how many children in your child's reception class?

[pofacedandproud]

Ds just started reception in a city school. Class huge, 32, and another class with open doors to his also has 30 ish children. They do most stuff together. They do have two teachers and two TAs [all very good] but it is just mayhem in there. Thinking about options. Small rural schools [would have to move] or private [would have to sell a kidney]

So, can you tell me, how many children in your child's class? Private and state? Trying to get a good idea of what the alternatives are.

DS class 26 - 1 teacher, 1 general TA, one TA who is one to one with SN child.

Total in Year 75 (3 classes) all in completely separate rooms.

The school is one of 3 primary schools (we are still 3 tiers) in the large market town. DS school is the largest.

When DS started reception in a city centre school there where 16 reception children.

28 in the class in total, mixed with year 1.

Still the same number of viruses I guess. And even dead posh kids seem to get just as many nits

Open plan of 60 sounds fabulous in terms of socialising and making the school day fun, by the way (we don't have that in DC's school). In theory the downside might be less calm and structured teaching. Saying that, I firmly believe that in the UK there is too much focus on formal learning, at too young a level, so the state school open-plan thing sounds bloody good to me. If OP were me I would try it for a while and see - moving to a more formal environment might not suit all kids - especially boys, who need the social/play more and are less able to do the structured stuff ..

yes that's what I was wondering overmydeadbody. Small reception class, but joined with year 1. Still, ds would enjoy mixing with year 1s, he is the oldest in his class.

26 with one teacher and one TA. Don't know how many children in the other 2 Reception classes but there is one teacher and one TA in each.

State primary.

Oh, and by the way, the 'doubling' of fees to cover the extras is I think true at the more senior level (year 9+), but not in the earlier years. All I have to add on is uniform (can get second hand easily). School dinners and local day trips are included in fees.

22 with 1 teacher, 2 TAs (private)

Small rural CofE state school, they have 5 in reception! Whole of infants in one class (there are about 20 of them altogether) with one teacher and a TA who focusses mostly on the reception kids. We love it - they know the kids really well, the children all play together across the year groups, and there is a really kind family atmosphere in the school.

Thanks Squiffy. good to know about second hand uniforms. The other thing, I know it sounds stupid, is that ds is so fussy about food and he likes to have a packed lunch. all the private schools seem to have school lunches. If i can get him over that then all I have to do is find a nice small prep that doesn't have a ten year waiting list! [friends put their son down just after birth for the most popular one round here]As well as get some work to pay for it..

that sounds nice pantywoman. I'd like the community aspect. I'd also like more stuff done at festivals [harvest, christmas, hannuka] nothing done much at our school.

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Reception - 2 classes of 22 and 23 children, 2 teachers plus various TAs and 1 SEN support.

Year 1 - 2 classes of 22 and 23 children, 2 teachers plus 1 shared TA and 1 SEN support.

State school in small town.

30 in dd1 class (they have 3 classes each with 30 in so 90 children in reception and the school receives over 250 applications for those 90 places (weird thing is was our 2nd choice of school so v.surprised we got in)

We had 8 in DS2 year group in village primary - but then 16 reception started and it was chaos.
In any event we moved to private and there are now two classes of 12 each with a teacher and a TA.
Not sure about doubling fees, I have one in Prep and I pay 4.5 a term which includes music lessons of £300 and thats all "extra" In Pre prep I pay 2.5 and no extras. Even the day trips are included (seriously I was expecting a bill for recent trips to the Science Museum and local ish castle but was told it was all included!!! Wasn't expecting that.
Our uniform is fairly cheap and good 2d hand shop.
Also just found out they take the voucher scheme through employers so we'll be saving 2k a year.
hope this helps

Last year dd2's reception class size was 17 (private school). This year they are down to 11. The class sizes was the main reason I chose private.

MaMight...I'm loving the idea of the class nanny!

29 in each class (2 classes), with large open-plan area for children to "flow" from one room to anohter.

2 teacher
2 TAs, plus the odd floating TA

State.

It not mayhem, although I see how it could be.

oh and one teacher, and two TAS for the 17.

DS class size 30, 1 teacher and 1 teaching assistant
There are 2 reception classes but I don't think they spend much time together indoors
All the state schools round here have class sizes of 30ish

It looks remarkably organised to me though, not chaos at all.

Last year DS was in reception and early reception combined and there were 12. This year he's in a combined year 1 and year 2 class and I think there are 10 of them. He is doing better being mixed in with older kids than he did mixed with younger.

TBH I think he would be happier in a larger class, although I do love this school and the teachers to bits as they did so much to help him after we had to remove him from his horrible other school after only half a term in reception.

28 in my DD's French school (third and final year of pre-school). 30 is the legal limit per class in the three years of école maternelle (pre-school) and there is a rarely a TA in the classroom, though the children are in a smaller group for 1/4 of the day during their English lesson (where they are also streamed by ability).

25 is (I think) the legal max in the five years of primary.

I think the class sizes are huge and, unsurprisingly, a lot of the "ground work" in the second year of pre-school is about behaviour, living in a group etc which bored my DD and some of my friends' rather well-behaved children silly. Things are definitely looking up this year now that real work with letters and numbers has got underway.

BonsoirAnna I was so sure your dd's class would be tiny!

what is the voucher system stoppingat3? [clueless]

Pofaced. have you been there at all times of day? I only ask as ds in class of 23 and there is another class of 22 but they all share 1 room (so 45 in one -not v big room) there are 2 teachers and 1 ta.

Some days they do teacher based groupings and others they do topic play/work in '15s' and so have 1 group at either end of the room and one group outside .. and some time seems they all play together...

I was not keen on this at all and in the morning it is chaos and seems horrendous but on passing by (being nosy) later on seems quite calm and organised and at pick up they are all sitting quietly'ish

I would be surprised if the doors were always open if Ds is ok prob leave it for a while esp reception as so young ....and maybe start saving for private secondary!

I have been in a few times [picked him up a bit earlier a few afternoons when he had been previously ill and was tired] and yes it did still look like mayhem! Enjoyable mayhem but mayhem. They do do sitting down stuff but at the moment not splitting them into smaller groups much as far as I can tell. It is all very learn through play.

Max of 30 in each class (2 in each year), although I don't think either is full at the moment. We have a similar structure - inter-connecting door between the two classrooms and once the register is taken, the children are able to move between the rooms doing any of the planned activities or go outside to their dedicated play area. Each class currently has a teacher, TA and classroom assistant, although I'm not sure if that lasts all year. The system of moving between the classes is working particularly well for my DTs, as it is the first time they have been separated and so are still able to spend time together during the day.

I think it's possibly a bit early in the school year to tell how chaotic it is - at our school the younger children are still going home at midday, and they haven't started any sort of structured learning yet, although this is most definitely limited during reception as they focus on 'learning through play'.

After half-term, they will split each class in two for starting literacy and numeracy - so half of each class will be in one classroom for learning, with both teachers and the other half of each class with be in the other classroom or outside with the TAs for different activities (hope that makes sense, my brain couldn't quite work out how to explain it!).

So although it might seem chaotic, I'm sure once the parents have gone in the morning, that it settles down a bit and as the children get more used to being in class, it will become less of an issue.

po, I thought I'd read somewhere that anything over 30 meant you had to have 2 teachers. Might be worth checking?
But also what's it like further up the school? DS's school is similar in size and reception was v.unstructured (though happy), but in Yr1 it's far, far more structured and children work quietly, independently, etc. Have a snoop if you haven't already. You may be surprised.