Summer boy starting primary school when he’s only just turned 4

[charliebell30]

My son turned four at the end of June. He has been in pre school for nearly two years and loves it. I was going to leave him there another year but I have decided to start him at school this year now.
I think he may be bored of it now and ready for more. He doesn’t really enjoy phonics at preschool. He’s a bright boy. I am just really worried about making the right choice for him! My eldest son is a summer boy and I’m just frightened of making the same mistakes again by starting him too soon. Any help would be appreciated

I have two summer born boys who are going in to years 6 and 2 this week.

I would put DS1 down a year if I could even now. He finds school very difficult, and if I could delay him having to start secondary I would.

DS2 who actually has the later birthday found reception quite challenging. He kept up with the class but I think it was hard work. However, once he turned 5 and went into year 1 he has flown. Starting at just 4 has turned out to be fine for him so far.

I agree that it is the personality and strengths and learning needs of the child that matters most.

Every child is different, my July born DD is starting school this week. She's developmentally around the same as her friends who are September born (they'll be in the same class) despite them being 10 months older than her and physically taller than most of the children in the class too. I had no hesitation in starting her this year and she's really excited.

However i have a friend who has deferred her DD until next year, there is a week in age between our kids but my friends DD is at such a different place developmentally that school now just wouldn't work for her so they didn't hesitate with the decision to defer.

It really does come down to the individual child, and to some degree the preference of the parents- as in there is no disadvantage to holding off for a year.

DD was 4 in the july before starting reception. She was fine. There were many younger than her.

As a PP said so long as social skills are good then your DC will be fine.

You say he doesn’t enjoy phonics - why force him to sit through phonics tuition where he can be a kid for a bit longer and get more mature and ready for it....

You might want to check how they learn phonics - I was under the impression they don’t revisit the bits they cover in Reception in anywhere near same depth in Year 1 and 2, so he may have gaps in his learning that follow him all through primary.

I could be completely wrong about that though. My DC are older and never did phonics.

I wouldn't worry about putting them in when their young, they might struggle at first but basically everyone catches up by the end of the year and the added advantage is your kid gets on with their life a year sooner when they turn 18.

My DS is end of July born. I thought about deferring but am glad I didn't as it would have been more of a struggle to start school later after missing out a year and the class cohort already being bonded.

He's always been near the top of the class though academically and is 2nd tallest is the class luckily so hasn't suffered for being 3rd youngest in it.

Slightly off topic...but as a reception teacher I wish nurseries would steer clear of introducing phonics as we often have to undo their incorrect teachings.

My DS is summer born, August. He is doing so well in school and I would never have dreamed in holding him back. He has loads of confidence and even though his best friends are nearly a year older than him, he keeps up with them no problem. It really depends on your DS. If I’d have kept him back, would he have been doing what he’s doing now?

It’s all down to the individual child. It’s no point loads of mnetters saying that their summerborn was fine. Every child is different.
My dd turned five last week and will start reception next week at CSA. It was totally the right decision for her in many ways. But that doesn’t mean that every summerborn should do the same.

By the way, they don’t ‘all catch up’ by the end of the year. The gap may get smaller, but (generally) they never do as well as autumn borns.

neddle

You can’t have it both ways. If every child is different and there’s no generalising, how is it ok to say that generally summer-born children never catch up?

Surely, in both cases, some summer-borns catch up and some don’t, just like some are fine starting school at 4 and some aren’t?

Summer borns as a cohort ever completely catch up.
And they underperform all the way through A-levels.
And there was also data on CEOs, etc - most were elder in their classes.
Not saying it’s the most important thing to raise a hugely successful business person, however - to a large extent self- confidence gets formed in those yearly years.
When kids get picked for class leadership positions, teams, etc. Or not.

If a parent had a choice to hold back a child - and start in reception a year later - there is no reason not to.
You don’t get to run an experiment to see if yours would be the rare summer-born who is OK.
It’s not a badge of honour to say my kid did OK, despite....
Why NOT give your kid all the best chances????

I appreciate most people don’t have a choice and need to make peace with it. Fair enough.
But if you have a choice a why not

You don’t get to run an experiment to see if yours would be the rare summer-born who is OK.

But it's not rare for a summer born to do ok. Even generalising over half are achieving expected standards, that is not rare and allowing children to proceed through education is not an experiment. The data provided by neddle earlier is unconfirmed and unchecked, my own research on the subject showed that any gap is negligible quite quickly and delaying school actually has few or no tangible advantages in terms of achievement.

Waiting that additional year isn't going to disadvantage a child either so, as many PPs have already said it's completely down to the individual child.

Statistically - ‘birthday disadvantage’ gap isn’t negligible.
Summer borns have lower performance at GSCEs&A-levels. They are more likely to go for vocational training and less likely to go to universities, etc.
Years of data prove it.

England hasn’t had years of allowing deferred entry to Reception, so there is NO data to show whether or not allowing deferred reception entry is beneficial.
There is data from the US where deferring is a usual practice - but they start school at 6 there.
And it’s not a valid comparison to 4yos.

I am not trying to make parents of summer borns feel bad. I have one of those myself.
Just hope that parent who have a choice have the full picture

I'm summer born and did probably the best in my schools academically throughout. (Not bragging as I'm not exactly in a high flying job at the moment! Just saying no reason to think they'll necessarily do badly)

I think there is a huge amount of scaremongering which isn’t helpful at all. Maybe the reason some summer born dc underperform is down to the views on here - if your teacher expects you to underperform the chances are you will. It’s sad.

We weren’t given the option to delay DS Reception start date (born end of August), and apart from finding the school day long in the early days he has always been in top sets, has just secured a place at competitive secondary school etc with no tutoring.

You know your child best, be confident in your decision and you may be pleasantly surprised!

My summer born got 1 mark off full marks in her 11 plus and got a place at Oxford. Totally amazing for an August birthday! I guess Oxbridge doesn’t normally offer places to summer borns as they are so far behind. (Tongue in cheek!)

OP. If he’s ready, send him. He might enjoy phonics at school. Nurseries teach it because some DC are ready and start to recognise words, letter combinations and sounds. You cannot hold the brightest back.

of all my friends with PhDs about 90% are summer born. And I know a lot of friends with PhDs.

It really depends in the child. if he’s ready, send him. friends didn’t send her -more than ready - august born daughter, and really regret it now (they had the year from hell as she absolutely hated her extra year in pre-school, and other issues).
other friends held their not at all ready (and actually july born) sin back, and it was great for him. it really depends

I think it depends on the child. My DS has a late July birthday and I kept him in school nursery for an extra term (so he started reception in the January).

I did that as although he was bright, he still was very young in his ways and socially I thought it would benefit him. The school encouraged us to do this.

My summer born girl will be going to school next September. I think she’ll be more than ready and nursery agree but I have had pangs of worry as I’m familiar with the stats.

I was a summer baby and excelled academically so in that respect I’ve been less worried as I think parental input and genes will have more of an effect than month of birth overall. But, I think I struggled more socially and I was shit at sporty things which wasn’t great for my confidence. I’ve been trying hard to instil independence and making sure she does extra circular activities like
ballet where she has to separate from me and listen to the teacher.

Nursery have said it’s not generally the summer born girls that struggle but the boys. How true that is I don’t know but others have said it upthread. Unfortunately, there always has to be a youngest and at 4/5 the difference is massive. It does just seem unfair on the little ones.