Years 3 and 4 are not involved in a Christmas production

[hmc]

In our small local village primary, our Key stage 1 kids are doing a nativity performance and years 5 and 6 drama club are performing their own festive play. But the teachers have arranged nothing for years 3 and 4.

Is it just me or is that a bit crappola?

years 3, 4, 5 and 6 do no Christmas show at our primary - Y4 do no drama production of any kind throughout the year, and Y3 only have the harvest festival assembly and y5 have black history month assembly, y6 do a production but that's at the end of the summer term and usually involves a lot of miming along to backing tracks - so your school sounds like it's positively bursting with thespian endeavours to me

and our school is huge - more than 500 kids ....

Gosh, didn't realise this was the norm.

I suppose we are used to all the children being involved at our school. This is the first year there has been any departure from that....

Only KS1 and YR at our school. Y3/4 present memories of their residential (used to do big production, but we thought that was a waste of time), and Y5/6 do a grand production after SATs.

I'd be sad. All our children are in a production - every afternoon for a couple of weeks is given over to it. Three plays - one for KS1, one for Yrs 3/4 and one for Yrs 5/6.

DS2 is in yr4 and he isn't in a production.

Hmm, I was going to post about this too. We are having huge issues with DD's school and I was wondering whether it was the school being its crap self or the norm.

we have a separate play for every class, supposedly 10 mins each. every single child in the school (full primary but only one class per year) takes part. At times when watching 7 productions one after the other i lose the will to live but the kids love it.

I'm thinking lucky you, our Nativity has gone into overdrive - costumes, lines, actions, songs - teacher has lost perpective on the joy and fun side of it!

DS2 is yr 2 so leaving infants and they just do a Christmas concert. DD is yr 4, in jnrs play. DS1 is yr 6 so leaving jnrs, nothing at all (until leavers' show in summer).

I say yeehay! only one costume (and it turns out the school is making that one - result!!!)

I do think nativity is a KS1 thing. The main reason I suspect that the KS2 (apart from yr6) do a play in our schools is that it's a junior school so no KS2 play would = no Christmas show at all. But I suspect a lot of primaries don't include KS2 kids.

At our school, Reception do a Nativity, year 1 do a chirstmas play and year 3 do a concert. After that there is an open-to-all-who-want-to-join Music and Drama group who do a carol concert at the local church, with extra twiddly bits provided by the by-invitation-only Singers Club. This extravaganza is also inflicted on the local old folks home and unsuspecting shoppers in the Co-op in the run up to Christmas. And then we have a big show in the summer with the main parts chosen by audition and the entire Music and Drama group providing the chorus and bit parts.

Big school with VERY enthusiastic music teacher, who organizes all this with slightly worrying fervour!

our school has just changed theirs to as it is getting bigger. used to be that ks1 did nativity and ks2 did christmas play oof some sort. now nursery and reception will do christmas 'open morning' 2 and 1 will do nativity, 3 and 4 do easter performance and 5 and 6 do a summer one. i do see the logic but ii do think it is a shame that dd age 7 won't do a christmas performance again. it was part of our xmas really.

think I'd be relieved

mine go to a huge school where they believe everyone should be involved and everyone have a part. Have no idea how they manage it but they do (they put 2 year groups together but it means 180 children in each play). Tis v impressive.

We have a small school so Reception, yr1 and yr2 do the Nativity with R/yr1 taking the parts and yr2 doing the narration. Then the two KS2 classes do a "performance", either together or each class seperately. We then have a big summer production in which all the children are involved together-even if it's just in the singing.

I think it's good to have a break for kids who don't dig the Xmas performance scene.

At our school, KS1 does Nativity play while KS2 practice for evening carols in town -- DS yr5 hates the singing practice, he doesn't want to ever perform.

At DS's school R-Y3 do the nativity. Everyone else (up to Y11!) is involved in a play (not a Xmassy play). Mind you, there are only 98 children at his school to start with.
At DD's, N&R do the traditional nativity two mornings, Y1/Y2 do 2 performances of a themed Xmas play (Baboushka(?) last year). Now DD is Y3 and the performance is split into Y3 enacting The Twelve Days of Xmas (DD is a calling bird), Y4 doing god knows what, and Y5/6 doing a play involving a Grandma.

I do kind of subscribe to a view that everyone should be involved to some degree, even if they are just bonging a triangle at the back or the little ones are simply fluttering birds in the forest of the Yr6 play, but it's hard work sometimes.

Ours is a big school too. They put a lot of effort into productions: every child is on stage and they end up with really good quality performances.

Christmas - YR, yr1 and yr2
Easter show - Yr3 and yr4
Victorian Day show - yr5
Final summer end of school concert/show - yr6

They also do various dance workshops, poetry performances, special assemblies and so on. But each child is just involved in one "show" each year.

All our children take part in a Christmas play, but under the previous head this was not the case. Previously KS1 did a nativity, and KS2 just did a carol show. Now they all act, because the head has school age children and understands that it is important for the parents children to have a play for everyone.

quite common I think. My dds are in Yrs 2 and 4 and won't do a Xmas production this year.

It's perfectly reasonable imo. At our school KS1 do a Christmas play and Yrs 5-6 do an end of year production. Yrs 3-4 get a bit of down time! A lot of kids do plays/dance/music outside school as well so this practice hardly consigns them to a cultural desert. Also the school hall simply isn't big enough to accomodate all the performers and parents if they did a big thing altogether.

It's not like your children are missing out on Christmas - I expect they get the same party/ dinner/ card making etc that everybody else does?

All ours are involved to some level. The primary school do a play every year and each year group has a different role in it. This year our group are being lords and ladies and doing some dancing. The main parts are taken by a different year group each time - this is unfortunate as our year group has missed out every year and this is their last year at primary.

Perhaps they will do aproduction later in the year ?

My DDs go to a huge 4 form entry school and it just wouldn't be possible for the whole school to be involved in any one concert or even 4 different productions. Year 3 and 5 do separate productions year 4 do nothing for the year and year 6 have a production in the summer term.

Where I work (junior school)the year 3 and 4s do a christmas musical. The rest of the school are involved in a carol service. Year 5 do an easter musical and again year 6 do something at the end of the summer term.