August child starting reception

[Lolly122]

So my DS will be starting reception in September. He turns 4 on the 18th of August and will only have been 4 for 2 weeks before he starts. He has been attending a school nursery but he didn’t get a place in the school. Back in February, I got called into nursery because in the teachers words “he wasn’t progressing like the rest of the children” I also received his spring report from nursery a couple of days ago and again, the teacher was saying how he was falling behind. It’s just got me thinking is he too young and not ready to start learning? I’d feel awful if he struggled and wouldn’t want him having too much pressure on himself at such a young age. Has anyone else got an August child and how did they get on starting school at just 4?

@LizzieAnt Thank you and thanks for the help

@CottonSock I’m not sure I’m trying to look into that myself. I know in my area though DS would have to go straight into year one and skip reception which I’m not sure if I’d like that or not

@Firsttimelottie I never really had my doubts on his learning until he started nursery. His speech is good and he is good at counting and is on the ball with things. But from what the nursery teacher has told me, I am now having serious doubts. She even said herself she was wondering whether he was ready for learning or not

you can delay and start in reception, having to skip it isn't true. the school and LA have to prove it's in your child's best interest to skip it, it never is!

My son is even later in the year than yours and born early.
Emotionally and physically he was ready for school so I sent him... He settled well. He was behind his peers academically but always seemed to shoot up workwise from Easter onwards. Reception and first half of yr1 he did that. Year 2 no problem.

It does to some extent depend on the school... Ours sees reception as a settling in period for school life, lots of play and an acceptance that youngest are very young so might not concentrate as well, do as well etc. Allowing children to be on their own learning curve...
My friend has a similar style boy same age (end of July) in a different school. That school/teacher made no allowance for age, very academic and he struggled in infants. He was also caught up but its not been as great as it could have been.
Because my son catches up at end of year I got him some tutoring over summer after Yr 2 & 3 to keep him on target... It worked really well... Kept his mind ticking over.

My dd's birthday is 16th August. She had been 4 for 2 weeks and 3 days when she started school. She is in Y2 now, we got her report yesterday and she has got straight A's, excelling above expected for her age.

I had the same panic as you, at preschool dd was a singular, she didn't play with kids just alongside them. She was the only kid in her class kit to have gone to the school nursery so the other kids knew all their letters, phonics etc as they were able to follow the teacher led eyfs curriculum whereas her preschool could only follow the play side of it as they didn't have a qualified teacher on staff.

She spent the first couple of weeks in reception a bit airy fairy but was reading a little bit by October half term. By the time she finished reception she was hitting all the targets expected of her.

Ultimately you know your son, however, if you are going to defer you need to consider whether your LEA allows deferred kids to enter in reception or whether they only allow admission to Y1. If the former, great deferring may be your best move. If the latter, I would think very carefully as you could inadvertently make things worse for him as he will have a whole year of learning to catch up on and that could have ramifications later.

Did you manage have have a read of this link I posted earlier? How does he compare?

My dd was born in august and she was fine settling in. DS was July and took him ages to settle atleast a couple of years to the routine he had previously been in private nursery he did very well in his SATs last year

@JiltedJohnsJulie yes I had a look and he can do most of the things on the list At the moment, he is struggling a little with phonics and can’t understand tenses. For example, he will say things like “I runned” instead of “I ran” and he will say “let I do it”

Oh my, I don't think my August born got her head completely around phonics until she was around six.

As for the tenses, he's three! It sounds perfectly normal

Oh good that’s a relief! Those things are the things I got called into nursery for!

@Lolly122 i think your preschool has a very acdemic focus! My older one who is a March child doesn't know any phonics when she started school. My younger one who is a September only knows that S is the starting sound for snake and sam, that kind of thing. Neither of them did any phonics. They will go through it in Reception. Ours has a workshop for parents at the start of the year to learn phonics. The best you can do is learn it yourself so you can support your child. Even though there are studies saying younger children do worse, but similarly, there are studies showing even bigger effects to education outcome for those from poorer backgrounds and those with worse educated mothers. Look at all the schemes out there helping poorer children to access higher education. Look at the effect of private education on sports. You can make a very big difference by supporting your child's education.

To me, being ready for school is being able to put their own clothes on, being toilet trained, can eat a meal without an adult spoon feeding them. That kind of thing.

It's comforting to hear that @Lindorballs October child similarly struggled with friendship for being quite a bit older than her peers.

Late August born twins here. Not held back. Now 9 and doing really well. Reading was a bit slower than some of the others, they caught up in year 1 and 2 then just carried on doing well. SATs in year 2 were better than average scores. Greater depth in some subjects now.

You will know if your LO is ready to go.

I have an August born, youngest in the class. Yes in reception she wasn't the best at reading and writing and yes her attention span was short but she absolutely loves school. Numerous teachers have said she's the happiest child they've taught. If he's happy attending nursery I wouldn't hold him back, they do pick things up very very quickly in reception.

Thanks for the replies. I think my worries are because he is such a different child at home compared to how he has been described at nursery. I think a lot of it is down to his confidence. I also think he’s one of those kids who just can’t be bothered sometimes. But I’m sure he will be fine