I have to bite my tongue when I hear parents say this one thing...
/‘He/she is behind because they are summer born.’
I take this sentence very personally. You see my son is summer born. He is a July baby. You will never, ever hear me say that my son is ‘behind’.
Why should he be behind?
Why should his date of birth determine how well he does academically?
It doesn’t.
Sure, all children develop at their own pace. Absolutely. Does my son know his phonics as well as one of my October born students of his same cohort? No, he does not.
Does my son know how to answer questions better that some of my September born students of the same cohort? Yes, he does.
Developmentally he is struggling with his phonics but this is nothing to do with the fact that he is a ‘July baby’. This has to do with the fact that he is simply struggling with them right now.
Developmentally, his questioning skills are just extraordinary. The way he speaks is something out of this world. I honestly feel like I’m speaking with a 5 year old. This is to do with the fact that he is just very gifted with his vocabulary. And also most likely due to the fact that I’ve focused on this skill far more than I have focused on his phonics.
The date of birth of my students is so insignificant to me. I do note them down when students sign up to work with us but this is purely to know their date of birth and for no other reason.
I have to bite my tongue because I know that when parents tell me about their summer born children that it is purely out of love and compassion for them. But it is just not helpful when preparing for the 4+ Assessments (I hear this for the 7+ and 11+ Assessments too by the way but that’s not what I’m speaking about here).
Your child will be assessed in the exact same way as their autumn born peers. You may or you may not believe me, that’s up to you. You may or may not like that fact, but it is what it is.
I say this out of pure love and compassion for you and for your children who will be sitting their 4+ Assessments.
We only want the best for our children and when some of my potential new clients become defensive with me about this, I do not take it personally. I know that it is only because of the love that they have for their children. I get it.
However, when you prepare your child for their 4+ Assessments, I encourage you to not spend too much time dwelling on this who ‘summer baby’ thing. Put that to the side and just prepare your child to the best of your ability to go in and shine in any 4+ Assessment.
