11 Plus Exams Forum

I would love your ideas on leaving primary school celebrations for Y6. We are thinking of organising a party out of school and a momento but that's as far as we got. All suggestions gratefully received!

When DD left they had a disco.

The PTA also did a year book type thing for them, with their first memories of school, their most embarrassing moments and what they wanted to be. Also each child was given a pen and pencil set with their school name on.

Thanks TInkers - super fast answer. Did all the children like the disco? We want to make sure that there is something for girls and boys to enjoy and I've noticed at school functions that the girls seem more into it than the boys.

My DD doesnt like loud music so she would have liked a quieter place, but that's just her. She never went to any school discos before and hasn't since.

They had a photographer there with various 'props' and groups had their photo taken. Things like inflatable guitars and saxs, feather boas, interesting hats, that sort of thing. It was Hollywood themed so plenty for both boys and girls. The photos wre on the photographers website to buy afterwards. Some of the staff were there too. They had 'cocktails' to drink with exotic names etc.

Only thing I would say is that it was after their last day at school and things got quite emotional when they left, as that was it, the end.

We (parents not school) organised a swimming party at our local pool the Saturday before they left and then a disco on the evening of their last day. We weren't sure if the boys would be into a disco, hence the swimming too, but both genders were well represented at both and had great fun

JD

We've hired the village hall before now and then all camped on the field.

For my older two, the school organised an after school BBQ for year 6 and staff. This was I think, the same afternoon as the leavers production. They were given keyrings with the school logo one side, year of etc. engraved on the back. My two have kept theirs as momentos, some used them for their locker keys at the next school.

We were lucky and a local farmer lent us his field and barn - as the weather was lovely we stayed in the field. All parents were given an item to bring for a joint picnic (some had to bring paper plates, others soft drinks, others food etc, if parents wanted alcohol, they brought their own). All children were encouraged to bring water pistols and spent an amazing few hours running around getting soaked! Just had an ipod blaring out music and a few gazebos for shade - everyone bought picnic blankets and chairs - easy peasy and no real outlay!

We re-enacted their reception class photo, putting in any new joiners in the space where others had left. Also a couple of the mums went into school for a few days, before the end of term and took lots of lovely photos which they made into a photo book (using one of the companies on the internet) and parents were able to purchase (it has some class groups but then more friendship groups and the kids running across the field and in the trees) all set to one of Dr. Zeuss's poems about moving on...just lovely!

One of our parents had a humongous garden and equally big sitting room and they very kindly allowed us all to invade.

We hired a limousine (which the leavers didn't know about so it was a surprise) and they went for an hour's drive through town, eventually getting dropped off at said parents' house where we'd erected a marquee. All the parents came as well as the Head. Burgers and hotdogs were on offer, along with cake and 'mocktails'.

In the run up to the 'event' we'd asked each child to nominate who was the smiliest, who was the sportiest, etc. until eventually everyone was nominated for something. We then bought little trophy cups and had the nominations engraved on, along with their names.

We were supposed to end the evening with setting off lanterns, except it was far too windy so everyone took them home (still have ours somewhere).

We were extremely careful with costs and called in favours/cut deals where we could and got it all for £20 a head (that was for each family, not just per person).

Edit to say: we also used their reception photo in their 'invitation' and bought them little books, which we gave to them before the party. They then went round all the teachers, each other and anyone else they wanted to include, and got them to write in them. Tis lovely looking back at them now, six years later.

Lovely memories. I am smiling just reading them! I forgot about the emosh element and remembered being the same when leaving my primary school - I even hugged the old dragon deputy head.