Children's education worries
 

Hi,

This is my first post here.

I live in Japan (have done for 20 years), am married to a Japanese lady and we have 2 daughters (both of whom have UK passports and whose births are registered in the UK).

We are considering a return next year if possible.

My daughters are currently 6 and 10.

When it comes to getting the eldest a place in a secondary school, are there any pointers or points of reference anyone has?

She'll be at the age to start the first year of secondary school on her return (if we make the move)

Will she need to take any tests/exams? Can she do this from abroad?

I presume she'll not be allowed to enter the year below her age?

Her English is good but not to a level of a regular British kid and am worried about her being able to get
a place in a school near where we hope to live.

Thanks for any tips/advice in advance.

Re: Children's education worries
 

Your will not be able to apply for any schools until you are living here. You have to go to the education board at the council. Filll in a form with your 3 chooses of school,. Then it's a waiting game to wetther any of those school have a spot. We came back last summer (2018). Applied for a school when the schools were breaking up for the holidays and didn't hear about a place u til the schools were going back in September . You will get a school place it just might not be the school you want.

Re: Children's education worries
 

So she'll be going in to Year 7 when you return? Is there any way of you returning sooner if so? Applications for secondary school places have to be done by the end of October the year before i.e October of Year 6. Which means that you can apply later, but you will be at the back of the queue for places behind those that applied before the deadline. But it may be fine if it's not an oversubscribed area, whereabouts are you thinking of?

Re: exams, she'd only need to do them for grammar schools, but again that will depend on the area you're planning on moving to as to whether or not that's relevant.

Re: Children's education worries
 

Re: Children's education worries
 

Which month/year will she turn 11?

I'm not sure how oversubscribed Lincolnshire is, what you need to do is go to the council website for the town/village you are hoping to move to, and look at their school admissions pages. On them somewhere they will have details of this years allocations, so you can then see which schools are oversubscribed and what your chances are of getting her in to a school of your choice.

I wouldn't worry about the English thing at all, when my daughter started secondary school there were several kids that joined at the same time that didn't speak a word of English. One of them was a French girl who was fluent within a few months and is still one of of her best friends now several years later. If your children have some English, they'll be fine. All I can suggest is that you make sure you speak English at home as much as possible between now and then, and get them watching tv etc in English too.

Good luck.

Re: Children's education worries
 

Re: Children's education worries
 

OK, so yes she'd be in Year 5 now, and if you were in the UK you'd be looking at secondary schools now and submitting an application by the end of next month. Hopefully Lincolnshire isn't oversubscribed and a late application won't matter. I'm just used to my area (Berkshire) which has some of the best schools in the country so is hugely oversubscribed, but I know it's a lot more relaxed elsewhere! :lol:

Good luck.

Re: Children's education worries
 

Just to share our experience. We moved back to the UK at end of July last year after we arranged an entry test at a grammar school for my daughter to get into year 7 (she was 11). It's because we missed the council test so we contacted school to take school test. She passed the exam so she started grammar school in September.

For my son, he just finished 3rd grade in USA so we contacted the council as well as local school near grandparent's home, got a spot from home before council contacted us. He was in Y5 last year. He'll be taking the 11+ exam for 2020 secondary school entrance. Test will be out by 3rd week of October and we need to register for a school by end of October.

We purchased Bond's books as well as subscribe Bond's 11+ online for both children to practice English and Math for the 11+ test. My daughter finished Y6 (primary school level in USA) before taking the test so she probably had some academic knowledge more than my son.

Again, the key things are to connect with the council and schools where you think you will be living. My husband had to make so many calls and write many emails to book for test days. It was stressful but one year later, we're glad we got them into good schools. We have been moving through many countries so the kids were quite easy to adapt new environments.

Good luck!