything else, including genuine sickness and important family events and funerals. Whereas private schools don't question you if you say that the kids will be off school for 3 days to travel to your parent's funeral and don't ask stupid things like "can't the grandparents look after the kids?", as my friend was asked recently when bereaved.

It's not the only factor but it's one that would prevent us going back to state. We went private in the first place as we were in a primary school "black spot" and our school run would have been over an hour each way (urban traffic), which we couldn't make work for us.

Yes, in y1 now.

they did NFER tests at Easter and she got 1 question wrong in reading and 2 in maths. They didn’t give me the SAS and I can’t find the table online to convert it but I’m assuming it will be 140 in reading and in the 130s in maths!

Hoping y2 will be better. But having been doing supply teaching for a few months I suspect not. Almost every maths lesson I’ve been left all the kids have the same task, extension for the most able is ‘help the others’ or ‘read a book’. No better at the other end - comprehension lessons where children who cannot even decode a text are supposed to go through and mark it up for where they’d be putting emphasis and pauses and stuff. The whole ‘keep the whole class together’ thing has a lot to answer for!