Can anyone give me advice of choosing a primary school? What is the procedure?

[extremelychocolateymilkroll]

My dd is 2 in August. I'm looking at state schools for her. Can anyone advise what the procedure is? Nursery places seem to start at 3. If you want your child to go to a certain school are you generally more likely to get the child into the primary if they are already in the nursery? And it probably affects where you are able to send your child to secondary school? The local RC school to us is a good school according to Ofsted but another school is classed as outstanding. Is there much difference between good and oustanding? Surely if you're an involved parent your child will flourish in a good school? Also, the local RC school's early years section is classed as average - is that really all that important? Many thanks.

My DS goes to an RC nursery. He automatically qualifies for a place in the School but we decided to register him for the school a little further away, as the RC primary is the feeder school for the local RC high school, which is not a very good school.

He got a place in the non-denominational school we registered him for, no problem, as we still live in the catchment area.

Once he gets to the end of primary school, he will automatically get a place in the local non-den. high school that this primary feeds to. However, we could register him for other high schools if we wanted, and if there are spaces, he might get one.

HTH

Where she goes to nursery isn't taken into account for Reception applications. Ofsted 's are no substitute for visiting and getting your own feel for a place as things can change between inspections.

hi extremely.

In most schools nursery place doesn't mean anything in terms of a school place.

As Lizs says - visiting is better than reading ofsted although both help. DD1 starts school in Sept and we had decided which school she would go to based on ofsted (outstanding) and SATS (top of borough) and in good schools guide. Then we visited it and our local c of e school (good ofsted and above average SATS results but not as good as other school). Both DH and I said as soon as we'd visited the second school that that was the school for dd. Based purely on gut feel. She got a place (would have got into the other one too) so hoping we don't regret the decision !)

Look at your local authority website for detauils of schools/applying etc.

Many thanks for all your replies. I know it's supposed to be a stressful process but I didn't think the stress would start this soon!

I'll second that nursery and pre-school do not guarentee place in actual school.

Also - check out the schools yourself. Our only catchment school has a good ofsted - yet there was no mention about the violence outside the school from the parents during the afternoon pick ups or the police patrols....or the fact it now has made the local papers because of its spectacularly low attaintment! If you were to go by the ofsted, you'd think it was amazing.... Always look and get a feel for the place - there is no substitute and meet the staff. We were shocked when we went, really upset as we've no other catchment options!

Thanks jeanjeannie. It's a nightmare, isn't it? Best of luck with whatever you decide to do.

For information on entry criteria goto your LEA council web site and look under schools / admissions. That will tell you exactly how they allocate school places.

Thanks wishiwas.

Depending upon where you live,you may not have a choice as such. Some areas have very tight catchments and if you're out of catchment you have no chance. Some LEAs prioritise catchment, in others siblings come before catchment. Check out your LEA website or ask them to send you an admissions booklet.

Nursery places have no baring on Reception places although occasionally church schools are allowed to do this.

Go and visit the schools you are interested in. Ask to see round the school during the school day. Are the children busy? are they too noisy? are they too quiet? Do they look as though they enjoy being at school? Do the staff look as though they want to be there or do they give you the impression they would rather be anywhere other than where they are? Look at the work on display, is it all of a very high standard or is it varied? (indicating they celebrate individual success rather than only top quality from a very few children). What out of school activities are on offer? What SEN provision is available? what provision for high achievers?

I would say do not set too much store by league tables or OFSTED. If you have read any other SATs threads on here, you will see that many parents consider them unimportant and choose to take their children out of chool at that time, fair enough, but that means you cannot use SATs as a reliable guide to attainment and standards in those schools. Equally with OFSTED, our school was judged satisfactory, despite being 2nd in the area based on SATs, purely because 'only' 68% of our children got level 5 last year!

For my Dss, I always went by mine and Dh gut feelings ( including not sending DS! to 'top' comprehensive in the country!), and can honestly say we made the right decisions for our kids.