Ballard School - Open Day

Ballard is a family school and it welcomes children from Nursery to GCSE.  The school has 32 acres of woodland, playing fields and school buildings and it situated on the edge of the New Forest National Park and near to the coast.  There are four main parts of the school, each with their own designated area.  Everyone in the school gets the benefit of our location and our wide range of excellent facilities and specialist teaching.

The Ballard experience starts in Early Years and Pre-Prep.  The Nursery looks after children from 2 yeas old and then Kindergarten through to Pre-Prep from Year R to Year 2 (aged 7).  Lower Prep runs from aged 7 to 10, Upper Prep from 10 to 13 and Senior from 13 to 16.  The advantage of this system is that each transition stage can be managed and minimises disruption.  Levels of independence, challenge, homework, flexibility and breadth of curriculum can be managed carefully to suit the child.

When you start at Ballard, you join the Ballard ‘family’ and we make every effort to make children and their parents feel welcome.  All our joining children will have a form teacher who will take responsibility for their welfare and introduction and they will also be ‘twinned’ with a ‘buddy’ who will look after them and make sure they know their way around the school.

For years 3 and above, Parents can monitor progress on attendance, homework and obtain other pertinent information on their child’s progress via the school IT system.  From year 6, pupils will also have a homework diary and these are reviewed regularly by form teachers.

Days at Ballard are varied and fast paced. The school day starts at 8.30am with form time. Lessons are 50 minutes and there is a mid-morning break with drinks and snacks available.  Lunch for younger children is served from 12 noon and from 12.45pm for the older children. Afternoons will be a mixture of assemblies, form time, lessons and sport finishing at 4.00pm followed by an optional (but very popular) activities hour from 4.15pm with school finishing at 5.10pm with the departure of school transport.

Open day dates