Choosing a primary school (no visits allowed)

[ely3857]

It’s awful you’re in this position as ‘feel’ is so important.

Distance is a huge factor both for getting into the school and then getting there and back each day. Walking distance would be always preferable as parking near schools is a straight up nightmare. If you preferred a school that isn’t your closest what are your chances of getting in anyway?

I’d avoid, as hard as it is, FB groups about the school as people do like a rant and a moan and it really just might not your experience at all. Even those who praise the school may do so from a very different angle than you’d be coming at it from (in terms of child’s abilities, personality etc).

Do read Ofsted but read between the lines. The headlines on paragraphs are useful as is the overall school grade but how long has the head worked there? What is the report not saying to you. An outstanding school may not be the right fit for your family so don’t be swayed too much by that. In fact I tend to view outstanding as a bit too much really!

If possible, walk down the street close to pick up/drop off. How are the kids, are they calm and happy or are half of them hiding and crying (dramatic I know but if a kids willing and happy to go to school then that’s half the battle!). You might just get a vibe from that.

Good luck.

[waiting4disney]

I'd look at school websites at the newsletters etc it will give you a feel for the school. Ofstead reports- not results just general comments. I'm not a fan of the reports usually as not always true reflection of school but they have kids comments on there usually.

Ask any neighbours about which school their children go to.

Virtual tour and head teacher talk should help.

[rachelhelen82]

My son has just started year 8, he attends a private school that takes pupils at age 3/4 and goes through to GCSE’s. He has been there since age 3, he settled really quickly and I like the ethos of the school, both of which played a big part in my decision to leave him there until he’s 16.

My initial reason for sending him to this school was that although the primary schools in our area are good and I would have been happy for him to go to, there are only realistically two secondary schools that he could have gone to and both are very poor. I know it’ll be a long way off for you but maybe you could also look which secondary schools the primary’s you’re are interested in feed into?

[Mrs Red C]

I'd ask to see if you could do a Zoom call with Head and potential class teacher. Some schools are doing or virtual tour/open days...
.

[Blue nose]

Depending on where you live they will have rules on who gets priority places.

Our primary was:
Kids in care
Siblings
Catholics in the catchment
Catholics out of catchment
Non Catholics in catchment
Non Catholics out of catchment.

If it's a popular school and with lots of siblings they can fill quickly so if you're not higher up the criteria you won't get in.

Personally we looked at two of our nearest. One faith and one not faith. We'd have got in either as both our catchment. Many others were turned away from both.

How about going for a walk past any at playtime/PE time to hear how the children are behaving?

Ask to speak to the Head. They might not allow you to walk around but they should be doing all they can to encourage you to pick their school.

We didn't like one that wouldn't offer after school clubs/activities as 'the staff work hard enough without having to provide childcare' this was 10 years ago and the school went on to do lots of activities.

Unfortunately you do get a 'feel' but a lot of that can come from conversation rather than physically walking around.

[Woohoobb]

Well today’s the day! Good luck everyone 🙂

[kk20]

ask about class sizes and classrooms. im not going into too much personal details here but our DD went to a school with 38 in each class and were taught in corridors plus outside (im not talking forest school etc rather a covered outdoor courtyard in normal school gear, it was freezing). there were two class intakes and 2 teachers with 2 ta's an they couldnt cope. ofstead report was overall good with some outstanding.

DD had a poor time and was falling through the cracks as the teacher could not keep up with the class (too many with a large ability range). we moved her in year 3 to a local private school and didnt look back. the class dynamics were totally different. not all priate schools are chelsea tractor/footballers/snobs, most of the kids there were from local business owners, doctors etc.

[marypoppins38]

We had 3 primary schools within walking distance in our village. We chose the catholic primary as our children were baptized catholic and it had an outstanding Ofsted rating. It had lots of outdoor space, lots of after school and lunchtime activities and had a real focus on children participating in sports. It was a fantastic school and definitely the right choice. Both kids thrived there and thoroughly enjoyed it.

[arielrocks]

I missed this original post, sorry OP.

We were in the same position so could only see the videos the schools made. I wasn’t to hung up on ofsted reports as a few friends are teachers and told me to take them with a lunch Of salt.

For us we chose the school they felt the best for our son. He has additional needs and the school furthest away offered the best support for him.

There is a school at the end of my road but we didn’t want that one.

Today we got the school we wanted which was brilliant news.

[Rabel]

Today is the day here as well.

Thank you to everyone who posted - you were all very helpful. And I'm sorry that I haven't been back on to update for a while (real life isn't as sunny as I would like at the moment). We managed to look around one at the weekend with staff members only, but it didn't give us a true feeling for the schools. We submitted our choices based on the information available and then discovered that others were doing open days which we had missed! I managed to look at some online (recordings of presentations etc) and think we are happy with our selection but we haven't chosen the closest as our first choice. Will wait to see what we get and go from there, they are expecting to release the results late this afternoon.

Fingers crossed for everyone