Our daughter will be 4 next May, she is really happy at her montessori nursery so we decided to wait until she is 5 to get her into school. Meanwhile we are trying to find out about which ones would be our best options among our closest schools. We live next to Our lady and St philip neri, we are catholic so we are considering the school as one of our options. I have been told that in this country catholic schools are good and a really good choice (I am not british, but from where I come from the same is true). Their last ofsted report doesn't seem "outstanding" so I am looking forward to reading some first hand views about pros and cons, are parents and (specially) children happy with the school? Are the classrooms overcrowded? She would be going into year 1 (not reception) would that be "mission impossible"? . Otherwise what would you consider other best alternatives? Thanks a lot in advance for all your feedback.

Have PMed you with more detail of our experience.

The last OFSTED report came as a real surprise to parents at the school. The inspection framework changed and while it appeared that many schools were downgraded, they were actually being tested on different criteria from previous inspections, and the criteria are much tougher. I personally feel the school is much better than the last OFSTED suggested.

No school is perfect, but we have been very happy with it. It's not too big - they take in a class and a half worth of kids in each year group, so there are classes with mixed year groups as well as classes with separate year groups (so, for example, my son last year was in year 5 and was in a class with the older year 5s and younger year 6s and this year he is in the next class up, which is all year 6). It seems a bit complicated until you get your head around it, but it actually works really well, and it means no individual class is too big. On average, my son's classes have had between 18 and 22 children in them. This system also means the Head has flexibility about getting new kids in, if need be, as he can usually fit them in without breaching the rules on class size. He is very approachable and will be happy to talk to you.

The atmosphere in the school is really good - the kids are happy, well-behaved and respectful and seem to enjoy going to school. Teaching (as anywhere) varies but I can tell you that there are several teachers who are exceptionally good.

This post was last modified: 28-03-2012 01:30 PM by rshdunlop.