Do bright children still get moved up a year to start secondary school early?

[Carolinethea]

I was reflecting on my school years with friends the other day and we were thinking about the number of pupils at my school who were a 'year ahead' when they started - ie they were age 10 when they started secondary. I was wondering if this still happens?

At my school -very academic, independent day school- there were maybe 10 children out of our year of 120 who were aged 10 at the start, ie a year 'young'. They were generally autumn babies so only marginally younger than some in the year but all had passed the entrance exam/ interview etc so the school was happy with their presence.

I'm not aware of any such children in my son's school and I was wondering if it had fallen out of favour?

(Of my acquaintances one or two were a year young and they have mostly turned out ok; one was generally regarded as being very bright, top of the class in every subject, and still is 20 years later definitely and one was a later bloomer who was unhappy at school and probably could have done better at school if she had been in her correct year)

It can be a day's difference between a September child skipping a year and an August child in the year above. Or if you can have an 364 days age range at reception then is 365 days or 500 or 600 days really a huge difference at year 7?

In state schools? No, absolutely not.

Just checked, the local girls' state grammar still allows it. The girl must have the support of her primary school and score in the top 50% of eligible applicants.

This happened to my sister. 2 Sep bday so got put up a year. Utter disaster. Academically she could cope but socially it was awful, not helped by just having one of those toxic year groups that every school has. The year she was put into had quite a strong Sep- Dec bday bias so most kids almost a year older and she was quite “young” ( with hindsight is likely on the spectrum).

I think now schools consider it more holistically and that is a good thing. My ds is September and I thank my lucky stars he wasn’t 10 days older as I think he’d have struggled . Conversely dd is late august and completely fine.

life is long. I don’t really see the point of rushing through school just to get one more year of retirement at the end.

I think it would be highly unusual now and haven't seen it in state or Indy. I skipped a year with several in my class at my all through Indy, though. Three of us spent one year rather than 2 in a combined Y4/5 class, all summer borns. So, not due to age more that we'd done all that was required. It wasn't a massively academic school, though, and I think they moved us on because we were getting a bit bored. Worked out fine for us all and we just thought it was the norm at the time.

I took 11+ at 9 and moved to secondary school at 10. It was the same for my 2 siblings. They have October birthdays; mine's Feb. We went to fairly small independent schools. In my year of <60, at least three of us were up a year.

Of the people in my independent primary, half of us started secondary school early.

Academically it was fine; socially it was very hard. I was near the top of the top set for every subject. I struggled to meet the required standards for my year in PE. I wasn't allowed to aim for the standards for my age. I was bullied as I was younger and smaller than everyone else.

This has changed substantially over the past few decades. It’s now not the done thing to move a bright child up.

My kids/stepkids went to seven private schools over the course of their school careers. I heard of two kids having to repeat a year, but none skipping a year. There were some very bright kids too (not extraordinary, but one girl taught herself and took a couple GCSEs on her own a year early, getting 9s. and got 9s in everything else plus did CCF, starred in the school musical etc etc and went on to get 4 A stars at A levels. Still didn't get into Oxbridge however).
Unless truly out of the norm exceptional, it wouldn't be in the best interest of the school would it, and even then I don't see the advantage for the child either. Super bright kids can teach themselves on their own if needing more of a challenge, and still remain in their peer group.

My mum was a secondary teacher in a non-UK system where pushing kids up a year was very common, she was always very anti this. Frequently the children fell behind in later years and she felt they would have been better off schooling in their age group. Even if my child is very bright I would not want him to be pushed up a year.

When my daughter started secondary school, two girls in her class moved up a year early. One of them was summer born in her correct year group and so was almost two years younger than the oldest when she started year 7. Both of the younger girls coped very well and there weren't any issues with bullying. It was quite common for a couple of girls to move up a year early. This was in a state grammar school.

It happened in my state secondary school over forty years ago. At the time I did not think it was a good idea. Those moved up were fine academically but often struggled socially.

My SIL was put up a year at school but I'm not sure at what point. Her birthday is at the beginning of October so she would have started secondary school aged 10. This was a private girls' school in the 1980s.

When I was at school in the 1990s there were two girls born on 1st September, but a year apart (so one was put up a year).

It seems to be more popular now for summer-born children to start a year later. In my daughter's Year 5 class I know of at least four children whose parents deferred them starting Reception. Some of them are older than some of the Year 6 children. Two of them will turn 12 during their summer term of primary school and the other two are August birthdays.

I know of 2-3 cases over the last 10years or so in my DCs selective indie school. One lad was I think 2 years ahead. Got an Oxbridge place too.

I was a year ahead and my much younger sibling went through 2 years ahead.

Academically it was fine. Socially and in mental health terms it was a total disaster. We'd have both been happier and ultimately achieved better if we'd been in the right year for age. There are plenty of ways to keep bright children entertained in cohort (and sibling still managed to almost get expelled - for hacking the school computer system, printing off the internal exam papers and making a tidy sum selling them iirc).

Parents didn't really mean to do it. I moved schools a lot as father was a CS and we were overseas etc. Youngest accidentally went to school at 2.5, and being very tall, just got moved up with everyone else as nobody really registered she was over 2 years younger than than the rest. Since she was generally top of the class, she just stayed in that cohort.

I know a lot of children who were in a similar position - including a few who finished A levels in their low teens. The only ones it worked out okay for were those who were Sept-Nov birthdays and a year ahead where there wasn't much of an age gap.

None of us would want our own children out of cohort.

It was definitely a thing at some schools. At my school in the 1980s there were some pupils who, because they were autumn babies and then had also skipped a year in this fashion, were two years younger than others in the class. It wasn't great - it was a mixed school and 17 year old girls being in a class with 15 year old boys is not great. I was an autumn baby and put in for the entrance exam a year early and failed unsurprisingly as I'd been at a terrible primary school that believed in allowing children to teach themselves when they felt like it. My parents took me out of the terrible school - thank God - and I got in the following year and was always one of the oldest. I've was so relieved it worked out this way, I was very socially confident and could see it was WAY tougher for the younger ones who often just were too immature to cope and ended up in all sorts of difficulties. It was a daft system and I'm really glad it no longer appears to exist.

I went to a state grammar in late 90s / early noughties and it did happen. I think there were perhaps 10 or so in my Year who took the entrance exam and passed it in year 5 and basically they either skipped Y6 and came straight to grammar school or their primary school moved them up once they knew they had their place (the former was more likely as primary schools in our area actively tried to discourage grammar school applications and treated pupils badly who went down that route)

I can’t say I saw marked differences between the “year early” kids and the rest of us at the time but with the benefit of hindsight and an adults view on things, certainly one or two were noticeably quite immature. One also ended up not doing particularly well in GCSEs and a-levels so perhaps this was a factor for her too. On the other hand there were some amazingly bright kids who probably needed that push because they were more than capable and would have just been bored in primary.

I don’t think it happens much now. My daughter is at a private primary school, which is very high achieving, and I don’t know of a single pupil ever leaving there early to go to secondary. I looked at the local state grammar (not the one I went to) and their admissions policy states they must enter in the correct year for their age with no exceptions.

Happened to me - 11plus at 9 - I loathed it. Was always well up there academically but way behind socially. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

We had a few in the 1970s (well known indie school), I think they were all September/October birthdays. My DF was 2 years ahead in the 1930s and then had to spend 4 years in the 6th form as hexwas too young to sit the university entrance exam (or something!). It affected him socially (probably on the spectrum as well).

This happened to one child in my DD's year at a state school but is definitely not the norm.

He was so bright that, even in the year ahead he was way ahead of everyone else in eveyr subject. DD got 2 marks more than him once in a test and I think she still considers this to be one of her finest achievements :)

From what I can gather he did struggle emotionally/socially when they got to about Year 10 though.

I have never heard of this happening in either the state or private sector. I think it’s now recognised that this can be problematic for lots of different reasons and there are few benefits, if any.

Three girls had moved straight from Year 5 to Year 7 when my daughter started secondary school, which apparently was not unusual for that school but I don't know of any other schools where children have been moved up a year during primary school, although I know of a few cases where children have repeated a year.

Sorry, that should have been two girls.

I knew someone who moved up a year in a state primary, but it would have been in the mid 90s, so not recently. She was bright and had a September birthday. She stayed a year ahead all the way through and started university just after turning 18 (so in the September she turned 18).

It was done at my school too in the 80s. The bar for the exceptions kept moving so I was one at a mid-Oct birthday with a few more months younger than that. They eventually stopped it.

Having seen it in practice I think that there should only be a 12 month gap from oldest to youngest. With the deferrals now becoming more popular it's happening the other way round. Unless there are truly exceptional reasons I would get everyone to be in the "correct" year group.