When do you start looking at secondary schools?

[MollieO]

Ds is in year 3 and we've had an invite to a school evening to discuss secondary school options. Is this normal or is it ridiculously early?

I've assumed I wouldn't need to start thinking about them until year 5 at the earliest. Is that right or am I being a fool?

You are not being a fool; I agree that it seems ridiculously early. Once you have discussed secondary options, what on earth are use supposed to do with the outcomes fo these discusions?

That's what I thought but I do know a number of people who have already started looking. I was rather at this but getting this invite has made me feel a bit .

I suppose it depends on whether the school knows from past experience that people like an early heads up on what they will need to do, and when. And perhaps spread school visits over year 4 and 5 allowing time for repeat visits (some schools only have open days in the autumn term) and not leave it until yr6 when you'd be close to deadlines.

It is on the early side - unless to save encroachments on staff evenings they run them only every other year and it's a yr3/4 invitation. If you are happy to leave it, then give it a miss and look for advice/support at a time that is more suitable for you.

I would have thought year 5-they might change a lot in the next 2 years. However I suppose it it good to know the options.

It depends on what your options might be. If they include grammar schools or independent schools then year 3 or 4 is fairly normal, especially if boarding is an option. You can wait until Year 5, even early year 6, for state schools, but state schools often only do one open day a year for people thinking about applying, and if you have a number of options across say an LA boundary then you possibly need to plan so as not to miss out. Also admission requirement change fairly regularly, but always with some consultation, so it is best to know how it works in advance incase you want to make your views known.

We have a real mix here - day, boarding, comprehensive, grammar (in catchment but out of county). Although not sure at the moment if ds would go to senior school for year 7 or year 9 (current school finishes at year 6).

If boarding is a consideration, then year 3 is a good time to start thinking IMO. Bear in mind that the CE curriculum starts in Year 6 so he would need to be in a different prep by the end of year 5/start of year 6.

We went to the school open days when DS was in Yr 5.
To avoid a big panic in the first half of the Autumn term in Yr 6 when the applications have to be in.

Anyone interested in grammar applications would neeed to do that anyway, because I think the grammar admission forms needed to be in during the SEpt of Yr 6.

All the state secondaries in our area did a wide range of open days, covering evening, weekend and school day slots.

We went to weekend ones in Yr 5 and then again on school day visits to the schools we favoured in Yr 6. We were encouraged to take our children to the school day ones in Yr 6 as part of the primary school's support for the transition to secondary.

This has felt like plenty time enough.

Don't start too early otherwise you will drive yourself mad with considering options for more than one year (or two at the most)

It is a very, very stressful (and it can seem hideously competitive) time and if you start doing it too early in your child's primary school education you are just going to be totally burned out by the time they get to Year 6 (although I stand to be shouted down by people who might consider themselves not to get ruffled!).

As Blu said, Yr 5 is really early enough to start going to open days but it does no harm to possibly read a bit about potential school options
before they get into Year 5. Certainly for the grammars, the open evenings tend to be in the summer term so if you don't start thinking about options before Year 6 starts you are slightly snookered as you won't have visited the school and might even have missed the 11+ application form submission dates....

The other issue is that if you have a lot of schools on your longlist, it can be extraordinarily tiring fitting in all the visits into a few weeks in September/October. Some of the open evenings will clash and then you have to try to juggle daytime visits around other (most likely work) commitments; some schools offer loads of potential visiting sessions but others don't. The children are allowed to miss school to attend daytime visits but they get totally tired out, being bombarded with so much information etc..... By the end of October everyone is feeling very frazzled - and it's worse for the ones who are simultaneously sitting 11+/selective exams (and doing extra work for those exams) and doing school work too!

I think that if you have so many different options, you could very usefully think about those and which ones would best suit - otherwise you really will have a lot to contend with....

We only considered state schools although DS was pretty sure he really wanted to go down the grammar route. But we probably did visit about 10 schools in total and he ended up sitting five lots of exams - we were just thankful, come the end of November, that we could relax (until Offers Day on 1/3/2012). Some of DSs classmates are sitting a private school test too in January which means five months of exam stress.

Sorry, don't want to put you off but do not under-estimate how tiring it is for everyone in the family for the time the whole choosing process is going on - even our DD (who is nowhere near that stage yet) breathed a huge sigh of relief when the visits/exams finished and the CAF form was submitted.

Good luck!

We started keeping our eyes/ears open for secondary school news in yr3, keeping a record of Ofsteds and GCSE results. It makes sense to find out about a school over a longer period of time, rather than just a quick snapshot glance. Then you might get an idea as to whether they are on their way up, or on a downhill slide.

In yr4 & yr5 we went along to the open evenings (so we didn't have to do them all in one go - I find them quite a trial). Later in yr5 we looked round our top two schools during the school day.
Finally in yr6 we took ds1 along to the open evenings of these two schools.

We only looked at secondary schools in October of Year 6 - with applications for secondary schools due in that month. But I was reluctant to start looking at schools until my DD had her 11+ results. We did, however, listen to local gossip about schools, and keep an eye on local newspaper stories.

Schools usually have open evenings in the autumn term. Sometimes they have taster days for year 5s in the summer term. I certainly wouldn't both until year 5. Let your child enjoy being in the juniors!

I'm going to go to the school talk but I'll do my best not to get overly worked up about secondary schools at this age! Assuming we stay in the school and therefore move at 11 I agree that year 5 is early enough to start looking. There is an outside chance ds may move next year to a school that finishes at 13. If that happens our secondary school choices will probably be different.

I think it is brave to only start looking in year 6. Our schools seem to do their open evenings before the results of the 11+ so I don't think we'll have that option and I also know I'll need a bit of time to work out what schools we should be considering!

MollieO you sound as if you are doing the right thing....you sound very level headed - good luck!

Yes, think you are incredibly brave and energetic leaving it all until the Autumn Term of Year 6 but maybe you are a lot younger and have that energy....