What should I do for my son?

[GooseyLoosey]

I hesitate to start this, especially here, but here we go...

Ds is 5. He is not a child genius and I am not quite sure what G&T is but he is a very bright little boy who is top at most things in his class. However, he has struggled socially (a lot) but has just about cracked it now (or at least learned how to fit in) - is not in trouble every day, has some real friends and is no longer the one excluded from all class parties.

The problem? School is small and has 6 classes for 7 years and the split is done on a strict age basis. This means that next year, ds (who is fairly young in the year) will be held down and go into a class with mostly younger children. It will break his hard formed friendships and I worry that he will go back to being disruptive (especially as he is physically very large and can kind of overwhelm younger children).

Any tips or advice to offer - can I do anything about this?

[witchandchips]

I went to a school like this and was similar to your ds (bright but found difficulty making friends). May birthday so kept down a class.
Actually worked out really great, the split was not quite 50/50 so the group kept down was a bit smaller, we often worked by ourselves on a seperate table just outside the main class room + because we were a smaller group actually got I think more help. The other issue was that the teaching style was geared towards being multi-level, no presumption that we were all at the same stage. This helped children at the top as well as children at the bottom

[Marne]

Hi, we are in a simalar situation, dd1 (4.8) is realy bright, a year ahead with reading and writing, her school is small and has mixed classes but they don't keep the younger ones back if they are ahead (they keep the ones who are struggling behind).

My daughter also has social probems as she has aspergers syndrome, i don't worry too much about this at the moment as sahe seems happy and is doing well (never in trouble).

Maybe talk to the teacher and ask their opinion?

[GooseyLoosey]

Thanks both. I have tried to talk to the teacher. Thing is that they have only recently moved to doing the split on age rather than ability and they are not willing to talk about it at all really - I gather the ability split caused ill feeling. They think this way they can avoid all of the parents complaining that their little Johnny really is brilliant and is not being treated fairly. Whilst I can understand this and see that the school just want to point to objective criteria they can ridgidly apply, it doesn't seem quite right to me.

[snorkle]

Goosey, I'd tackle the school specifically about the social issues. Is there anything they can do for him to help him maintain his established friendships - especially as he'll presumably be re-joining his peers at some point. Could some arrangement be made so that he does join his friends for some activities?

I don't think I'd be so worried about the academic side as they'll hopefully be on top of that one and if he's bright he'll catch up easily in any case. I'd only raise that with them IF it becomes a problem rather than assuming that it will.

[GooseyLoosey]

Thanks Snorkle. I will try and talk to them about it from that perspective. I really don't have too many concerns accademically for him - they are mostly social and behavioural (he really doesn't like younger children - partly I suspect because he has a younger sister!). It just seems that we have worked to hard to get him to socialise and behave and this will undo it all.