what are good questions when picking a high school to attend

Choosing a secondary schoolhouse: 10 crucial questions to enquire

When you're faced with finding the best secondary schoolhouse for your kid it tin be easy to focus on schools' settling-in strategies for Year seven pupils, merely it's vital to look beyond these initial worries and seek answers to questions which will affect your child several years downwardly the line. Moira Holden reports.

Prospective parents' evenings at school tend to be focused on how a secondary schoolhouse will ease your child's transition from primary, but make sure you're not defenseless out in later years when presented with their policies on important schoolhouse issues.

Many schools vary in their approach, and so here are 10 questions you lot need to inquire up-front when touring schools and going to open days with your child.

Download Twelvemonth 6 to seven transition packs

• English & Maths transition packs
• Exercise journalistic writing, figurative linguistic communication, persuasive text and more
• Revise key maths methods and concepts

1. Do y'all use Primal Stage ii SATs results to stream or ready in Year vii? Some main schools put pupils in classes based solely on SATs results. Other schools use a combination of SATs, CATs (Cerebral Abilities Tests), which are carried out early on in the new term, plus reports from chief schools.
2. If you practice use SATs, practice you lot use the overall results or just i single subject? 'My son'due south new school used only his SATs maths result to stream him in classes,' warned Marion, whose son is at present 14. 'Information technology was his worst result, and so he had to be in a center form for all of his subjects when he would have been better suited to the English language peak stream.  I didn't discover out nigh information technology until he was half mode through Yr 7. I wish I'd asked about it at the prospective parents' evening, but it never occurred to me.'

• Do you lot set or stream? The Department for Didactics defines setting equally grouping pupils according to their power in a particular subject field, whereas streaming sees youngsters put into the same ability class for the majority of their subjects.
• How much is the schoolhouse influenced by the EBacc? 'Parents need to know what the curriculum is going to look like further up the schoolhouse,' says Simon Spencer, deputy head of the School of Pedagogy at Birmingham City Academy. 'If the schoolhouse wants to follow the English Baccalaureate, and so there will be an emphasis on certain subjects. Other subjects popular with pupils and parents may not exist bachelor to the same extent, so parents need to ask how wide and balanced the curriculum is.'

• Do you accept an early entry GCSE policy? Some schools won't allow early entry because they feel youngsters volition get higher grades when they are more mature. Catrina, who has a daughter, 13, said: 'The school policy meant she had to complete 1 GCSE in Year ix. I thought she was too young and I think she could have got a college grade if she'd taken it later.'
• Is the school a free school or an academy? 'This is an important question because if a school falls into those categories information technology does not have to follow the National Curriculum,' explains Simon Spencer.
• GCSE or IGCSE? The IGCSE (International GCSE) has traditionally been the exam taken in independent schools, just more state secondary schools are now turning to it. Check exam boards to find out.
• Do you have mixed ability classes at GCSE? Core subjects of maths, English and science tend to be set, merely some youngsters find they are in mixed ability groups for subjects such as history and geography when GCSE courses begin in Year 10.
• How many pupils stay on into the Sixth Form?This is a adept indicator of a school's reputation for A-level teaching. If only a small-scale percentage stays, then it could betoken your child may accept to become elsewhere to study their pick of A-level subjects.
• What grades do pupils need to get to be allowed to stay in the Sixth Form? Some secondary schools require a certain amount of GCSEs at a certain form, but other schools don't follow the aforementioned criteria. Check if a B grade at GCSE is sufficient to carry on the field of study at A-level.
• Looking at schoolhouse data? To compare local schools' functioning go to Government Schoolhouse Comparison websites in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

morgannalk1969.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.theschoolrun.com/choosing-secondary-school-10-crucial-questions-ask