I might discuss DS moving up a year with teacher...

[toffeenose]

DS has just gone into Y2 at a very small school. Last year Y1 and Y2 were taught together and DS made lots of friends with children in the year above - his birthday is the very beginning of September and many of them are just weeks older. There are only 8 other pupils in Y2 and many of them are summer born so seem much younger than him. He doesn't really have any friends in his class and has come home very sad, which is not like him at all. The break times are staggered so he doesn't even get to play with his friends till the end of the day.

The school is independent and follows the national curriculum but it is guided by the belief that in the early years, children will come to reading and writing in line with their development, so although they are taught to read, children who are not keen will focus on stories and words but not be pushed to progress with phonics until they are ready. DS is not reading or writing.

I want to talk to his teacher about the possibility of moving him up to Y3 to be with his friends. There are 3 children in the year above who are not yet reading or writing so that is not in itself an impediment to him moving.

Would I be completely mad to put this on the table as an option? The only reason really is that socially in his class he is pretty much on his own as the three children who he was friends with in reception have left. I would be willing to pay for a 1:1 to work with him in class.

I would just be interested to hear people's views.

Not true I'm afraid Iced

Why are you paying school fees and offering to pay one to one in class?

My son was a late reader and writer - he's yet to catch up in Year 6

This school may feed into good secondaries. Doesn't mean they'll take your DS if he's struggling

Reading isn't a developmental process, it's a taught one.

www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar98/vol55/num06/Why-Reading-Is-Not-a-Natural-Process.aspx

Recommend Dr Marianne Wolfe Proust and the Squid

Reading isn't a developmental prices in itself but it relies on other capabilities that are developmental. Or are you saying you would expect a newborn to be able to read? Of course you couldn't. Because (usually; there are some rare exceptions in people with developmental disorders) one developmental ability you require in order to be able to read is the ability to understand and use language.

You can say that I'm wrong all you like but there are abilities that need to be developed before you can learn to read. Brains can't do anything until they've developed the underlying ability to do those things. Reading has to rely on pre-existing mental processes and abilities or we wouldn't have it.

Haven't read that one. Something else I'll need to add to my list.

"Reading has been so important to me all my life, I don't want it to be a penance."

This comment by OP seems odd to me. If your parents love reading, and reads all the time, isn't it natural for children to pick up what parents are doing?
It was like that for me, and for my ds. He pretended to read books even when he couldn't possibly read. He hated reading aloud when it became a homework, but never lost love for reading.

Book loving parents and child who cannot read at 7 rings alarm bells for me.

If reading doesn't have developmental prerequisites, then why do some perfectly bright children with perfectly good teaching struggle with reading (i.e. dyslexics)?

Since there isn't a universal definition of dyslexia it's impossible to answer but if we take the broadest view and use the label for all reading difficulties then Unfortunately a major cause is poor teaching.

So, I have a developmental disorder that meant, among other things, that by the time I joined nursery at 3, I could read storybooks to the other children Not through intelligence, but through a quirk of my development. These developmental abilities which are required in order to be able learn reading developed later in my classmates, despite my being no more intelligent than them. If reading doesn't rely on developmental factors, why couldn't they read when I could? Do you think the rest of them should have been made to feel slow and stupid because they didn't have my developmental quirks? Should they have all had to sit there with a curriculum they couldn't access because I could read? And if not, why should a 7-year-old be made to feel that way?

http://or.dyslexiaida.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/06/LN_Reading-Brain-WP.pdf

There are too many posts for me to reply to here, so I apologise for not responding to all the very interesting points raised. I would just like to say that DS's later reading start is being perfectly well managed at his school - there is a trained SEN staff member who is going to spend more time with him and we have discussed various possibilities with his teacher. Having the belief that compelling children to read before they are 'ready' - which as the poster just above said, and I agree - is not productive, they are also capable of teaching the curriculum without non-readers being disadvantaged.

I understand that many poster are shocked that a just 7 year old doesn't read but to me it is not remotely shocking. What is deeply shocking is very young primary children suffering stress and anxiety at school or feeling stupid that they can't do something that they will quite easily access at a later stage.

DS is really happy at his school which provides immense benefits in terms of confidence, emotional maturity, spending his days at forest school, no worries about SATS and a teacher with the autonomy to go off topic instead of focusing on upcoming tests, learning through play and providing excellent academic performance which by the end of Y6 means the children can progress where they like. Most go on to state secondary and flourish. We have a major public school nearby and the head is very keen on children from our school to apply because of their engagement with their work.

Reading isn't difficult and it's unthinkable that he wouldn't get there pretty soon after he sets his mind to it. I just need to keep encouraging him. He is not going to be behind or 'struggling' as described on this thread. I just think education in this country has gone very far wrong.

Codyking if you need a 1:1 in a private school you have to pay unless you get funding. Paying for a one to one was just one idea DH and I came up with because if DS were to go up to the next class (unlikely I know) then it wouldn't be fair if he took up all the TA's time.

https://www.ldaustralia.org/client/documents/Teaching%20Reading%20is%20Rocket%20Science%20-%20Moats.pdf

As far as I can tell, mrz, that PDF is saying exactly what I am - that reading relies on certain pre-existing abilities in the brain. If those haven't developed yet, how is the child to learn to read?

(The 21.22 one. DP you honestly expect me to trawl through every link you put up? I really can't be arsed. Especially if, like that one, they back me up.)

Most of my thoughts have been covered in other people's posts. One thing I would say though, just "food for thought" really, is to check that the destinations of pupils from this school aren't being distorted by some lower-achieving children being encouraged (or choosing) to move elsewhere in year 4-6.

Reading in the Brain: The Science and Evolution of a Human Invention
by Stanislas Dehaene

Perhaps a summary might be useful, or a brief explanation of why you're posting that link?

Which link?

Bloody any of them!

There's a reason people don't walk into a debate, throw a stack of papers at the audience with no description, or explanation of why they've chosen these papers and how they back up their arguments, and walk out again.

"As far as I can tell, mrz, that PDF is saying exactly what I am"

Well if you're saying that the human brain isn't "wired" for reading as it isn't a natural process and the brain needs to be "rewired" then that's exactly what it's saying Iced

Speak soon; off to bed.

Me, that is. I'm knackered.

What, this bit?

form new circuits for cultural inventions from older, genetically programmed, component processes that make up vision, language, cognition, and emotional systems. Each component part is necessary for the whole circuit to function well enough to achieve expert reading

This bit?

Nighty night.

Montessori school, OP?

I agree that it doesn't sound as if your DS would be best served going up a year. Being the youngest in the year is never great, his reading is likely to become a hindrance that could dent his confidence and cause long term problems: why not stay with his peers and get his reading firmly established as groundwork for future years?