Bets time to have a baby with respect to schooling

daisiegg

I learnt on my PGCE (a few years ago, so statistics may have changed since then) that 'summer birthdays' (children born in the latter half of the academic year) were the biggest underachieving group nationwide. More so than ethnic minorities, more so than children on free school meals, more so than A* pupils (also a huge underachieving group), more so than white working class boys (who do worse than their black counterparts).

That said, I am sure there are exceptions to the rule, and loads of other factors that influence it.

Although strangely I currently teach a top set GCSE class and out of interest I just checked my mark book to look at their birthdays - the vast majority of them are before April and all the very top pupils (the guaranteed A*s) actually have birthdays in September and October! Again, I know this proves nothing....just found it interesting.

This is something that OH and I have talked about a lot when we think about having a baby. His daughter is summer born and has always underachieved at school, despite being sent to an expensive private school, despite a huge amount of encouragement and input in all sorts of ways from her parents...and OH thinks this is down to starting school before she was ready and never really catching up to where she was meant to be.

Of course, I am sure there are many highly intelligent and high achieving people born at the end of August...and as others have said, it is virtually impossible to actually plan when your child will be born! How can you know how long it might take you to conceive? Etc...

I just think it is worth being aware of - it was certainly taught to me as statistical fact that summer birthdays underachieve. So I if I did have a child born in the latter part of the academic year I would just be conscious of that and make sure I gave them as much support, help and encouragement as possible to reduce the disadvantage academically.

NoAngel

I have friends who decided that they would have a September baby. I thought they were crazily optimistic, how could they plan these things?! However, I was wrong, she was pregnant right away and the baby was 2 weeks late, so born very beginning of October.

busiscoming2

An interesting thread.

You can't plan when a baby is born. You can't plan it's potential ability. Even a child born to brilliant parents may have a bad attitude to learning and not do so well, whereas a child born to 'average' parents with what would seem not much potential, could study like stink and achieve A*'s across the board!

DianneB

My dil told me she didn't want a 'thick' August baby - guess when my birthday is :rotfl:

Millie2008_2

If the birth months of the intake of my postgraduate students year on year are to be believed, there are far more important determinants of academic achievement than when the child is born, as they are scattered throughout the year Ditto the birth dates of our PhD students.

Spendless

I'm September born and I wasn't amongst the most academic at school. I would come out as slightly above average I would say. My children who are both March born, excel at some subjects and do poorly at others. My sister has March born twins who have just gone to Secondary school, the boy is in the top sets, the girl in the middle ones. My son is at school with several multiple birth children, including twins, triplets and quads and they are all mixed differently ability wise-which would suggest to me, there's more to it than when your birthday falls.

Zekko

I don't think it makes much difference academically when you are born tbh. This is mostly dependant on 'nurture'.

I was born mid-August. I finished school/uni with an Engineering Degree and currently have a decent paying job in the Oil & Gas sector.

Long summer evenings and (usually) decent weather for birthdays is also nice. Your kid will thank you for this!

FBaby

Why do some people think they have (and even better can!) control everything?

How about being grateful for what you get and make the best of it?

bylromarha

Primary School teacher here, worked in Reception and KS1 most of my career.

I wanted a September baby as it meant best maternity leave pay for me. It's the only reason. I'd seen first hand how little the difference was between sept and summer born. Summer borns a bit more immature on school entry, but they soon catch up maturity by year 2.

More importantly I'd seen first hand the difference the 0-5 years input makes. It's what you do before school that by far makes the most significant difference.

FWIW, we had trouble conceiving, so we ended up with an August baby...just happy we had a baby by that point.

He's top of his class by a long chalk (year 4) , as is his July born sister (year 2). If anything, summer borns get slightly favoured as tests are standardised by age, so a sept born score of 42 questions right on a test is worth slightly less than an August born score of 42 questions right on a test in the governments eyes.

Firefly

hayday75 wrote: »

Jeez i can't believe this is an honest question ? ...
My first worry would be giving birth

Whereas mine would have been am I even fertile? A child is a gift and we often don't get to choose gifts.