Keeping children home until starting school

[RedRobyn2021]

I would really like to hear from parents who chose to keep their children home until they started school rather than placing them in a childcare setting. How did your child cope with the transition?

Do you mean before starting school nursery or before starting reception?

I didn’t keep mine home although I was a sahm. Mine started free 15 hours at 3 years old.
However I have a few friends who didn’t send them and their children definitely struggled to settle in school, particularly in socialisation.
mine went to a nursery that was attached to the primary school they went to. Their nursery classroom was right next to their year R classroom so their first day they were surrounded by children they'd already known for some time.

I've always been of the opinion that the pre school funding was put in place for a reason - the government would not have committed to such a huge amount of funding without there being significant evidence of it's benefits so even if there's no need for childcare, pre school time is important for almost all children.

I agree with this, my daughter loves to play with her friends at preschool. She's learned so much about how to play with others and they have a messy room for painting etc she access to all the time. She's benefited so much from her free hours and I would recommend sending your child 100%!

Mine did 9 hours max. 3 mornings in their last term before school. 2 before. They had the best of both. Time with me to do our own choice of activities and an understanding of structure used in school.