Family Matters

"Happy Parents Raise Happy Kids"

Repeating a Year (revisited)

The topic of repeating a year bothers many parents. Recently, I was asked by another parent for advice on this matter. I have chosen to present her story here and hope other parents will benefit from my advice.

Hi Ronit,

Last night I read your comments to Repeating a School Year, which is our own situation. My boy was also born in May and he started school when he was 4 & half years old. We struggled throughout his school years. I felt exactly the same like Mama Fiona - I also found "a huge maturity difference to his peers who are 1 year older in most cases. Academically he is sound but struggles to remain there, and keeping him focused is a constant battle. My gut is telling me he needs to repeat, more so for confidence and to help him settle better with kids his own age. School is resisting this as academically he is not well below."

I kept asking so many principals to repeat him but no one had accepted until December last year to let him do Year 5 again. I was so happy to transfer him to that close by school. However my boy is now already 10 years old, he missed his friends a lot and cried a few nights in bed. Last night I cried with him too, we actually don't know what to do... He is a shy boy so it took him a few years to make just a few friends who targeted to normal public high schools whilst my family always want kids to get into selective.

May you please advise me what we should do? Do you think I should let him continue Year 6 or should he repeat in this new school?

I appreciate your advice Ronit,

Leena

Dear Leena,

As I have said before, parents' gut feeling is a good indication that something is not working well. Schooling needs to be a fun and happy experience for kids and sometimes keeping them a year can do wonders. Being 4 and a half when starting school can be overwhelming for some kids and lack of maturity is in fact the best reason for getting a child to repeat a year, especially for boys.

What you are describing involves a change of school, which in itself can be a very big challenge for your son. There are some schools that shuffle the kids and the teachers every year so that every year, kids have a new set of friends and teachers and some kids find it too hard to cope with.

It is normal for your kid to be afraid of the new experience. After all, he needs to learn new rules and find his way into the social life of the new school and that is not easy. But if you develop guilt feelings, you are not helping him.

Is there a way for him to meet his friends from the previous school again?

Although friends from the new school are very important, it is healthy to teach kids to separate between school friends and other kinds of friends. Kids with high social skills always have friends outside of school from afternoon activities, hobbies, neighbors and family.

If you think your son should repeat a year because that will give him an opportunity to match Year 5's emotional development, repeating in a new school is probably the best way. If he stayed at his old school, he would have probably drifted apart from his old friends over time and had to make new ones from his own grade. At the new school, he can start fresh and with an age advantage over the new kids.

If he survives this transition, the experience will strengthen his social skills through the extra practice. But to ensure his success, he will need your help and confidence.

Repeating a year needs to be explained very well to your son. He needs to understand he is not there for academic reasons, but as an opportunity to be the oldest in the class, rather than the youngest. Tell him that school is like long distance running. Runners with short legs must take more steps in order to keep up. Show him on the sports channel that most runners have long legs. It is the same with many other sports, like boxing, Judo and weight lifting, in which you only compete with people who weigh roughly as much as you do.

Tell him that the brain is just like legs. Every year, his legs grow longer and it was not fair to let him run with kids with longer legs, because they need to take fewer steps to reach their destination. In the same way, he should be with kids who have the same abilities to think and feel. When he started school, he was put into a group of bigger kids, but now he will be with his own group and have a much easier time.

You can even stand with him on one corner of your house and ask him how many steps it will take each of you to get from there to the other side of the house. Then, walk to the other side, count your steps and compare. You can even get a taller person to participate.

Then ask him "Which of us got there will less effort (fewer steps)?"

If he tries to match the number of the steps you take, let him do it and he will immediately try to take bigger steps. Point out to him that each step requires more effort, so it feels like hard work.

Your son needs to understand that there is nothing wrong with him and that with kids with the same length of legs, he will not have to work so hard and it will allow him to have fun. School is fun!

My son was 4 when we moved from Singapore to Australia. The transition was so big for him we were worried. He was confused, he cried and he sat for hours with his toy mobile phone and "talked" to his friends in Singapore. It was heart breaking to watch him doing it, but pretty quickly, he found new friends at his new kindergarten and the memory of his lost friends faded.

Help your son find friends. Go to his new school, meet with the teachers, volunteer to help in class, meet with the other parents and invite friends over. Have a sleep over with 2-3 new friends to establish his status in the class. Invite the whole class to a birthday party (a special party that everyone will talk about for a while later). Be friendly with the other parents and offer to help with drop off and pick up. One good friend can change his whole life.

Tell your son, "You have many friends at the new school. You just haven't met them yet" (he may know Michael Bublé's song Haven't Met You Yet). My 21-year-old daughter went to 8 different schools in 6 different places in the world. This has helped her become an extremely flexible and friendly girl. Transitions can be surprisingly good for kids.

When he is happy, successful and surrounded by friends, he will thank you for this.

Good luck, be strong and trust yourself!
Ronit

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February 8th, 2010 | Author: Ronit Baras

Posted in Ask Ronit, Education / Learning, Parenting | Tags: academic performance, Ask Ronit, change, choice, Emotional Intelligence, friends / friendship, happiness, how to, K-12 Education, Kids / Children, parenting, school, social skills

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Leena
Hi Ronit,
Many many thanks for your kind advice. You are such a great philosopher to me.
Thanks God that my boy stopped crying on the second day, he said he's got 7 friends already and his 14year old cousin has been a great after-school carer for my boy so far.
Thanks again and hope my boy will enjoy his new school with his new friends. I would try my best in accordance with your advice.
Sincerely yours,
Leena
Leena
Ronit,
I told my boy this evening about your theory of the long legs' competition - same as matured brain, I hope it would always work.
I would keep you update with my boy's situation. Good luck to us and our project.
Thanks again Ronit,
Leena
Jane
Dear Ronit,
I was hoping you could advise me based on your experience. My daughter recently transferred to a new school with an entirely different curriculum and we are finding that she is more advanced compared to her new classmates. She is at prep level and they are just beginning to learn to read, write, basic maths (numbers 1-20) and the learning is very play based. She is enjoying it though because she gets very little homework- perhaps only once a week. My daughter's previous school was too academic and I could tell she was not enjoying her learning environment. Homework was everyday, prelim exams, end of year exams. While it is good that she enjoys her new school, I feel she is not learning enough. She is repeating what she already knows and I feel it is a waste that she will forget all the learning she worked hard to accumulate from her previous school. I like that she is challenged and that she is learning more new things but presently hubby and I feel we are just paying more tuition money for our daughter to play and do art work! My daughter was already developing her reading, writing and doing maths and knows her number 1-100. It appears her present cognitive level is more matched to the students in Year 1. Assesment was already done and cognitive ability is there for Year 1 but the school's advice is to keep her in Prep because of emotional maturity issues. She will be the youngest in year 1.She is 5 turning 6 July 16 next year. If she does not cope she will need to repeat Year 1. Apparently a lot of what is learned at the end of Prep is repeated early in Year 1 anyway hence I am hesitant to agree with the school's advice. Also we are expats and it is possible that we will move again after another 3 years. I would rather my daughter be ahead than behind. New school and most likely a different curriculum again. What is your advice in this present situation?
http://www.ronitbaras.com/index.php/about/ Ronit Baras
Jane,
I guess some of my answers depends on where you live.
If you live in Australia, this is my answer:
skipping a year is usually not recommended unless you think that staying will make it worst, which is what I get from you.
I don't think that turning 6 on July 16 is a problem, yes, she will be the youngest but my daughter turned 6 on July 15 in grade 1 and she is even a tiny girl and this is not an issue at all.( she is in grade 4 now and doing perfectly fine)Yes, she will be the youngest but 16th of July is not too young. It is around the cut off day but it is a day that was picked, nothing magic about it.
My recommendation will be to monitor her behavior and trust your gut feelings. if you think that she is wasting time, it is probably a waste of time for her to stay in prep.
I was an exapt myself and learned that my kids were very advanced too when they came to Australia, so if you do live in Australia, it is probable that when you go back, she will need some help to catch up.
you have two options. One is to work with your daughter at home and teach her the next level and the next level ignoring the level in class. It will make sure she is stimulated and challenged. The disadvantage of this approach is that kids will dumb themselves to fit in the level of the class / what is expected of them.
I was given that option when my son was in prep and I didn't like it but worked with it as I was afraid of the skipping class option more ( the "no skipping" approach that I was holding as a special education teacher was even stronger for boys) but after 6 month of assessments and talks with the psychologist who was assigned by the school and based on her suggestion and because my son thought that everyone in school was stupid, didn't want to go to school and developed superiority complex, I went to the office and said, I would like my son to be in grade 1 on Monday and where do I need to sign? and it happened exactly like that - Which was the other option I had.
My daughter was the youngest girl in the prep. We could make her stay in kindergarten for another year but she was not happy to play, she wanted to read and play with math the previous year so we thought it is better to put her in prep.
To learn from what happened to our son who was very, very advanced and skipped 4 times ( he turned 15 yesterday and he is finishing grade 11 in a month) we have decided we will not over stimulate her. nothing! I was happy with that for about a year. Her teacher said she was perfect and had A all over her report card. When she entered grade 1, I have decided to go to her class and help the teacher with reading and math and what do you know? I discovered that my daughter, the perfect daughter is very, very, very far from being an advanced reader- She was still an A student but there was a group of kids that could read in a grade 2 level and they were given extended work while my A daughter was given short sentences books to read.
What I have learned is that kids will dumb themselves to fit the group of the kids in their class. which is what she did the previous year ( with my help!)
It took me about a month to get her to grade 2 level reading and from that moment on, I said to myself,In every class, my aim is that she will be among the advanced group. The advanced group is there to prevent kids from skipping a class. This is my monitoring way, if the advanced group is not advanced enough and the kid is emotionality stable, skipping a class is a good option.
If you do not live in Australia, I am not sure what the cut off date is and if you still have enough time to make the shift to grade 1.
I would recommend you to make the transition as soon as you can. preferably in between semester breaks and after a discussion with your daughter, making sure having to find new friends and getting used to a new teacher and working a bit to catch up is not a threat for her. Most of the time parents feel threatened by changes more than their kids.
What you need to balance is her emotional state and be willing to take the responsibility of supporting her during the transition.
Good luck
Happy Parenting
Ronit
Jane
Thank you so much for your immediate response Ronit! I feel even more confident now with our decision to proceed with accelerating her to Year One.
http://www.ronitbaras.com/index.php/about/ Ronit Baras
Hi Jane,
I am glad it did help.
keep us updated with your daughter's progress.
Happy day
Ronit
Lisa
I think it is important for the readers to see both sides and understand why this is suggested
http://www.det.wa.edu.au/detcms/inclusiveeducation/schoolsplus/public/publications/repeating-a-year-of-school.en?oid=MultiPartArticle-id-1406079
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Repeating-school-has-no-benefit-study/2006/08/30/1156816936042.html#
Regards Lisa
(Educational Psychologist)
http://www.behappyinlife.com/ Gal Baras
Hi Lisa,
Research must always be analysed carefully and this one could be explained differently. You see, the kids who were held back could not be compared to THE SAME kids had they been allowed to proceed. The articles you refer to do not describe things like socioeconomic background or any other support these kids may have had or lacked.
Ronit and I personally know someone who was held back as a straggler and is now a wealthy and well-respected accountant, so on a case-by-case basis, repeating a year may actually be a good thing. If you take into account kids who were in the young range to begin with or kids whose home does not support learning, your decision is likely to be different from other circumstances.
The researcher's recommendation that kids should receive special support to keep them with their age group would be excellent in a perfect world and I would then wholeheartedly agree. But the public system is so short on resources, this is not always possible, so what's a parent to do who cannot help their own child? Sometimes, the only practical solution is to ease the child's pressure.
Best regards,
Gal
http://www.ronitbaras.com/index.php/about/ Ronit Baras
Hi Lisa,
As always, for parents, their own kid is 100% of the statistics but I was really happy to read about recent research that question the need to repeat a year.
I generally think that learning difficulties or even low academic achievements are not a good reasons to repeat a class because time is not the solution. If there is a special need, the need needs to be fulfilled.
Maturity is the only reason and most of the time parents can tell their child is not mature enough.
I am a special education teacher and believe that we need to adjust the service to the kids not the other way.
I was very happy to read the the research in the links you have sent. I used old research ( with similar conclusions) to give my clients as resources to help them make educated decisions regarding their kids.
Leena's child is a great example of a child that academically does well but emotionally needs support. She already did the transition and has made the choice to repeat the year, at this point, I always say it is better to support that and make sure the child feels safe, wherever he is.
Thanks for the links Lisa, I will sure use them in the future.
Happy day
Ronit
http://www.ronitbaras.com
josephine
my daughter is about to start year 12 but she is really persistent in repeating year 11 and not because she failed but because she feels like she didnt understand anything at all from the previous year and because she wants to be able to have a better chance at getting into university to study teaching. so should she repeat or not?
http://www.ronitbaras.com/index.php/about/ Ronit Baras
Josephine,
Usually, the kids do not like the idea of repeating a year.
If I had a daughter that wanted to do that, I would let her.
There are many humiliating things teen go thorough when repeating a year but you are describing someone who is willing to go through this in order to gain an advantage, what an inspiring daughter you have.
My recommendation would be:
Make sure the reason she is staying is not social. ( boyfriend or friends)
Make sure the reason she is staying is not fear of finishing high school and trying to postpone the end.
Make sure she took into consideration the social impact of hanging around kids that are a bit younger than her, Especially boys.
Make sure she took into consideration the social stigma of repeating a year.
If you go through this process, she should be fine.
Good luck
Ronit
http://www.ronitbaras.com
Jane
Hi Ronit!
I wrote to you October of last year seeking advice on accelarating my child. We are aussie expats and our daughter transferred to a new school that uses the the Victorian state curriculum abroad. Prior schools involved a mixture of the Singaporean curriculum and Montessori and or just Montessori in other countries. Our daughter was placed in Prep ( she turns 6 this July) but she was clearly ahead compared to her new classmates who were just begining to learn to read, write, basic maths (numbers 1-20) and the learning is very play based. Her last school was very academic: homework was everyday, prelim exams, end of year exams. Anyway in short an assesment was done and cognitive ability is there for Year 1 but the school's advice was to keep her in Prep because of emotional maturity issues. After considering your email, hubby and I went ahead in pushing for the school to accelerate her to Year 1 and the school granted our request with reluctance. After about a month since her transition into Year 1, the teacher said she was doing fine but again cautioned us about the possiblity that she might not cope as eventually the pace will pick up. I expressed my confidence that she will do fine then last wednesday we had our second meeting since transition with not so positive feedback. Basically she was telling us that our daughter has the "brains" verbatim, confidence is all there, but she strongly feels that she will not cope. Emotionally she is just not ready to cope with the expectation for Year 1 students and she thinks she will have to repeat year 1. We were told that darling daughter is very playful, keeping her focused is a challenge at times. She is chatty, sometimes copies work off her tablemates. A few times she refused to do the work, ignored the teacher. A few times she has had to complete her work alone while the rest of the kids were done and ready to sit down for a movie. I was not suprised with the feedback because she is like this at home. She needs a lot of coaxing, reminding, repeat instructions, reprimanding because she will wander off or not do it. I asked the teacher if perhaps this is not so much immaturity but the child's nature? She insists immaturity. It was also disappointing to see that the teacher seems to have already made up her mind before the year is over?? I might add that with a recent addition to our family in March of last year, my attention has been divided if not more focused on our second child, and I wonder if putting in more parental coaching at home, perhaps investing in a tutor might address the issue? The teacher requires a decision this coming Monday. She also said that she could a) push darling daughter but the effects may not be worth the unecessary stress and the child might develop a negative attitude towards school b) just let her slide and finish the year and just let her enjoy but she will definitely have to repeat year 1. I will also add that our daughter is 6 months younger than the youngest in the class whose age is 6.
I would very much appreciate your thoughts on this situation Ronit as I am at present reluctant to accept the teachers opinion or she right?
http://www.ronitbaras.com/ ronitbaras
Hi Jane,
Hi Jane,
I was very sorry to read your email.
This exact thing happened to us – a teacher that is not happy with your choice as a parent and is doing all in her power to prove to you that you have made the wrong choice and using the kid to prove it to you.
I believe there is too much attention given to the chronological age in school and it will be very surprising for the teacher to explain how come the oldest child in grade 1 is only a week or a month younger than the youngest kid in grade 2 - it is not the age!
Smart and gifted kids have same emotional problems as non- gifted kids. they react to having a new sibling, problems at home, pressure, anxiety – just the same. Their main problem is that the adults around expect them to have none and immediately blames it on their age.
I know It is a hard decision but no teacher in the world can tell at the beginning of the year ( God, it is term 1 in Australia) that a child will need to repeat!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, unless it is a cover up for inadequacy.
For God's sake, we are talking about 6 year old child – why is it such a threat for her.
Forgive me, I am emotional as it brings back the memories of a teacher that did this to us. She tried to convince us that Tsoof, my son, who was 7 but in grade 3,does not understand a word he is reading. She tortured him and us for 8 weeks. We tortured him for 8 weeks thinking he really do not understand anything he is reading until one day we went for a meeting with her, it was a class with two teachers, that teacher was the main teacher and the other one was a support teacher. When we entered her class, during the break, our son rushed in and said something to us in another language. We turned to him and said in another language that he needs to leave the room and wait for us outside. When he left, she said to us that speaking to our kid in another language next to her was rude. During the whole time she told us so many bad things about him. She gave him grade 1 workbook and said he cannot cope with that. ( he already did half a year of pre , half a year of grade 1 and half a year of grade 2 in Melbourne) When we left, the other teacher came to us in secret and said " I don’t' know what she is talking about, he is so bright and understands everything I give him"
We realized that it is personal.
We wrote a letter to the school and gave it to them with confident – he is moving to grade 4 – our decision and final!
I had to make sure the whole time he was at this school that this teacher will never never teach him.
He moved to a new state, new friends, new house, new system and she expected him to get 100% on everything he did.
He is now 15 years old, finishing grade 12 this year, excellence award every year, school captain, studies at the university, (going to be at Australian Got talent this year)- His teachers say to us he is the best thing a teacher can ask for.
If I were you, I would tell her that your daughter is staying and that you will support her at home and that you expect the teacher never to bring the repeating a year option –ever again.
One big rule we have had for the last 7 years – never, never talk about your age ! it worked. Some people who figure out he is young, do their best to make him feel inferior.
Call me if you want to talk.
Happy weekend
Ronit