Maybe we Mnetters should get up an e-petition to Downing Street? Not sure how we'd word it but the gist would be that where a child's best interests were at stake, LEAs should be obliged to look sympathetically at a properly researched request that a given DC should be allowed to repeat a year or start school a year later WITHOUT prejudicing its future education.
It is yet another symptom of what's 'wrong' with our education system, this ridiculous 'One Size Fits All'.
DS2 is early May thus not SO 'late' but his infant school and I both agreed heartily at the end of Yr 1 that he would have been so much better served by repeating YR but we all knew the possible consequences so hadn't. He's doing 'OK' in the juniors but he will always struggle to keep up because just as he's grasped something- the 'class' has already moved on. This can do real damage to a DC's confidence and I believe, perhaps controversially, is a BIG factor in why so many particularly boys from less well supported backgrounds, give up- with all the predictable consequences.
Of course, there's every chance as DS such as mine will undergo a 'maturity and understanding' spurt- and everything will be fine, but surely there could also be accommodation to move a 'Year Behinder' up to their 'proper' year if that were to happen?
I am not suggesting that every middle class mommy wishing to 'buy' her DC advantage by putting their perfectly able and appropriately mature DC BACK a year so it will obviously shine amongst its younger peers should be entertained (in some Oz private schools, the practice was SO rampant they had to change sports teams from 'Year 6', 'Year 7' etc to 'Under 8's', 'Under 9's' to level the playing field as they had SO many strapping great lads upto 2 years older and bigger than their team mates playing in the same Year group!) but surely if a teacher, the school, the governors and the parent feel that way (and even the DC in some cases!), it's in everyone's interest to go that way.