Transitions From Pre-school Into School

[Guest Biker]

Just wondered how others were managing the transition from pre-school into nursery.

As an extended school we run pre-school (along with breakfast and after school care) in our own building within school grounds. Our children then feed into the school nursery.

However the school nursery has been established for a long time and as a pre-school we have only been on school site for nearly 2 years.

 

It would seem ideal for us to have really strong links but it does not seem to be happening.(not through lack of trying on our part)

I won't go into detail but enough to say that we feel that we work hard to provide lots of opportunities for the nursery and pre-school to come together or share information but it is politely rebuffed.

I am very concerned that we have children who attend both us and school nursery part time and we should be working together for these children especially.

does anyone have experience of this situation and can you suggest some ways to get the teachers on board with what we are trying to acheive?

 

Help!

Biker

[louby loo]

yes!! and I'll be following this link closely.. neither of our two main feeder schools show any interest in working with us.

 

xxx

[Guest]

Hi - the new eyfs does state that where children attend two settings they must work together ie share childs interests and learning - you could maybe approach them with this idea in mind as to open up communication. I am sure Ofsted will be looking in the future how well both you and he nursery work together - this might help a little. I know when we last had our ofsted this question was asked.

 

Good luck - Dot

[Guest Biker]

Hi - the new eyfs does state that where children attend two settings they must work together ie share childs interests and learning - you could maybe approach them with this idea in mind as to open up communication. I am sure Ofsted will be looking in the future how well both you and he nursery work together - this might help a little. I know when we last had our ofsted this question was asked.

 

Good luck - Dot

Thanks Dot.

This is one of the reasons i am feeling so frustrated.We always knew it was good practice and from the child's point of view it is so important that the links are good so transition is smooth!Now with the introduction of the EYFS I thought things might be easier but I still seem to be hitting a brick wall!

Sorry just need to vent a little feeling quite cross!

[hali]

we asked our feeder school for more visits that the nursery staff took the children too and stayed with them (to save school teachers being responsible for them in classes)the school were happy with this : we now do assemblies, lunches, and afternoon stories and children go up 4-6 times the half term before

[Guest]

our school has become better at this but not great, however if you plan for and do your bit for the EYFS when ofsted come knocking it will be school who has the egg on their face.

we did a bit of a training come staff meeting this morning and discussed this very thing. for the first time the fs leader from school is going to give us training on the EYFS and we have already listed what we think we should be doing. we have a list of questions about transition and working together for nursery wrap around and the nursery/rec children in our out of school club. will keep a close eye on this post to see how others are doing.

sue

[Guest]

Hi All,

 

 

We feed into many schools and have found it rather hard to deal with parents expectations when starting school. We have a couple of parents who are sending their children to private phonic classes. They all seem to feel that their children should know all their letter sounds and write them before starting school. We have written to all the parents informing them of "Letters and Sounds", and where they can download on the internet etc informing them that there is such a lot for the children to be proficient in before they move to phrase 2.

 

Just wondered how any of you are dealing with Letters and Sounds - do you all have these issues ?

 

If you are a reception teacher, what are your thoughts ?

 

Thanks Dot

[Guest]

I feed into 3 schools 2 we have great relations with, but the third one we have no contact with at all. I actually gave up contacting them a few years ago when I was told that we couldn't be passing on a children because we weren't a catholic group. but that a whole different story.

 

Good luck try maybe finding one member of staff that you can work with rather than all of them.

[Guest]

Hi everyone

 

This year, partly as a result of studying FD with OU, I have been very proactive in trying to set up links with local primary schools. This has been quite successful with the two nearest ones and one or two others. We drew up a Transition policy and have explained in more detail to parents the various forms that go with the children. However, I am just wondering if this whole transition process is now a victim of its own success. Currently our school leavers are just about impossible! Their behaviour has deteriorated and they seem to rush about all over the place both inside and out, showing precious little respect for the younger children. I have discussed this with my colleagues and we are beginning to feel that the whole process, however much we try to play it down and keep it all in proportion, gets the children hyped up and in some cases, confuses them as they spend more and more sesssion in their new settings, then return to ours and don't seem sure of the ground rules any more!! It's not fair on the others in the group and we don't want to be nagging them during their last few weeks.

 

 

What do others think?

 

Lesley

[Guest]

Currently our school leavers are just about impossible! Their behaviour has deteriorated and they seem to rush about all over the place both inside and out, showing precious little respect for the younger children.

 

In schools we have always experienced this.It happens in every year group so don't take it personally or as a setting failing. We used to do transition visits to new classes on the high school transition day as year 6 were not on site. This happens early in July but then the unsettled behaviour began so we have changed this year and the meet and greet new teachers is happening next Tuesday 2 days before we break-up. In reception we changed our last topic to space-superheros-sports heros to keep the boys on side. It has worked.Only yesterday after parent attended sports morning did it feel manic. I did an identify the TV sports theme music as part of our music lesson and that kept interest but it was still hard.

 

I don't think theres a quick fix but don't over play the moving on they will be getting it enough at home 'When you go to big school...' its bound to be unsettling for young children as they have no concept of what 'big school' involves. My advice is to take a DEEP BREATH and carry on with your usual boundaries. (having a count down chart to when they go and you can relax helps too )

[Rufus]

I am an F1 teacher in school and I wish i had some of you guys as my feeder pre schools. I visit every child that is coming to me, which happens every term because we are 3 term intake. All in all i visit about 11 nurseries every term and not one of them come to my school. I am constantly trying to make the links, going to play with children, and do observations, taking welcome books over, taking school uniforms so that they can play dressing up and I am so frustrated that I get nothing back. Sometimes when i visit i even feel like I am geting int he way!

Regarding letters and sounds i think pre schools should stick to phase one, this can never be done too much and it is really hard when children come up having experience of phase 2 and 3 but no knowledge of how to use and apply this.