Monday, 28 September 2015

Summer born children starting in Reception class a year later than their age cohort could result in a 17-month age gap within your class. What are the new rules and what effect will they have on schools and your teaching?

What are the new rules?

It has been announced that children born between April 1st and August 31st can now start in Reception class in the September following their fifth birthday and they will remain with that age group throughout their schooling. 
 
Most importantly for schools, they will be assessed at the end of the key stage of the school year they are in, not the key stage matching their age.
 
Although the DfE will have a period of public consultation, and it is subject to parliamentary approval, schools and local authorities are being advised to take immediate action prior to the formal changes. So, in effect, it starts now, which assumes the outcome of the public consultation will be favourable to this change. As teachers, we need to think about this carefully and respond to the public consultation with our views.

Who decides whether a child starts a year later?

 
The emphasis is on parents deciding whether to defer their child starting school for a year. In the final paragraph of an open letter from Nick Gibbs it is implied that parents may have the biggest say in the final choice of starts date:
“We have, therefore, decided that it is necessary to amend the School Admissions Code further to ensure that summer born children can be admitted to the reception class at the age of five if it is in line with their parents’ wishes, and to ensure that those children are able to remain with that cohort as they progress through school, including through to secondary school.”
 
In addition the proposed code requires admissions authorities to also take account of the views of headteachers. Will headteachers know enough about a child that has not started school yet? This may fall back onto how active a parent seeks the advice and support of the school in their desire for their child to start a year later. This could, perhaps, place headteachers in difficult situations between parents and admission authorities and with parents themselves. 

What are the implications for schools if a child defers a year?

 
You could have a child born April 1st who is 5 years and 5 months old when they start school, along with a child who is 4 years and 1 day old.
 
How disadvantaged will children who turned four in August be in the same class as children possibly 17 months older, born in the April the year before? If there is a significant difference within a 12 month gap, then this could be wider. What about a child that is young for their age and summer born, but is not brought to the attention of schools or the admissions authorities? Is this left to parents or will there be a system to pick these children up?
 
Will this just push the problem into different months? What about March born children that have delayed development? Will they now become the ‘spring born’ group that are disadvantaged?

This is not just a Reception/KS1 issue, this will effect every year group in years to come, even up to secondary school as they remain a year below their age group cohort throughout their school life.
 
Most importantly for schools, children who defer a year will also be assessed in that year throughout their schooling. So would it be tempting to encourage most summer born children to defer? Would this improve key stage assessments for your school? How would two schools results be compared that may have different age ranges within the same end of KS tests? A lot to think about.

What does research suggest?

 
The DfE ‘Month of Birth and Education Schools Analysis and Research Division’ is a really interesting document bringing together relevant research.
 
Research shows that, overall, children who are the youngest within a school year group perform less well and the eldest perform better.  However this gap decreases as children progress through school. At the end of KS1 there is a gap between summer born and autumn born of 10 percentage points, reducing to 8 percentage points by the end of primary school and to 6 percentage points by GCSEs taken at 16 years. Research also shows that children with summer birthdays are more frequently identified as having Special Educational Needs, which is particularly the case at KS2. 

So there are some issues for summer born children. However allowing more children to defer a year might not solve the problem and may make it worse for some children.
 
Evidence from countries where children are often placed in the year below shows that it does not improve academic outcomes for children who are behind and that delaying entry to school for a year to increase ‘readiness’ may lead to worse outcomes for summer born children.
 
Some schools (and parents) may prefer delaying a term for the youngest in the year. Research looking at children starting mid-year found that pupils that started in September performed better by the time they started Year 1, than those who delayed starting Reception until January. Most interestingly this was regardless of month of birth. Also, summer born children starting in September outperformed those starting later in the year.

Another option for schools is to offer part-time places. Analysis of the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile scores shows no disadvantage for part-time entrants compared to full-time entrants when birth and timing of entry are taken into account.

The DfE defines summer born children as those born between 1 April and 31 August -  this is up to 5 months before the normal start date.

Most of us would include July and August as summer born, and possibly even June, but May and April? This seems to be stretching summer rather…definitely English summers!

How many children are likely to defer?

 
Findings from the Parents Omnibus Survey (2009) suggested that although parents may comply with the LA and school policies on admissions they may prefer alternative arrangements for starting school.
 
60% felt parents should have a choice when their child started school

25% said that summer children should not start school following their 4^th birthday

32% said they would prefer to wait until their child was 5 before starting school
 

Further reading

The admission to school of summer born children
Nick Gibbs, Minister of State for Schools open letter

Schools Admission Code December 2014
Guidance for Admissions Authorities (LAs, Governors)

DFE: Month of Birth and Education
Schools Analysis and Research Division

What happened before?

Until these changes children who started later still entered the class for their correct age. So if parents chose not to send their summer born children in September after their fourth birthday, they started in Year 1 and miss the whole of Reception.

It is estimated that 1-3.5% of children postponed starting school until Year 1, missing out the full Reception year. It was not encouraged for children to defer a year and start in Reception, within the year group younger, although this did happen in exceptional circumstances.

As for mid year entrants, of children starting in Reception classes in 2007/8, 89% started in September, 10% in January and 1% in April.  So midyear starts were also in a minority.