Move up a year ( summer born who originally deferred entry)

[Beenthere02]

My DS3 is August born. He repeated Reception as he was very immature. Unfortunately he has never settled with the new group and he always remained friends with his previous group of friends. He is now in Y3 and all these years very unhappy. Academically he is good but he may have dyslexia and his reading is still coming along. Currently top set at everything.

As he is not at his 'correct' year group all the age standardised tests are from the year above which is not very helpful as he hasn't completed the curriculum of that year.
I am debating with myself on whether to move him a year or not. Although academically I think he is at the correct year group, he really struggles emotionally. I am also afraid that he will be bottom set and that this might have a bad impact too.

I would be worried about him missing a full year of the curriculum. Things like maths he will miss concepts he needs to rely upon all the way through to his GCSEs. I don’t know if it is realistic to make up that amount of gap with extra tutoring etc without it feeling very demoralising and exhausting for your son.

If he's been moved into the year below and is academically still struggling then moving him up to the original class doesn't seem like a sensible solution to the problem.

The tests he does should be based on work he has completed not his age. I would think a more sensible plan would be to move him to another school rather than back to his old class where he will have missed a year of work.

Did you even read the op? She said he is struggling emotionally but not academically

Op what if you moved him and he continued to struggle emotionally, and then also academically?

I’m actually really glad you posted this, although I don’t have an answer. I didn’t hold my August birthday daughter back and she’s now in Y4. Y2 and 3 were hard for her, and I’ve sometimes regretted it. She’s coping academically in most areas but not excelling despite being very engaged. I sometimes wonder how different things would be if she was in the lower year. Focus on the fact that he’s doing really well; the curriculum goes so quickly in KS2. The maths my 8yo is doing I didn’t see til secondary in the 80s/90s.

Yes I read it but even if he's in the top sets in his current class there's signs he's struggling academically and he will be behind regardless as he will have missed a whole year of learning compared to his classmates.

What is going to happen when he reaches secondary school age?

The attached is from the 2023 Government guidance document Making a request for admission out of the normal age group
https://share.google/Rh9jh6a1DGMYX47AW

Deferring wasn't a thing when our June born DS was started school (and his response when it came in and I told him about it was, But why would anyone want to do that? , or words to that effect), so I've no idea whether 'Remember you need to start the secondary application process in year five, because secondary schools won't be obliged to allow a chronologically year 8 child to start in year 7' is something that is explained to parents when they say they want to (fully) defer their DC's entry into Reception, but it obviously ought to be.

The year above will have covered a huge amount of work that really are essential foundations for what’s yet to come. I honestly can’t see a way of catching that up effectively even with a tutor because as soon as he moves up they’ll still be covering new concepts while your ds hasn’t had chance to grasp previous ones.

The friendships can still be encouraged, but moving back to that class would be a mistake imo.