School Assessments for Y1 Admission (British/UK schools) | ExpatWoman.com
 

School Assessments for Y1 Admission (British/UK schools)

138
Posts
EW NEWBIE
Latest post on 15 February 2016 - 14:37

My daughter is going for a Year 1 assessment at a British curriculum school in Dubai. Can anyone share their experience? Is it more observation-based on social skills or are they expected to know specific things like how to spell/read?

Some of my friends who have kids younger than my daughter have gone to assessments at schools here and the kids are expected to know much more than what I thought a 4 year old was expected to know (based on the American curriculum).

I'm a bit nervous...

7
Posts
EW NEWBIE
Latest post on 16 February 2016 - 15:10
Hi, Our young one is applying to start Y1 in Sep as well, and the school said that if the reference from the current school was good enough, they would not be calling us for an assessment. Dont know if this is the case for all schools. For us, this was a godsend as flying to Dubai (We are not there yet) just for one assessment would be very expensive on top of the already astronomical school fees (dont get me started). Good luck with your assessment.
518
Posts
EW GURU
Latest post on 16 February 2016 - 14:41
Didn't mean to scare you. There is still a lot of role play, painting and free flow activities. I only mentioned the academic part of it for your reference for the assessment. Your daughter is quite young. My son is 5 at the moment and would be 5 and half by the time he finishes fs2 so I think the learning is quite age appropriate and he is not struggling. The writing part of it all(sentences and numbers) is not very formal at this stage and they are encouraged to attempt it but not expected to master it by the year end. So for a year 1 assessment you should not be stressed about it as my little one is not keen about writint and his teacher is fine with it.
138
Posts
EW NEWBIE
Latest post on 16 February 2016 - 13:51
Thanks for replying comp99! She would be starting Y1 in September 2016. I told my British husband what you said and he was shocked (as am I to be honest). We come from the school of thought that kids should mostly be learning through play at this age and not formal schooling. I don't remember pre-school/pre-kindergarten (which is 3-4 years old in the US) to be so formal. There was a lot of painting, role play, and blocks...not much writing. I'm sure the formal writing for letters and numbers started in kindergarten (5 years old). Definitely reading sight words started in kindergarten as well. Well, I guess what's done is done. No sense in stressing over it. They all "catch up" at some point in the early years anyways, I don't see the need to stress about what my 4 year old can or can't do. If only they tested her on her Minecraft skills or the imagination she uses in block building...she is ace at those things.
518
Posts
EW GURU
Latest post on 15 February 2016 - 20:16
Would she be starting year 1 in Sept or joining a school in year 1 mid year? My younger one is in fs2 in a uk school and is learning to blend sounds to form words. They are learning numbers and learning to write them correctly until 20. Also a bit of addition by counting objects. By the end of the school year they are expected to read sentences with frequent words in them in an Oxford tree book. Don't know which uk school you are applying to but the expectations could be a bit high depending on the school.
 
 

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