Does anyone have DC's who are close in age, but different in personalities, at different schools?

[moodlumthehoodlum]

DD (5) happy, compliant, doing well at good state infant school in a lovely yeargroup (but with large classes)

DS (3 but due to start Reception in Sept when 4) happy, but easily led, very small for his year, has had a mixed year at nursery in the same school and will be in a year group full of four year old terrors.

So, we've decided late in the day, to switch to a pre-prep down the road, so that DS is there, but DD remains at her infant school, because she "loves" it, and is doing well there.

But I am wracked with guilt and self doubt having made this decision, and I wondered if anyone else had done anything similar?

Waaaa. [wracked with guilt emoticon]

no experience with my dc but i went to a different school thanmy siblings because my mum thought the sch they went to had gone downhill by the time it was my time to
it did cause a but of resentment but onthe whole was ok
will sch runs be tricky? and assemblies, sports day etc ondiff days, if you work it might be tricky?

Logistics will be a nightmare, but I work from home and occasionally so does dh, so its not the end of the world. I would hate to cause resentment, and I'm hoping that our mix and match approach to state & private will work out evenly in the end, so whilst DS is in private now, DD might go private later, and that may change according to whats best for them.

Does that sound brave? I'm trying to pretend I don't have a massive issue with it..

Yep. Ds1 lively, sometimes moody, boisterous boy, currently thriving in large all boys prep. We removed his younger, young in year, small-for-age brother to a smaller gentler mixed school, where he too is now thriving. Go with your instinct - I wish I had at the time rather than moving a year in.

IME children at this age do not understand the difference between a state school and a private one unless you really sit them down and try to explain it, so I wouldn't bother. Parents will of course raise their eyebrows, but they'll envy you for being self assured in managing to firstly identify the best environment for your individual children and then managing to secure it. I suspect that you will have more reaction from the parents at the preprep rather than at the infants (again people often seem to view the state sector with angst and despair), but as you will be speaking from a place of more knowledge than most, enjoy fighting your corner!

My two haven't particularly batted an eyelid to be honest. We explained that ds2 would be moving to a school with girls as that suited him better, whilst ds1 was doing well and had many friends where he was. Pointed out it would be unfair to force ds1 to move against his will, and so equally it was fair that ds2 got to go to a school that suited him as obviously we had chose the prep because it suited ds1 (if you follow all of that!).

like bigchris I went to a different school to one of my siblings as we had different academic abilities and it wasn't a problem for me and I don't think my sibling ever had an issue with it. This was secondary school so we were able to get ourselves to different places. I would be happy to send my DCs to different schools as long as each was in the place that suited them best and I could manage the logistics.

I have an nt ds in primary and a sn dd in local special school nursery.Not so bad as dd gets transport laid on but it is a rush to get ds back from school to be there when dd bus drops her off!

If the preprep is single sex then you may find that pick-up and drop off times are fairly flexible to allow you to do 2 school runs (as of course any families with both boys and girls have to manage in single sex schools.)

if you work don't forget differeng inset days might mean taking more leave too

Oooh thanks everyone for your helpful replies. LadyMuck, I think your point about them not understanding at this age the difference between private vs state, is a very wise one and I'm not going to make an issue of it.

We haven't actually told them yet so we'll have to see what the reaction is, but I need to get over my own hang ups first before we do.

And then there's the whole issue of committing to terrifying fees for the rest of my natural life, but that's a whole other thread..

Fortunately the schools are really close, and even with the nightmare sets of traffic lights in between them, I think that with ds' drop off at 8.30am and dd 8.45am I think I might be able to squeak in everyone on time. Pick up should be no problem