Anything wrong with placing a child out of year?

How far behind is your DD?

'Working Towards' could indicate only mildly behind within a single year group, which is well within the normal variability within a year group - so pretty much any mixed ability class in a normal state school will have a group of children at 'Working Towards'. It will also have a group exceeding, and a group broadly meeting the expected level.

On the other hand, the vast majority of primary classrooms will have children who are very significantly behind due to significant SEN - so for example in Year 5 but working at perhaps a a Year 1 or year 2 level.

Which group would your DD fit into? The 'working towards' group that is somewhat below age related expectations but not many years development behind, or is she working 3-4 years below her chronological age?

If she is 3-4 years + behind, then yes, there might be an argument made for her repeating a year. The move down could be permanent, but IME the children this applies to are often considered for special school (or mainstream + specialist unit) entry at secondary transition.

If she is working towards the current year group expectations but not so severely below, then tbh your best option for accelerated progress is to leave her exactly where she is. Where i work, and I am sure it is pretty much universal, we work exceptionally hard with the 'Working Towards' children in the hope of moving them into the 'Expected' band by the end of the year. We don't neglect anyone else, but that is the group we are seeking to accelerate the most.

ANY classroom contains a proportion of children 'working towards', so that in itself is not a marker for moving down a year. Significant SEN leading to a very very large learning gap between her and her age peers might be, under certain circumstances, but it remains rare.

As pp have said, placing a child out of year group is at the school's discretion; however, I wouldn't approach this as the easy solution it may appear to be. Research from the Sutton Trust suggests that repeating a year may actually hamper progress.

There is an hysterical ideology in England about children being out of year group. Usually from people who dont seem to understand that even 20 yeas ago children weren't pushed into school at just 4. Successive (Conservative) governments have centralised more and more in education so instead of a qualified and sensible head being able to make a decision that benefited the child. That no longer seems to be acceptable. Yet more dumbing down of education professionals. No wonder they are leaving the profession in droves.

If you believe that your child would be better off in the year below then go for it. The current evidence that headteachers rely on when discussing declassification is severely out of date; reliant on incomplete research and uses examples from other countries with vastly different education systems. So quite frankly a load of bullshit. The "establishment" are so frightened of people not behaving like lemmings that they will say anything to keep your child locked in place, at no matter what cost to them.

This is very interesting. Can the school really move down a year without asking the LA? Is it safe to ask this question at open evenings

The LA will need to consult with your preference as to wether they can meet your child’s needs as per her EHCP. You will need to discuss education out of year with the school. It is at their discretion, many schools won’t do it and just because they do it for one year there is no guarantee that they will not put your child back in year when she makes progress.

Being educated out of year is at the discretion of the HT/Governors not the LA. Section I of the EHC plan just names the setting and not the year group.

Can I just say as a person who did change school and was ‘put back a year’ I hated it! I was bullied and bullied by other children. I felt left out and in the end it didn’t help me at all.

But they did what they thought was right for me at the time.

I did however go to uni and get a degree

An EHCP runs until 25 so the moving years and access to education are different. It's designed for those who may need extra education to bridge the gap and reach full potential.

SIlver47 I know of at least two children who have been kept back a year in primary and have been a year behind right through the whole system -primary and secondary.

Ok, to look at it another way ....

{say your dd ought to be in Year 8 - I'm just putting that for explanation purposes as I can't see where you have said)
What if they said "She is working at a level that we would normally be expected from a child who is in Yr3" - do you think that would be appropriate - for a 12 - 13 yr old to be sitting in class and playing out at break times with 7 - 8 yr olds?
Or what if they said she was 'just' 2 years behind - would it be any better for her to be in Yr 6 again ?
Or - and this is very likely with many people with ASD having a very uneven profile - what if they said she was working at Yr 8 for chemistry and biology, Yr 9 for maths, Yr 3 for English, Yr 5 for History and Geography, etc.,etc... then where do you think she should move to ?
All teachers work with children covering a massive range of abilities and levels of understanding. However, if a child has particular difficulties accessing the curriculum because of their special need, then they usually can't suddenly access everything by repeating a year of work. It really isn't that simple.

Not much to add except that the curriculum is designed by politicians so that a certain percentage don’t meet expected standards. If everyone met them then they’d just move the finish line further along so that they could claim that they were championing a rigorous curriculum.

One of my kids used to get the “working towards” label and the teachers always looked puzzled when I’d ask how far away he was from expected. If he was in the year below, would he be expected? The old number grading system at least made it clearer how far behind he was. He’s a late August born hence the question about being in the year below.

Bottom line is that it is the LA who will agree or disagree with changing year groups, so you need to approach them to start the discussion about staying in the same year group fro two years . For the right pupil it has to be a sensible way forward but the question that all have to answer is whether it is the right move. In other words would staying back a year give the pupil the opportunity to improve at an accelerated rate or will they always be a pupil who is "working towards"

It is only in the last few years that it has become the case that it is more common and possible to do this with the LA's agreement, so as you go up the age range you will in theory stay in the same out of age year group.

However at the time to move to secondary does seem a point at which there seems a push to get pupils back to their correct age group. Personally I do not see how this can happen for most pupils as they will have missed year 7 completely and must therefore be behind again.

The reality is that it is only now that the out of age pupils are starting to cause issues further up the educational ladder and the usual processes and rules are having to be reconsidered.

Silver no, in Liverpool for example deferred children will stay in the same out of cohort year group through their education.

I thought that with an ECHP, you could access additional years of education under certain circumstances. But only if the plan specifies it.

The school is obliged to follow the plan, not parent's wishes in addition to the plan. Did you raise this as a possibility during the meetings whilst current version was drawn up? What was the response?

It seems most odd to me that you can't easily do this. Where I was brought up (not UK) if you didn't pass the school year (graded by teachers in primary or passed end of year exams in secondary), you had to repeat the year. There were always a handful of slightly older children in the year who had repeated a year by the end of schooling, sometimes it was just what they needed to get them back on track

Silver many children defer in state schools and have no such problems being taught out of cohort.

only if they return to their cohort before leaving that school, so it is entirely internal to the school. It is very rare, because it will automatically knock the school down the league tables, so it has to be a school which will accept that.

Silver many children defer in state schools and have no such problems being taught out of cohort.

the "spare" year is for post 16, not years r-11.

if you theoretically do GCSEs a year late ( not that you can, in the state sector), you would not be entitled to apply for an apprenticeship, nor to do a level 2 qualification in sixth form before level 3, nor change sixth form course, not resit A levels, etc. There is a "spare year" but only for special circumstances, and only post 16, where the funding is different.

In addition, there are many social and logistic difficulties with being outside your year, as well as being excluded from sport. As well, there are problems with insurance, and with legal requirements of age restrictions on various trips, activities and parts of the curriculum.

Free education is for 15 years , 7 in primary 5 secondary and 2 for A- levels or similar, so there is a "spare year"