ExKiwilass

SNIGGER There does seem to be a lot of bright kids on BE...I'm just waiting for the person with the average kid...

tallperson

Just to offer our experience. When we moved here our daughter was 5 and had completed reception year in UK but because of her age had to go into kindergarten here. After 1 month though she was very unhappy and long story short she switched to a private school that would let her go into Grade 1. She is now 14 and in Secondary 4 and has not had any problems along the way, academically or socially.
Obviously it depends on the child and on the school and only you will know what's best but as someone said it is worth fighting for the right thing - noone else is going to do it for them!

Aviator

And sometimes that seems quite evident

AlexInBC

So is ours, but that's because it's such a small school and they have to have split classes to share the kids out relatively evenly between the number of teachers that they are funded to employ, rather than it being a choice...

It works well for us because my son gets to be one of four grade 4s in a class that has all of the grade 5s and four of the grade 6s, and last year he was one of 4 grade 3s in with all the grade 4s, but on the flip side a close friend's daughter is one of the grade 6s who's in the same class as my son and she has the same teacher for the 3rd year running. Also her closest friends have all moved up into the 6/7 split class

Geordie Lass

Exactly - hence my hesitation


Canadians start later at school so it stands to reason that kids coming over from the UK might be well ahead...

Geordie Lass

That was our plan - give him an easy start to school as he wouldn't be academically challenged and have an easy year but he's not happy doing that and is complaining of being bored etc.

tallperson

Same here - we thought giving our daughter a slower start because it was all in french was the way to go - but we can never predict how they're going to react!

Now dealing with our 5yr old hating kindergarten - a whole other ballgame - arrgghh!

MarylandNed

On the flip side of this, I sometimes see parents hold kids back a grade (I live in the US). I thought about doing this with one of my daughters because she has a late birthday and was born only 10 days before the cutoff for the next grade down. In the end we decided against it and kept her on grade.

Some kids who are months older than her were held back not because they were incapable of staying on grade but because their parents wanted them to be superstars in the grade below (in terms of academic and physical attributes). This increased their chances of academic success and also of outperforming their peers in various other activities e.g. sports (therefore an increased chance of a college scholarship).

Another reason given for holding a kid back a grade was the fact that college would be delayed for a year - which gives the parents an extra year to save the money needed for college.

MillieF

Our son is one of the oldest kids in the class as his birthday is 5th January, and he has just entered Grade Six, as all his mates in France have. I did ask him how things were going and all seems to be well, he has already done loads more Maths so they have punted him into a higher group for Maths and French but it is important (to us) that he stays with his peer group. He seems to be happy, and is making friends. He's also gaining confidence as he's getting 'good' marks, as he's not too challenged. He is also a bit lazy, and when he feels out of his depth tends to give up a bit. Our son is also fairly slightly built for his age and skinny, so would feel at a disadvantage if he were in Grade Seven.

calgeo

Ours seem to be ok so far (only 2 weeks into term) but they are in very good schools who has both said that they can be moved if need be....... Callan is a lazy wee sod so I think he will be quite happy where he is Georgia is very much a teachers pet and whilst she is very good with most subjects she does struggle with maths so a "do over year" may well just give her the confidence boost she needs. They are both contending with subjects they haven't been taught before including French and social studies so it will give them time to get up to speed with these.......... They are both loving all the extra curricular activities through the school so a slightly easier pace of life during the school day seems to help with that.........

The kids seem happy and are enjoying school and have coped brilliantly with the big move and new lifestyle so we are fairly confident that we made the right choice for them....... As with everything I am sure time will tell lol....

DandNHill

A word of warning though about puting them in the grade above the one they should be in.

A friend here was telling me how her niece was moved from grd 4 to grd 6 missing out grd 5 altogether.

She loved it as the work was at the right level accademically...BUT she was not allowed to go to the next school in to grd 7 as she was too young. She therefore had to repeat grd 6 which probably did more damage than if she had stayed with her peers in the first place.

Now this might be a Nova Scotia thing but it is worth checking before pushing for the child to be moved.

Also can they go to Uni if they are only 17?

HGerchikov

Our youngest son was in the same situation - but the Principal of his school agreed with us that Grade 1 was the better place for him than back in Kindergarten so he has been a year ahead all along. He has just started at High School, and also transitioned to middle school, there have been no problems with him being too young. Infact, all along there have been no issues but I think he is feeling it a little bit at the moment as he is late to get his growth spurt so is really tiny compared to some of his classmates. For our older son we just put him in the correct grade (4) and this gave him a chance to settle in and make new friends without having to worry about the academic stuff.

MarylandNed

Yes - not a problem. My 1st daughter did last year. My 2nd daughter did this year - she won't be 18 until December. I've heard of even younger kids going to university.

Geordie Lass

Good to know - thanks

JonboyE

I remember 60 Minutes doing a documentary about this. It came across as very pushy parenets doing "whatever it takes" to give their children any advantage they could get in life. Granted, that was just the journalist's perspective.

I think it has been known for a long time that the older children in any school year will, on average, outperform the younger ones in both academics and sports. This means they get access to the best teachers and coaches, get the opportunities to go to the best universities, and get the best jobs with the best companies.

Obviously there comes a point where the (up to) one year development gap ceases to be a factor, but the older kids have had a hell of a head start.