Tag Archives: Key Stage 1

Few successful appeals for infant class places in 2025.

Posted on by
Reply

One consequence in the fall in the birth rate seems to have been a downward trend in appeals over admissions to infant classes.  Key Stage 1 classes have been capped at 30 pupils for nearly 30 years now, so it might be expected that parents would be keen to ensure their offspring gained a place at the primary school of their choice. After all, parental choice has been a cornerstone of admissions policy since 1979, regardless of the government in power. The data for 2025 admissions ahs now been added to the tie series by the DfE. Admission appeals in England, Reporting year 2025 – Explore education statistics – GOV.UK

2025
Primary (infant classes)Other primary classesPrimary
Admissions617,802137,153754,955
Admission appeals lodged by parents8,2506,33414,584
Admission appeals lodged by parents (percentage)1.34.61.9
Appeals heard by an appeals panel5,1283,8718,999
Appeals heard by an appeals panel (percentage)0.82.81.2
Successful appeals4991,0961,595
Successful appeals (percentage)9.728.317.7

Of the 617,802 requests for places in infant classes, only 8,250 resulted in an appeal, presumably as the child was not placed in the school of the parent’s choosing at offer day. Some parents either accept another school or a place became available, so 3,122 of these appeals were not proceeded with, leaving just 5,128 appeals heard across the whole of England. Of these appeals, only 499, or 9.7% of the appeals heard were successful, presumably because of the class size limit.

Across the rest of the primary age range, there were only 14,584 appeals, or 1.9% of those either moving children during the Key Stage 2 phase or joining for the first time, perhaps because of the imposition of VAT on private school fees in January 2025. Again, a number of these appeals were not heard, presumably again because a place could be found after the appeal had been lodged. Interestingly, the success rate was much higher for these appeals than for the appeals for admission to infant classes, presumably because there is no mandated maximum class size for Key Stage 2 classes.

In the secondary sector, appeals in 2025 were 4.9% of admissions, around the middle of the 4.5 to 5.5 range of the period between 2016 and 2025. Interestingly, the success rate of these appeals has been falling. In 2025, it was only 19.9%, compared with 26.3% of appeals heard in 2016.

As entry numbers are likely to fall in Year 7 over the next few years, it will be interesting to see whether the percentage of successful appeals rises over the next few years. However, it may well be that popular schools remain attractive to parents, and will still have no spare places creating the need to appeal, especially if siblings are not all granted the place at the same school.

The present Bill before parliament should return in-year admissions for all schools to local authority control. At present academies can opt out of a local system and manage their own in-year admissions. As I have not before (Jacob’s Law) this was especially challenging for children in care needing to find a new school place. Hopefully, their needs will be better appreciated in the future.

The effect of the pandemic on early learning

Posted on by
Reply

The DfE today published the results of the 2022 phonics screening check and key stage 1 attainment statistics. Phonics screening check and key stage 1 assessments: England 2022 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

These are the first phonics screening check and key stage 1 attainment statistics since 2019, after assessments were cancelled in 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic. Regardless of views on the usefulness of these tests they do provide some comparative data from before and after the pandemic.

These statistics cover the attainment of year 1 and year 2 pupils who took these assessments in summer 2022. As the DfE notes, these pupils experienced disruption to their learning during the pandemic. The headline outcome from the data is that attainment in the phonics screening check has decreased compared to 2019

According to the DfE, 75% of pupils met the expected standard in the phonics screening check in year 1, down from 82% in 2019.

87% of pupils met the expected standard in the phonics screening check by the end of year 2, down from 91% in 2019. Suggesting that schools can have an effect on outcomes.

In addition, according to the DfE, attainment at key stage 1 has decreased in all subjects in 2022 compared to 2019.

67% of pupils met the expected standard in reading, down from 75% in 2019.

68% of pupils met the expected standard in maths, down from 76% in 2019.

58% of pupils met the expected standard in writing, down from 69% in 2019.

77% of pupils met the expected standard in science, down from 82% in 2019.

I suppose these results are not a surprise given the turbulence of the past few years. Also, not much of a surprise is that some groups fared worse than others. Although the headline tables only consider single variables, such as gender, ethnicity, geographical region and SEN support, it is clear that while virtually all groups have seen declines in performance across the board, some have seen more than others.  

One striking change is performance on the phonics check for pupils eligible for Free School Meals. Those not meeting the criteria for Free School Meals as opposed to receiving free infant school meals saw the percentage meeting the expected standard fall between 2019 and 2022 from 84% to 80%, while for those eligible for Free School Meals the decrease was from 71% to 62%; down nine percentage points compared with a drop of just four per cent for those not meeting the criteria for Free School Meals.

In the Key State 1 results for the teacher assessment in mathematics, boys overtook girls, with 60% of boys compared with 67% of girls reaching the expected standard. In 2019, 75% of boys, but 77% of girls reached the expected standard.

Writing continues to lag behind reading and mathematics in the outcomes for the Key Stage 1 teacher assessments, with just 52% of boys reaching the expected standard.

These results show that there is much ground to be recovered following the effects of the covid pandemic, even if schools have an uninterrupted autumn and winter this year. Cutting funding for the education of this group may well be to produce life-long disadvantages for many of this group of children.

Baby boom now affecting schools, especially in London

Posted on by
Reply

Between January 2012 and January 2013 primary schools across England added nearly 2,000 extra classes in order to teach some 64,000 additional pupils. By contrast, their secondary colleagues educated some 23,000 fewer pupils in January 2013 than in the previous year, and saw the number of classes on census day drop by 85 compared with the previous year to a number around 1,500 less than in the peak year of 2011.

None of these statistics contained in a new Statistical Release released by the DfE (SFFR 21/2013) are very surprising to followers of trends in pupil numbers. Secondary schools are approaching the lowest point in the current demographic cycle, and primary schools in some parts of the country are already experiencing significant growth among the younger age children entering primary schools. This pressure can be seen by the fact that the average class size in primary schools has increased from 26.2 pupils per teacher in 2009 to 26.8 in 2013. At Key Stage 1 the increase has been even more dramatic, from 26.2 in 2009 to 27.3 in 2103. The number of KS1 pupils has increased by nearly 150,000 in the period between 2009 and 2013; an increase of more than 10%, with more yet to come over the next few years.

As has been predicted, the largest KS1 average class sizes are to be found in the outer London boroughs.  Twenty of the top 26 authorities with the largest average KS1 class sizes are London boroughs, and only two – The City of London and Lewisham are what might be considered Inner London boroughs in historical terms. Interestingly, two traditional inner London boroughs, Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea have the lowest average KS1 class sizes in the capital, on a par with class sizes in Sunderland and Buckinghamshire. In Harrow, the average KS1 class was 29.5 in January 2013, only 0.5 of a pupil below the legal maximum of 30 for KS1 classes, although this was exceed by the one school in the city of London where the average was shown as 30 pupils per teacher. In Sutton, where the Chief Executive last year spoke of a need to increase the legal limit, the average is a relatively unproblematic 28.7; slightly better than the average for schools across Birmingham.

Authorities in the North East took five of the lowest ten positions in 2013, although the authority with the overall lowest KS1 average class size was Cumbria, with its many small rural village schools. Here the average KS1 class was 23.9, some 5.6 pupils fewer than in Harrow.

If the success of London secondary schools achieved over the past few years is to be maintained, it will be essential to monitor the performance of the pupils in these increasingly large classes in order to avert any decline in standards at an early stage. If there is no decline in achievements, it will no doubt further add to the debate about class sizes and pupil performance.

Oxfordshire, where I am a county councillor, is in the third of authorities with the lowest KS1 class sizes, so it will be interesting to see how our KS1 results fare this summer after the scrutiny they have come under during recent years.