Staying back a year please reply

[LesleyA]

Please can someone respond to this as it’s s great concern to me. My daughter is 11yrs turning 12 in September. She repeated a year so most of her classmates are 10 turning 11. She is in grade 5 whereas kids her age are in grade 6. She still struggles although she has repeated the year. She has dyslexia and ADHD. Finds it hard to retain information. But otherwise keeps up with her classmates. If we are able we are coming to the UK in August (probably next year due to covid but for this question suppose it is this August). Ideally she would go tograde 6 in September (or whatever the English equivalent grade is) but the grade of children who are 10 turning 11. But as far as I understand the UK doesn’t take the fact she’s been held back a year into consideration in which case she will go with her age group ie kids born in September will be going to grade 7. This would be an absolute nightmare for her as she’s just keeping up as it is never mind missing out on an entire year (grade 6). Is it true that schools would not let her go to the gradeshe would naturally be going ie grade 6? Please please reply. Also she doesn’t have other special needs she converses well etc etc

OP
I’ve moved from US to England with school age children. One of which has severe dyslexia. You’ve had some good advice, but please do not think of it as “skipping” years because the grade in the US is called #5 and the Year in England is called #7. The two countries have completely different systems and they do not match up so 6th grade in the US is not at all similar to or equivalent to Yr6 in England. She won’t be skipping any years.
What the school staff do is they go through the child’s records- grades, courses, special needs, and then they assess based on their academic performance and capabilities where best to place them within the year for their age group. If the child is performing below the lowest cohort or “set”, then they will consider placing the child one year below their age group.
It’s a daunting process so I’d advise moving in July so you have time to work with the schools before the start of the new school year.

She would fall under special needs in England with dyslexia and ADHD. What we did was give the English school our child’s section 504 determination from the US County School special needs along with the diagnostic test report done by school psychologist plus her special needs education plan the US school had for her. The English school accepted it and placed her on their special needs list, did an IEP, etc. The special needs person in an English school then was called the SENCO. (This was six year ago, terms could have changed as we live in France now).

I moved from Australia to the UK when my dd was 12 and she went straight into year seven half way through the academic year. She was at least two years behind but she managed OK, mostly because secondary school is like a fresh start. It didn’t matter so much that she’d never heard of the Romans or whatever.

In England, children turn 12 in year seven. The cut of is August 31st so September birthdays start when they are eleven and turn twelve after a few days or weeks.

Not all schools have strict school uniform and hair policies. Not all schools have daily assemblies, particularly in secondary. My English secondary did an assembly a week, we wore our hair how we liked and could get away with wearing trainers to school provided they were black. @LeGrandBleu is generalising massively.

If her date of birth is between 1st September 2019 and August 31st 2020 then in this coming September the year group she would be in is Year 7.

Teens here go to a 250 year intake

The 10 classes are split into 3 bands

Higher middle and lower

In each band they are split again into top middle and lower sets

There are a few exceptions for example if X and Y can’t be in the same band.

The work is then differentiated for those groups. Some are working too end of year 7 the lower groups are effectively repeating year 4/5/6 work.

If she’s banded correctly she should be able to keep up.

Ask about help for dyslexics as the help can be patchy at best. She should have access to an iPad or laptop, touch typing, written instructions extra time etc

She won’t go in full thrust.

Not all secondary schools do banding and/or sets. Some schools haven't year groups of 180 children, some 500. It varies everywhere. Lets not confuse LesleyA too much.

Sorry 'HAVE year groups of...' not haven't.

It is possible, although rare, to keep a child back a year in England. My DS dropped back and is currently repeating year 10. We had to apply to the academy trust who had to send evidence to the local education authority who then had to agree that it was in his best interests.
He's an August born so was one of the youngest. He's now the oldest and is flying. Best decision I ever made!

From what I understand (and I'm probably wrong) children are either in 'sets' for each subject, or streamed. I don't know the difference and the person who told me about it just tells me I'm wrong about about how classes were split at my school (even though she's 15 years older and didn't go there - she also tells me I didn't go to the 'local comp' even though I did )

I was just suggesting that schools don’t have set level of work. It’s isn’t like the American system of keep up or move down.

The work is set in levels.

No child should feel over whelmed or of they are failing.

It would be year 7 in England. Anecdotally on here support in Scotland for SpLD is patchy. With a September birthday ie. one of the oldest in her peer group, going back a year is unlikely. Bear in mind that different systems cover curriculum at different paces , so it may not be such a jump in content across the board and small group work may be available where there are gaps, especially in numeracy and literacy. Given that the current year 6 have had their education disrupted since March she would probably not be the only one in need of going over KS2 topics and revision.

You mentioned that your daughter's self confidence is fragile and you worry it will crumble if she struggles at school. Are you in a position to be able to home educate her? If so, perhaps it would make sense to start off with that first while she settles into living in a new country. She can have all the extra help she needs, and the work is guaranteed to be at the right level for her because you would be choosing it and adapting as needed. Home ed is increasingly popular here, especially for kids with special needs who aren't able to access a suitable education at school.

Your daughter could get out and explore her new country with its wealth of historical sites, and make friends with a few kids at a time rather than dropping into the intense and sometimes relentless high school social environment with all the added pressures that brings. Assuming she wants to go to school eventually, that buys you time to look around at schools and find one that suits her - if in England, she doesn't have to attend the nearest school, though some schools will be full, which restricts choice. Having got the lie of the land, if needed you could move to another area with a school you like better.

One point to bear in mind for the longer term is that preparing for standard exams becomes all-encompassing later in high school. The way this is done at school is very rigid, so it is inadvisable to change schools, or move from home ed to school, during this time. If in England, you would want to ensure your daughter was settled into school by the beginning of Year 10, which in her case would be shortly before her 15th birthday. Home educated kids can also sit these exams, and it is much more flexible for them as they can do them at any age, choose from a wide range of subjects, and spread them out over a few years to reduce the pressure... BUT organising that is a lot of effort, and it can be expensive to do out of school.

I really wouldn't worry about the banding/setting/streaming thing- a school that takes her will look at her needs and place her in the most appropriate classes.

FWIW in my school, the XY bands are purely for timetabling, ability/needs are not taken into account (though if we have more than one pupil in a year with a physical need to remain on ground floor, we do place them in the same band for rooming purposes). The sets are done on half the year group in some subjects, and whole year group in others. The lower ability classes will be far smaller to allow more support of the pupils- e.g. top set maths and English will have 30 but bottom group of each will likely have 7 or 8, plus often TA or maths/English coach time allocated.

If you are wanting her to go down a year and join Y7 in sept 2021 do apply before 31st October, or you may find schools just have no spaces in their new Y7. Y7 allocations are done by Local Authorities and are centralised schools won't have leeway to take her.

Thank you for all this food for thought.

I wouldn't worry about schools and spaces. Secondary school appeals are much easier to win than primary, because the schools are so big that one child added to the numbers doesn't make a huge difference.

I also wouldn't worry too much about her esteem - one of my daughters needed virtual 1:1 support to even write a sentence in primary school. It took a lot of effort to get her ready for SATs. She's finding secondary school much easier because everything is discrete and they set for maths, etc.

Just to confuse things further there are also middle schools. It all depends on where you move to.

So, as said, your daughter would likely go into Y7 at a secondary school. But you seem to want her to go into Y6 in a primary school.

Something not mentioned yet is that Y6 in primary school is a very high pressure exam year (SATs). The whole year is a massively stressful cramming/revision session for the pupils. For a child with extra needs you really dont want to drop her into that environment.

Also she would just be making new friends only to lose them at the end of the year to go to another school and have to make friends all over again.

Y7 at secondary is new for all the pupils (no 'formal' exams for 5 years) and the friends she makes will be at the same school for at least 5 years. Its normal to have many children with 'special' needs in a state school and they are mostly really good dealing with everything that involves, whether they have formal diagnosis or not.

Despite what you have said I would go for Y7.