Who has July/August DCs?

[Rainymeadows]

Mine is due end of July and I haven't given a huge amount of thought to school performance and how this might impact on her, but those of you with July and August children, did you find it made a difference (purely out of interest?)

I have two others born end of February/mid April.

Yes it made a difference. Academically it made a huge difference early on. Now, less so. Socially I feel my dd is always playing catch up and I think her age (and the fact she is a first born) contribute to this.

You'll get lots of replies saying my dd was born in August and it didn't make and difference but there is a body of research that suggests children who are young for the year do less well academically compared to those who are older at every level up to uni. It also has an impact on sporting achievement.

There was discussion last year about giving summer born additional marks in GCSEs because on average they are so disadvantaged.

My ds will be 8 this July (in yr3 now) I'd say at 1st when he started nursery you could tell the difference between the younger and older children in terms of their speech reading and writing as the older ones had started nursery earlier but it soon levels out. I'm told that younger children in the class are more competitive this is very true for my ds.

Very early on I'm sure it made a difference, as did the fact that she was tiny for her age (age 2-3 school uniform!!). However, she is now Y8, and doing just as well as her winter born siblings at school. I do think part of any issue though was definitely me/us worrying about her, rather than any actual problem. That, and a truly crappy teacher in reception, who still didn't know her name in the second term.

I have a March, July and very late August. All in the top 3 in their classes, made no difference from the start.

The August-born is best friends with an early Sep-born in her year, and is one of the tallest...

The August-born was exhausted (= bad behaviour straight after school) for the first term or 2. But I think that's partly her personality and would have been an issue whenever.

DD is the very end of august. She's been fine academically, but in reception (and year 1 to an extent) the teachers did comment that her attention span was quite noticeably shorter than older peers. This wasn't a problem, just stated as a fact and that she would grow out of it, which I think she has now in year 2.
Socially, she's fine, but she does tend to play with boys more than girls, which could be down to the maturity, I'm not sure, have not given it much thought to be honest.

Ds2 is August and is now 9. My older 2 are both September. I think it has made a difference, not so much academically, but maybe socially - some of the others are really grown up compared to him, although he does have a lovely group of mates. ( all a bit eccentric, like him!)

It definitely makes a difference for sport - he is tiny at football compared to some of the lads, and not as strong.

In Scotland its February babies who are affected. Im a teacher and could usually tell you what children in my class are January/February babies without looking at their birth dates. My dd is a February baby and I'll be keeping her back.

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/389448/Summer_born_admissions_advice_Dec_2014.pdf

summerbornchildren.org

I think it does make a difference and these links may interest you. I'm hoping the difference will get less as DS gets older