Crepeys Not Crêpes

[Cremolafoam]

Oi over here hags

Now then all you wise hags. I need you to slap some reason into me regarding schools. We have to apply for DS's reception place by January. I can't quite believe this, as he's only just three, but there we are.

We are on the borders of all nearby catchment areas. The school I REALLY want him to go to (initials HM) gets Ofsted outstanding, has a resident artist, is multi-cultural, and is where all his friends from nursery will go. The catchment area last year included some houses near us, but might not this year. The other nearest choice is an unknown quantity. Very much the other side of the tracks, gets a 'good' rating, but not nearly so 'middle class'. It's also pretty mono-cultural, with the vast majority of the children being muslim. So he'd be in a small minority, but this may not matter.

Then there are other, perfectly good, schools nearby, but not sure about their catchment areas (which vary year by year depending on numbers).

There's a private school down the road, but that's £4K a term, and thus not a goer. Quite apart from the ridiculousness of sending him private when I've always been against the idea.

Logically I KNOW that he'll be fine wherever he goes, that 80% of educational outcome is based on the home environment, blah blah, but I'm consumed with irrational fear that I'll make the wrong choice and blight him for life. I even toy with the idea of moving into the catchment area for the HM school. Which is madness.

Herbs, there's no denying it is indeed a minefield, particularly in London. Don't do a thing until you have visited all the schools in question, and you will be very surprised how different some places are "on paper". And make sure you include in your choices a "safe" option that you are pretty sure he'll get into. And then you can start thinking about secondary schools.

Also, being in rural Surrey I have no experience of multicultural schools, but my DB's children went to Alfred Salter in Rotherhithe, a fantastic school, and being part of a white, middle class minority made no difference. I think if you live in London it's part of life.

Thanks CV. I suppose my problem with the non-favourite school is it has 80% of pupils with English as a second language. Is this a bad thing? Will it hold PFB's obviously gifted talents back?

But yes - I need to get visiting. I sang at an 'international day' concert at favourite school, and just loved the atmosphere.

I'm even panicking now about secondary. The local private school ? our 'last resort' - is gorgeous, but apparently gets harder and harder to get into the near to 11 you leave it. Thus even considering it for him at 4! DP is blithely ostrich-like about the whole thing, and thinks I'm being neurotic. He may well have a point!

BTW, are you recovered from your car trauma? And is the car? And what happened to the car behind you that he crashed into? All rather terrifying.

Whatever you do herbs, don't start paying for private school at four, there is absolutely no need, even if you you are swimming in cash and want them to go to Harvard at 11. And don't buy the "you'll never get in at 7 or 11 if you don't send them at 4" rubbish that some independent school parents peddle - tis utterly Not True. Infants school is so, so much about home and support there and just learning to read and sit still in class - yes, my kids had terrific phonics teaching at school, but it was me doing the "no, sound it out" stuff endlessly at home with Biff and fecking Chip - that I think it won't matter that much about English as a 2nd language issues. And for four year olds, English is not going to be their 2nd languge for long, they will learn so fast. If I am totally honest, further up the school once you're getting to 9/10/11, having a majority of non-English speakers in dc's class would give me pause if only because of things I have heard from friends who are teachers - but presumably by that time most of the children will have learned English and there won't be a problem.

I think the way that English as a second language is presented is quite misleading sometimes too - if you were offered a school where 80% of the pupils are bilingual, wouldn't we all be thrilled and impressed with that? I used to lived in Los Angeles for a few years many moons ago, and so many kids there have Spanish as their first language and speak it exclusively at home. I had a waitressing job where I worked with loads of 17/18 yr old Latino kids who had been in the US for less than 10 years, and they just slipped in and out of Spanish and English, were heading for UCLA and USC for their college degrees. I was . Am still of people with language skills.

Agree with all the above.
You need to see the schools. One of our local schools where I used to live was Excellent (I wouldn't have sent ds there because it was Catholic), my neighbour looked at it for her boy, but found that she thought it was way to formal (all sitting in rows) and it wasn't what she wanted for her child.

Agree with Wilbur too, have many primary teacher friends who all say that you can make up for any deficiet at home at this age, but key is for them to be happy and to develop socially etc.

Secondary - now there is a whole other ball game, and one of the reasons we moved!

Thanks all. Most reassuring. Secondaries around here are pretty appalling. There's only one good one, but it's for girls. There's an academy, but it's quite a way away. Current thinking is that we'll either go private or move into the next door borough, which has much better schools. Though by the time he goes, things could have all changed...

I have boots mag I am not going to any meet up as tres more haglike than you lot ...

BD, does that mean that I look OKish in it. Or are you looking at the photo of the gorgeous 30-something, or her equally gorgeous and much younger than her age-looking mother? I am the in-between hag, and I haven't seen the photo yet!

Re schools, Herbs, agree with what the others say about state schools. Also remember that even if you don't get your favourite school initially, you can stay on the waiting list - there is LOADS of movement in London schools.
And don't fret about secondary yet!!!!!
We did a really nice cycle-ride along the canal and lunched in Hackney village the other day - is that near you?

Near-ish! It's all got vair nice round there, not like when I lived in Hackney!

Everywhere's got a village these days. I live in Walthamstow Village! It really is a thing, though. It's got a medieval church, almshouses and everything...

I know - we have Brixton village now (which is really quite cool!) and there's Dulwich village of course. No Peckham village yet

I don't have a village. I have Crown Point which is an armpit linking Streatham, Norwood and Crystal Palace. It hums. It does have a lovely view though, of other people's villages all over London. And I have a Common, which makes up for the lack of Village. Snorting at Brixton Village though - where on earth is that? Love Brixton, but villagy has never come to mind when spending time there.

Soooo, when I come back to London, will the bit of Lambeff I live in have become a village? We are vair trendy now, we even have Pizza Express and some bars.

Elephant and Castle Village?

I've got a village. Well it's a side street with a Co-op, church, pub and a bit of grass that got engulfed by the city.

We do have a pub. The Yorkshire Ripper used to drink there.

Me too Ruby...pub, grass and a bus that comes every two hours.....! What is the point of that? But I do get to play two days every week in London Bridge Village

I used to live in St Reatham, Wilbur. I shared a house there when I left home in the 1980s.

Wilbur do not snort at Brixton village

I grew up in a village and swore I would never live in one again. Well, not unless I had pots of money and staff to drive my children around the countryside . Where I grew up, a bus coming every 2 hours would have been seen as a bit over the top: there was a bus once a week to market. There were about 100 people in the village and most of them were at least 90. It could possibly rank as the dullest place to be a teenager. I mean, even on a remote island you would have fab landscape, possible opportunities for exciting activities etc. We had ... cowpats and old ladies.

I like the sound of the vintage and retro market in Brixton Village (still snorting just a wee bit.

MrsS - you'd be quite surprised by Streatham these days, a lot of it is coming up like billyoh, and there is a sniff of village-style life in a couple of places. Streatham Hill particularly. We are just stranded on borders a bit, but we knew that before we moved here. We're hoping that the gentrification from Streatham on one side and Norwood/Dulwich on the other will wash up to us over the next decade. Crystal Palace is fab though - lovely mix of places to go and stuff to do and we're not far from there.

Must go to bed now - am totally knackered.