The recent royal birth has has prompted discussion of how summer born children are affected when they go to school.
A report from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (2007) explored the impact of birth date upon cognitive test schools. You can read their report here – IFS Report on impact of date of birth
In 2009 Cambridge Assessment undertook a review of the literature about this issue. You can read it here – Literature Review
When you are researching to find literature if you find an article or report that reviews the literature this can give you a useful overview of the area you are investigating. In addition you can use the reference lists in these publications to identify other literature to seek out.
Have you noticed anything significant about when children are born in your own professional role (or in your family)?
July 25, 2013 at 12:03 pm
This is an area of discussion which has always interested me as my own birthday is the 30th August. I only just (by one day and a few hours!) managed to get into the year group I was in as the deadline was the 31st August. I struggled all the way through Primary School and Secondary School. It was only really when I started University (I started the FDLT when I was 20) that I felt I was starting to catch up academically with others. The biggest part of being so young for me was socially and emotionally – I just wasn’t ready for school having only just turned four and it would have been so much better to have waited another year.
I sat my GCSE’s at 15, not turning 16 until a week after I got my results. I was compared (according to grade bandings anyway) with peers some of whom were nearly 12 months older than me – another way of putting summer born children at a disadvantage. This is only my personal experience however and there are always exceptions to the rule – I’ve had children in my class who have struggled being summer birthdays but equally ones who you wouldn’t know were born in July or August.
I would be interested to read others views on this topic!.
July 25, 2013 at 1:41 pm
My own son was an August birthday and I never felt he was ready for school when he started. I was always reminding the teacher of his age when they set him targets. One lovely teacher however said once that if he was in the year below he would have been above everybody. He wasn’t ready and the system didn’t take into consideration his birth date.
July 25, 2013 at 1:42 pm
My own son was an August birthday and I never felt he was ready for school when he started. I was always reminding the teacher of his age when they set him targets. One lovely teacher however said once that if he was in the year below he would have been above everybody. He wasn’t ready and the system didn’t take into consideration his birth date.
August 2, 2013 at 10:23 am
It’s interesting, isn’t it? There’s so many factors apart form birthdate to take into account. Has anyone encountered the use of age standardised scores instead of end of KS levels? Might that be a a way of thinking about a child’s attainment?
August 25, 2013 at 1:45 pm
I have seen age related spelling and reading tests being carried out yet they are are only used for internal assessment purposes and the scores are not communicated with the children. I think this would be encouraging for some especially when age comes in as a factor. Also an Educational Psychologist has used age related tests for assessment so it can conflict with school scores and perception for assessment. For some children, age related scores would be beneficial rather than their end of year results as witnessed with my own daughter.
August 30, 2013 at 9:46 pm
Thanks, Louise, that’s interesting, there is a way of converting SATs test scores into age standardised scores too, again for optional use by schools.
August 30, 2013 at 9:48 pm
I was an August birthday too – I wonder if as children get older the effect of when you were born wears off…
August 31, 2013 at 7:00 am
I personally think that the effect does wear off. This is only based on watching my own son grow. He is about to go into his second year of sixth form and is ahead in all his work. I do however feel that the social and emotional side takes a bit longer to catch up: as although he has gone through the same experiences as his older peers, developmentally he is not at the same chronological age.