who can share an experience with jumping over the Year ahead at school?

[Al1234]

I am new to this forum and need your help. Everybody is so proud of kids, so do I :) I want my twins to finish Primary school 2 years earlier at thier 8-9 y.o.
They are now at Reception. Reading is higher than Gold band (teacher keeps them on this level but they read any books now), maths even better than reading.
I think thier level is about Year 3 of English Primary School (we do all Bonds books and cover the primary school of another country).
Is it possible to put them into Year 2 or to Year 3 this September and where I need to go and what I need to do?
Thanks a lot.

It's quite unusual in England, maybe all the UK, to skip years. Easier if private schools.
So, if they finished primary school at age 9, would you want them to go to Uni at age 15-16?
Why?

Why would you want this? DDs reading was around that level at end of reception but tbh so were a few others. Now in year 1 she is always challenged and enjoys school.

I think it depends on how they are maturing emotionally as well as academically. Would NOT recoomend going to senior school 'early' no matter how ahead they are :( Can your school support them where they are to challenge them?

Don't do it. It will make them socially awkward, and if they are that bright, they will still need extended work. Enrich them sideways at home- music, languages, sport- and keep on top of the school meeting their needs- which a good school will do ( bearing in mind there are 30 in a class and noones needs can be met every minute on every day).

My son skipped reception year (at the advice of the school - not my idea), and it ended badly. He was emotionally not ready for it, and as talkingnonsense says, the work was still very easy for him.
It was pretty much a disaster, and we ended up moving him to a small independent school, who do a brilliant job of stretching him within his own year group. Much better.

I would not push for this.

It was the done thing in many schools in the 70s. Both my brothers and my husband were moved up a year.

Complete disaster. In senior school, they are little boys in a changing room full of men. They will always be looked down on by their peers because of their immaturity and their age. They all found socialising very difficult. Girlfriends were a source of consternation, because the girls that are right for their age are too young according to their peers.

Academically they coped fine, but socially they were stunted and emotionally they could not cope.

My DB2, who is ferociously intelligent (at the time he was tested, he had the second highest IQ ever recorded in the country in which we lived. He was 10) he did not amount to anything in life, despite the intelligence to have been anything he wanted to be. He never went to any further education, never found a career until his mid thirties, dabbled in drink and drugs and is now a functioning alcoholic.

Academically the children will excel in the right environment. Let them also be with people their own age, and develop socially and emotionally at an appropriate pace.

Don't do it - i was accelerated up a year, (like Hatti says it was fashionable in the 70s) underperformed at A level and failed to get into medical school, not that surprising considering i was only 16. It's all panned out fine in the end, i'd have made a lousy medic but i would have been earning about 5 x what i do now

Present school is weak and nobody will push or support them and I am trying now to change the school.
Thank you so much for all your replies.
I need two years to give them a chance to go and study for a couple of years abroad before they start secondary school here in the uk.
We are very busy out of school and I invest all my time into them. They are tired of doing nothing at school except playing and socialyising.
It is difficult to work with them after school. I would be happy to change the school for stronger and hope it will happen. Does anybody use flexy studying when you can keep your kids at home half a day or a day per week to teach them additional subjects?
We speak Russian, mandarin, plus Spanish and all these countries are in our possible list when they are 8-9 y.o. That's why I need two years free of primary school.

I really wouldn't recommend as I ended up in last year primary aged 9 with 12 year olds and not only was it a social disaster but I was still easily top of the class which just pissed off the other kids and the teacher even more. And guys I know who went to uni age 15 or 16 all regretted it too.

I'd go for extra breadth - reading a new language, music, projects, etc.

If your DC speak Russian, Mandarin and Spanish, just learning to read and write in those languages, in sync with monolingual children, will keep them fairly busy. Plurilingualism is an excellent way of dealing with gifted DC.

What language are they learning at school?

"That's why I need two years free of primary school."

But you don't need two years free of primary school, you can just take them out.

Please let them be children and don't keep pushing. Encourage and facilitate, yes. Push? Absolutely not.

If I understand what you are proposing, you essentially want to finish the primary school curriculum by the end of year 4, to leave your children free to live overseas (without schooling?) for 2 years before starting Year 7 in the UK?

The main difficulty with this is that for a lot of subjects, but especially maths, a gap in learning doesn't make an awful lot of sense. And it isn't as if a 9-11 is capable of sitting back and learning nothing for 2 years. They will learn something because they are children, but whether they end up forgetting a lot of what they know is another matter.

If they are bright children then they should manage to keep up with the uk aspects of their studies even whilst living abroad. But I would keep them with their peers as much as possible so that they find it easier to mix back in with them after living overseas. If they are always used to being the youngest by far, then that becomes an essential part of their identity at school, which will be a lot to come with if you are planning to country changes as well.

We have found years 5 & 6 quite difficult socially and it has lots of technique in readiness for secondary , including study skills, more formal testing/revision and essay writing which an 8/9 yr old wouldn't be ready for and needs ongoing practice. If you want a break from UK system take it earlier, before this stage, rather than later unless it is a long term proposition. ime those "ahead" in Reception are not necessarily the same as those towards end of primary.

Also sorry to rain on your parade but being very good at reading early in life does not necessarily equate to being gifted and talented in every area.

IMO it sounds as if you are hothousing them with a vengeance and is that healthy?

children of that age need to be children - I wonder if the frustration is theirs or yours?

I think you have a slightly unrealistic idea of primary school. That's not uncommon actually. Most parents' main recollections of the academic side of school involve secondary school, where the main aim is to learn the information and regurgitate it in an exam. Secondary is about formal learning, studying, essay writing etc.

Learning in primary school is completely different. It's not about subject content and learning things off, it's about being exposed to concepts multiple times so that slowly the essential skills necessary for succeeding in later education are built up. The children aren't learning when the Battle of Hastings happened, they're learning how to deal with paper, hold a pen, write legibly, understand numbers etc. These are absolutely fundamental concepts that have to be rock solid for a child to really succeed in secondary. Any gaps can have a huge impact so skipping a year where these things should be consolidated is a bad idea. On top of that primary gives the right structure for a child to mature socially and putting a child in with children two years older then and expecting them to deal with that every day is just cruel IMO.

Why not let them go through primary as normal and then take them out when they're year 4 and home school them for the next two years?

I think you should try to get them into some of the UK's very academic fee paying primary schools like www.nlcs.org.uk/ where one of mine went. They will then work with children their own age where everyone has a high IQ and th work may be a year or two ahead of state schools. These schools turn out some of the best educated children on the planet. Indeed the UK fee paying schools are admired the world over.

So perhaps the bset thing you can do for your children is take a full time job so you can afford to pay their school fees!

I was a year young at school as was my brother (as I was fairly bright) and that was at fee paying schools in the UK. One of my daughters started a year young although later did a year twice which was fine too.

I did it at the age of 8 - October birthday so instead of being one of the oldest I was the youngest by a couple of months
It had little effect on me as a child but became more noticable as I went to 6th form. I should have taken a year out, but instead went to university before I was 18, and was too immature. I threw my chances away, and immaturity was definitely part of that.

I was moved up a year between yr 4 and 5, and stayed with the older class into yr 6 (so I missed yr 4 and did yr 6 twice, when my own class 'caught up' with me).

I think the main reason for the move was overcrowding - the class a year above was smaller and had the space.
I liked it as the yr 4 teacher was not popular & I was glad not to be in his class.

I also escaped all the cliques and girly bitchiness of my own class but stayed fairly aloof from the girls in the year above.

Probably didn't do me a lot of good though, in the long run, as apart from 2 close friends I was kind of alienated from both sets of girls & it didn't set me up well for secondary school friendship groups.

The most annoying thing at the time was repeating yr 6: the teacher was good but it was boring doing the same things over again. I certainly don't think it put me at a disadvantage academically, though.

NB this all happened in the late 80's, by the way.

They are tired of doing nothing at school except playing and socialyising.

A young child "tired" of play & socialising sounds like a very :( thing to me, but to each their own, I guess.

I suppose if I were OP I would just let them bumble along to end of y4 without skipping & then go to whatever-foreign-language country most suited otherwise. DC are not especially bright & work 2 yrs ahead of target typically, so they already had basics of what they needed to know by end of y4; they had been exposed to enough of the KS2 curricula to get by. Plus if OP's kids are that clever they will have no trouble quickly filling any gaps in their knowledge when they come back to start secondary at right age.

Why not take then abroad now, when their brains ate like sponges for language? Make sure they spend time with other chdn- at school or nursery abroad- then come back for ks2? Like Xenia says, a good independent might suit you better.

I think that the other aspect you need to factor in, is how you will apply for secondary schools if you are not in the country for Year 6. Obviously this varies hugely around the country, but you will be at a distinct disadvantage if you are applying from outside the country.

Morning to everybody!

Thank you SO MUCH for your replies again.

So, kids have English as a first language and it is native for them.

I am trying to move them into better school. Being the top in the weak class is not very good sometimes. It needs to be a competition and I am trying to find it for them, otherwise they will be lazy.

Taking them abroad now is not practical. Kids start school at 7 y.o. abroad and when they are 10 y.o. they are normally 2-3 years ahead comparing to English system. This is the other reason why we study most of the subjects using thier books to catch up the programm if we move later.

I plan to put them into school abroad for a couple of years when we go thier. They will study with other kids with the same age I hope.

Please do not think I am pushy. They are definetely NOT gifted. I hope you know what I mean. You call them here able? Yes, they are able and they want to learn a lot. I do not want to loose this moment. Spanish was not my idea - they came and ask me to teach them.
They go to gymnastic, swimming, football, music 2 times per week and it looks like they like everything for now.

Being the top in the weak class is not very good sometimes. It needs to be a competition and I am trying to find it for them, otherwise they will be lazy.

that was certainly true for me at primary school & I found grammar school difficult & didn't do well, but I am intrinsically lazy, & it doesn't sound from your list of activities & interests as if your children are.

If the school where they are really can't offer them more to do, could you look at independents?

Ds skipped a year (independent). When he moved school he was made to repeat the year though as they wanted him to stay with his age group. He was very bored. I wouldn't recommend it.

Sorry but " Being the top in the weak class is not very good sometimes." is not a sensible statement to make about reception. You do not seem to understand what reception is there for. Kids do learn to read there, but really they are learning : how to learn, how to work with others, how to listen, how to get dressed and undressed quickly (PE) and so on.
In the country you are considering taking them to, kids don't even start school until 7, those kids are not all "behind" your kids. Children develop a lot, and I can assure you that those who were academically the best at reception are not necessarily the best at 11 or 16 or 18.

Basically, I think you are making judgements far too early.
BTW state schools do not accelerate normally ( or hold pupils back).