To be shocked deferring by a year has become this common?

[Killiam]

My DS is 4, his birthday is august 28th, he started school this year.
Today I went to a session at his school where parents were invited in to see what they have been doing etc.
After I was talking to some parents and they noted more than once how tiny he is, I said ah well he has just turned 4 so makes sense. This is when I learned of his class of 24 kids, 4 of them should have started the year before 1 June birthday, 2 July and 1 August. The next closest in age to my son is a June baby so no other July or August babies born his year at all!
DS seems to be doing well but when I asked the other summer parents why they decided to defer they basically all said they just felt their kids needed more time, nothing the separates them from DS.
DS does cry most days going in and couldn't write his name or anything before starting.
The school is in central London and is very diverse but lots of Eastern European and Asian parents and Ive learn that in most of those countries 6 or even 7 is a more common. starting age so I wonder if that plays a role?

AIBU to be shocked it is so common to defer now? Starting to wonder if I made the right choice!

It’s not just about liking school, though. I LOVED school. I was the youngest in my year by over 2 months. I did brilliantly academically, all the way through. But in secondary school, I had friends who were over a year older than me and guess what… when they started smoking/drinking/having sex, I started too. And I was young and not ready.

I’m in Scotland and we’ve deferred both our autumn/winter borns. One of our children started school at almost 6. All of our children went into school able to read and enjoying maths and writing. But we don’t want them to be 10 rather than 11 when their peers started getting mobile phones, or 14 rather than 15 when their peers start having sex. There are reasons to want your child to be old in the year that are nothing to do with academics. And deferring them doesn’t need to put them off anything.

That's the exact opposite of my experience, I'm an august born that excelled academically and thrived in that environment. I went to grammar school for my senior years passing the 11+ but I have an august 31st born (born a little earlier than her due date) and we chose to delay her not because I think school is an awful thing to not enjoy but because she's wasn't emotionally ready and when she gets to school I want to get the most out of her experience. She's delayed under a reception start as per agreement with catchment schools and our local council so wont miss a year of education.

I find this topic fascinating as it does seem to get people's backs up generally and I don't understand it surely we all just want the best outcome for our individual children. I also think there is a big push in the UK to rush children through childhood and play is not as encouraged as a learning opportunity. I also think I want my child to be as emotionally ready as possible to make life decisions as they get older, the fact that GCSEs begin in year 9 in some places means you're looking at options at just turned 13 which to me feels very young.

I meant to quote @YourLastNerve but something seems to have gone amiss on posting but just wanted to reply to the comment in terms of jadedness around schooling and parental attitudes.

@goodkidsmaadhouse I also had a similar experience to you, and the emotional and social aspects were strong motivators for me in delaying my daughter

Until this thread, I genuinely had no idea that this issue was so contentious. My kids are now at university. Most families I know did not defer, us included. But I understand why some parents do and it’s a personal decision. It is a revelation to me that some people get so upset about it.

it’s not just going into school that needs to be considered but also them leaving school. This is often not considered and children can be going to uni at 17 which can be hard.

Is this a quirk of the scottish system? In England an august born child would turn 18 at the end of 6th form and would not be going to uni aged 17.

play is not as encouraged as a learning opportunity.

For me, its not that play is not a learning opportunity. Of course it is. But its what you learn. You can learn social skills, problem solving, creativity. But you don't get anywhere near the same academic learning from play that you get from formal education. Not all play is equivalent either in the potential for learning. Studies will tend to focus on "perfect" environments where students are guided to ensure they challenge themselves enough, explore a range of different resources and develop skills further. In reality, if a child plays repetitively riding wheeled toys around a garden and rarely chooses to explore other materials, no, they will not pick up any pre literacy or pre numeracy learning. There will be a point where there's little novelty or value in the physical skills they are practising doing this.

Schools & the education system were really set up to focus on academic outcomes. The teaching of skills like reading, writing and maths, and the acquisition of detailed knowledge in areas like science, history and geography.

The assumption being that characteristics like resilience, decision making, negotiation, social interaction, emotional regulation, are for parents to have responsibility for and are less within the scope of school and that there's plenty of time outside school for play.

Parents overscheduling childrens lives is as much of an issue as the school starting age. There's time & learning capacity for school AND play.

I feel fortunate that all mine went to school in Scotland, where the start age is older. Kids here do not need to start primary school unless they are 5yrs old on the school new year start date (mid August)

So, my youngest DD was 2 weeks off her SIXTH birthday when she started.

And, all my others have been nearer 6 than 5.

Thus, they have been fully ready, already reading and with all the foundation skills in place.

The very youngest a child can start school here is 4yrs and 8 months if they have a January birthday. Parents can hold off til they are 5yrs 8 or start at 4;8.

I have heard many parents regret sending kids too young. But never one regret holding back.

My end of July born 4 year old has just started school. She is not usually one to cope well with things, but she has settled really well. I think it's down to her nursery preparing her and the school is quite small, as is her class so the transition is easier. So I think those things factor in. By chance, she is one of several children born in July/Aug in her year so that will help as she's not the only one.

I did briefly consider deferring but she was obviously bored of nursery and ready for change.

Unless SEN it's not until year one that summer borns really feel the difference if I have understood the research correctly. Reception is play based so not unusual to settle well.

I haven't read the full thread so this may have been said already.

Children who start school on the younger side tend to need more additional help in school than those who start later. Where I live ( not the UK) children generally start aged between 4.5 and 5.5 years. Some of the younger ones will go on to need extra coaching from special ed teachers. It's been shown that proportionally more of the younger age group need this coaching compared to the older ones - so it's not really SEN in many cases, ie many of them would be fine if they were just that bit older for their class.

Unfortunately, this has a knock on effect on those children who do have SEN. Special ed teachers are over-stretched and I feel the present system disadvantages those children who really do have additional needs. There simply isn't enough time to help them adequately while also attending to a younger cohort who are struggling too, but simply because of their age.

Starting age needs to go up and more early years provision provided imho. As pp have said, in countries where the starting age of formal schooling is higher, 6 or 7, the vast majority of children will be developmentally ready, and you don't see the same sort of gaps emerge between youngest and oldest in the class as can happen now.

I would have deferred my DC if they were jan/feb born (Scotland here)

I'm a January birthday and went to university at 17 and it was just too young. An extra year of school would have made a big difference in terms of maturity and socially.

As it is my two are spring born so were amongst the oldest in their year, and they always preferred it that way.

Two summer born and they have always struggled. They slept though most of p1

My DS1 (May) Y1 class was divided into Y1 and a Y1/2 class. He was in the Y1 group, 24 kids, 21 of them boys. The teacher said to me that she felt every one of them would've benefitted from repeating reception, were it allowed back then. Instead, his immaturity finally came home to roost at 15/16 when he didn't do so well in his GCSEs then flunked out of Y12 A levels. Luckily we changed direction, he did a BTEC and now has a First in computing.

DS2 (also May) effectively did a catch up year by doing an Art Foundation before uni.

Someone said 'it evens out by Y5'. It doesn't. I believe 2/3 or more of Oxbridge students are Sept-Dec born?

Finally, the older child is bigger, stronger, more mature so goes through school getting praised. The younger child might actually achieve higher once they hit that older child's age, but there's no rara squad for them.

I'd've deferred in a heartbeat had it been an option.

Those posters In England) that post "It's only allowed around here for developmental delays/learning difficulties" don't know the law. The law is the same across England. All parents can decide to delay the start of their summerborn child. The admission authority then has to decide in the best interests of the child which year group they will put them in. The answer is rarely that they should put them in yr 1 and skip reception as that is rarely if ever in the best interests of the child. Most parents that fight this win and the child goes in reception. The guidance on this for academies, voluntary aided schools (where the governors are the admission authority) and local authorities is quite clear. I deferred my now yr 7 son and the process is becoming easier and more understood all the time.

It used to be that a child started school in the term which contained their birthday or - if they had a holiday birthday - the term which preceded it. I, for example, have a June birthday and started school after Easter. Obviously, this was decades ago (1963!) and none of us went to nursery or any sort of pre-school.

I remain convinced that children are pushed into formal learning before many are ready for it.

This was our situation too. I still feel cheated out of that extra year 16 years later but felt it was best to start her in reception that go straight to yr1.
She was also very aware that all her friends were starting school and desperately wanted to be with them. She struggled to settle for the first term but was fine after that.

Summer children are disadvantaged. I remember a primary school teacher telling me DS2 was worryingly behind and had only just reached some literacy or maths target that his friends A and W had mastered three months earlier. I said, 'Yeah - they are both nine months older than him That makes a different when you are only six. So if you take that into account, he's actually mastered it six months younger than them.' I watched the lightbulb moment on her face as this had clearly never occurred to her. And she was an infant school teacher.

Summer born children are often made to feel less able academically than their peers at infant school - and throughout school life are less likely to be picked for sport as they are likely to be the smallest or least adept in their year. To give your child an advantage, make sure they are oldest in the year.

Obviously every child is different but on average I think being a summer born is worse for boys and those without older siblings (pretty sure there is also data to back this up).

DC1 is an early summer born boy and DC2 is an autumn born girl.

DC1 coped fine but DC2 is a similar level now, at just turned 4, as DS was when starting reception, yet she has a whole year of preschool first. She can write her name, is reading simple words, is tall and physically confident (riding a bike, drawing well, dressing herself etc). While DC1 was ok starting reception I can already see that DC2 is going to absolutely thrive and I’m so happy that she has a whole other year of play ahead of her. It seems unfair that they should have different experiences by a quirk of when they were conceived and I think deferring is a great way of redressing this.

I do think that it's mainly about the individual child's development and age is only one of many factors. In countries where it's common to repeat a year, it's also common to skip a year. Often the children skipping a year are end of year so almost 2 years younger than the intended age.
It just means that the academically able are allowed to thrive at their own pace without burdening the school to make a special plan for them or creating extra work for the teacher.

I really think people worry too much about maturity levels, I've never known it to cause a real problem. At least not half as much as trying to keep children all together simply based on age.

I don’t know whether this is still the case, but some years ago, the GCSE results of children out of cohort, therefore older, were not allowed to be counted in the school’s data.

I would definitely try to defer if I had a July or August born child now.

DD (7) is a December birthday but by some statistical quirk has ended up in a class where over half the girls have August birthdays. The developmental difference between the older and younger group is quite stark - it was very striking when they started how different the children's speech and language capabilities were etc, and this has had a knock-on effect on other things. Now, in Year 2, all of the 'higher attaining' children in the class have winter birthdays, and all of the 'lower attaining' ones are summer born.

As an ex-teacher myself I know how these early labels unfortunately tend to 'stick' throughout children's schooling - where I've taught very able summer borns in older years, especially those who have experienced a development 'leap' while they've been in my class, their previous teachers have sometimes doubted my judgment and claimed that I've over-levelled them, because in their heads they've already been put into the 'less capable' box. Some schools I've worked in have recognised children born after April as potentially needing additional help and support, but by no means all of them recognise age within cohort as a factor.

It's also interesting that the younger ones have formed a separate and quite exclusive friendship group, barely mixing at all with the older children - DD finds this frustrating too, as in effect this has halved her friendship options among the cohort. DD is unusually mature for her age, and says that (from her perspective) the younger ones behave like toddlers - completely different choice of games/ways of interacting etc. It's almost like mutual incomprehension between the two groups at times, and I'm not sure any of their class teachers have even recognised this as a 'thing'.

Interestingly, I understand that Sweden, so often touted as a paragon of late-starting education, is moving to start formal education a year earlier, having slid down the PISA tables. I can't find the Times article, sorry.

As has been said, I think the word 'school' is misleading. Most later starting countries have highly structured play-based programmes in place in universally accessed pre-school/kindergartens, it's not just sandpits and scooters.

I also understand that Scotland's move towards a Scandinavian model of education with more 'exploration' and less 'learning' has seen a slide down the PISA rankings, too.

Play based learning is great as long as it is structured and directed. That takes time, money and expertise.

Caveat to everything I wrote above is that I have a July birthday myself and absolutely thrived at school from the outset, so it isn't an given that summer born children will struggle! But that was back in the '80s/'90s, when the system generally was a bit gentler, less of a sausage factory, and children weren't as relentlessly judged and measured against each other.

My understanding is that play based learning that is non directive but child led is the model used in Scandinavian countries. For instance a child will be playing with conkers and then the adult facilitates a game of counting the conkers as the children play. That isn't the same as "right everyone we're going outside to play with conkers now"....

Right, so a school that has a blanket policy of denying is potentially not following the applicable legislation. This is the kind of thing that a judicial review decides - whether public bodies are making decisions in a lawful manner or not.

Right, so a school that has a blanket policy of denying is potentially not following the applicable legislation. This is the kind of thing that a judicial review decides - whether public bodies are making decisions in a lawful manner or not.

As far as I know, every LEA that has had such a blanket policy on this has been found to be acting unlawfully when taken to tribunal. This is why so many LEAs that used to be obstructive have now changed their policies and in most you now simply tick a box if you wish to defer.

It seems secondary Heads haven't yet caught up with legislation a decade old (!) but after a spate of tribunals again the same will happen I expect and they'll realise they have to comply with the law not make decisions based on their personal preferences/ prejudices. One would hope that this time it will happen faster because if they refer to the LEA for advice on the matter the LEA should already be aware that Heads cannot choose to refuse to admit children in the cohort they have been in throughout primary school, having dealt with deferred primary admissions for years now. Academies, being their own LEA, may take longer to get the message hammered home.

Again, all of this would be avoided if there was a robust regulator in the education sector ensuring all schools and Local Authorities comply with the law rather than leaving it to parents to force them to do so through tribunals, as with SEN provision.

Perhaps a judicial review on both of those would be helpful to prevent thousands of parents having to raise individual tribunal cases constantly to force schools/ LAs to act in a legally compliant manner. The education system is a shambles.

And no, to address PP's assertion that only people who are not academic/ failed at school hold this dim view of schools, that doesn't apply to me at all. I was a straight A student at GCSE and A level (no thanks to my many, almost all useless schools) and have a degree and professional qualification. But thanks for implying I'm not intelligent because I have experienced how appallingly schools behave. It's precisely because I value education that I've had conflict with the school system^^ because I would like my children to actually be able to have the support at school for their disabilities to which they are legally entitled so that they can reach their academic potential, and not end up with trashed mental health in the process.