School open days: a worksheet for comparing schools as a family

Quick Answer

Take the same one-page sheet to every open day and write down the same five things: the real travel time, the subjects and electives on offer, the support available, what an ordinary day looks like, and what your child noticed. Then compare the sheets side by side at home, without scoring them.

What should we find out at every school?

Three schools in two weeks blur together. Brochures and guided tours tend to cover the same ground; the differences are in the details you only get by asking, and in what your child notices when they are not being shown around. Asking the same things everywhere is what makes the sheets comparable.

This sheet works for any school type and any state. It does not say which kind of school suits a child, and it does not predict fit. Use it to notice what each school is like.

How to use it: print the worksheet table and the twelve questions below it, one copy per school. They fit on both sides of a single sheet of paper. The parent fills in the left column and the child fills in the right. Do it in the car on the way home, while it is fresh.

The worksheet

Print one per school. Name of school: ______ Date and time of visit: ______ Who came: ______

Section	Parent's column	Child's column
1. Getting there, door to door	Try the real trip at school time on a school day if you can. Write the leaving time, each leg (walk, bus, train, car), the arrival time and the total minutes. Note anything that could change it (a transfer, a long wait, school-zone traffic).	How was the trip? Write one thing about it. Could you do this trip every day? Circle one: Yes / Not sure / No.
2. Subjects, electives and languages	Which subjects does your child want or need to keep studying? Which electives and languages are offered, and from which year? Write down what you were told, not what you assumed.	Which subjects do you want to do? Did you see or hear about any of them today? Did you hear about a new one that sounded fun?
3. Learning and wellbeing support	Who helps a student who is finding work hard, and who helps one who is finding it easy? Who does a student go to when something is wrong? How does the school tell families?	If you were stuck or worried at this school, who would you ask? Did you meet someone who seemed easy to talk to? Write what they do, like "teacher" or "librarian". You do not need their name.
4. The daily routine	Start and finish times; how much homework is expected in Years 7 and 8; what happens at lunch and after school; clubs, sport and music.	What did the kids do at lunch? What did they do between classes? Would you join in with something you saw? Which one?
5. What I noticed	Anything that is not in the other four sections: how staff spoke to students, how students spoke to each other, what you could not find out.	Write or draw three things you noticed. One thing you liked. One thing you were not sure about. One thing that was just interesting.

What can my child fill in?

The right-hand column is written in words a Year 5 child uses, so they can read and answer it alone. They are not marking the school. You are collecting what your child saw and felt, which parents cannot see from the front of the hall.

Let them write it in their own words and do not correct it. If they write "the toilets were clean", that goes in the grid like anything else. Your child may notice the things that decide whether they will want to go back each day, so ask before you share what you thought.

Which questions are worth asking staff and students?

Twelve questions. The tag says who is best placed to answer. Ask a student the questions tagged "student" even when a teacher is standing beside you. A student describes an ordinary week, and staff describe the intended one.

#	Question	Ask
1	What time does a student on my child's bus or train line need to leave home to arrive on time?	Student
2	Which electives and languages run each year, and what happens if too few students choose one?	Staff
3	If my child has a subject they find hard, who do they go to and how quickly can they be seen?	Staff
4	What did you do on your last ordinary Tuesday, from arrival to going home?	Student
5	How much homework do students in Year 7 get in a normal week, and how is it set?	Student
6	When a student is upset or has a problem with a friend, who do they tell and what happens next?	Staff
7	How does the school tell families how a student is going between reports?	Staff
8	What do students do at recess and lunch if they do not play sport?	Student
9	How do new students make friends in the first few weeks?	Student
10	What do students here complain about most, and what would you change?	Student
11	What is expected of families: uniform, devices, contributions, volunteering, camps?	Staff
12	What is one thing you wish families knew before they chose this school?	Staff or student

A short answer or a pause is information too. Write down what was said and who said it.

The comparison grid

Fill in one column per school, up to three. There is no total, no score and no weighting row, because a number would look more certain than three sheets of notes can be. Look for what is different, then ask which differences matter to your child.

Write down	School A: ______	School B: ______	School C: ______
Door-to-door trip (minutes, and how)
Subjects and electives my child wants
Support: who helps, and how fast
An ordinary day (times, homework, lunch)
What my child noticed
What I could not find out

What does a completed comparison look like?

Fictional example. The family and the two schools below are invented for this page. Neither school is a real school. The family, Aroha and her son Tom (Year 6), are made up to show how the sheet is filled in.

Write down	Wattlebrook High School (fictional)	Marlowbrook Secondary College (fictional)
Door-to-door trip	55 minutes: 10 walk, bus, 15 walk. Tested on a Tuesday at 7:40. One bus change.	25 minutes by car at 8:00; 40 by bus with no change.
Subjects and electives wanted	Wants Japanese and robotics. Japanese from Year 7, robotics from Year 9.	Wants Japanese and robotics. Japanese offered only if enough students choose it; robotics club from Year 7.
Support	Head of year plus a learning support team; a Year 8 student said you book a time.	One wellbeing teacher per year group; a Year 8 student said you can just go to the office.
An ordinary day	8:45 to 3:15. Year 7 homework "about 30 minutes a night", said a student.	8:30 to 3:10. Homework set weekly, due Fridays, said a student.
What Tom noticed	Big oval. Students sat in groups on the steps. "Everyone looked busy."	Quiet corridors. Library open at lunch. "A kid showed us the way without being asked."
What we could not find out	Whether Japanese runs every year.	How many students take the bus from our stop.

What Aroha and Tom did with it: they did not add anything up. They saw that the trip was the biggest difference, that Japanese was a maybe at one school and a yes at the other, and that Tom had more to say about the second school's library. They wrote two follow-up questions and moved on to a visit to a third school. The example is not a recommendation of either kind of school.

What do we still need to find out?

Use this box last. Write each question you could not answer, who will find out, and by when.

Open question	Who will find out	By when

Where next

If you are still deciding whether selective entry is right for your child, read when selective isn't the right path. For score-free background on selective schools, see the NSW selective schools directory. For the mistakes families make while preparing for exams, see common practice errors.

Sources and review

Where the content came from: the sheet, the twelve questions and the fictional example are original Braintree Coaching Australia material written for this page. Wattlebrook High School, Marlowbrook Secondary College, Aroha and Tom are invented; exact-phrase web searches on 2026-10-15 found no Australian school of either name (the ACARA school directory itself was not searched). This page states no exam facts.

Author: James Rush, content writer, Braintree Coaching Australia.

Reviewed by: Braintree Academic Panel. A named teacher review has not yet been recorded for this page. If you find an error, please tell us.

Last updated: 2026-10-15.