That all children develop differently is a matter of universal agreement. When it comes to school starting age, disagreement comes to the fore. In recent years, there has been a trend for the introduction of compulsory primary school education earlier and earlier. This raises the question: is it better to send children to school at an earlier age, or can this be detrimental?
What issues does it raise?
A child’s readiness to start school is one of the important issues raised by this debate. If children are not able to absorb and learn, we might be wasting their time and misusing resources. Mostly, children are placed into school at a prescribed age irrespective of whether they are ready. ‘Readiness’ will vary from family to family and place to place. In general it means being able to socialise confidently with other children, being able to demonstrate language development so that they can speak up if they need help and to have fine motor controls, such as being able to hold a pencil or tie shoelaces.
Professor Kay Margetts of the University of Melbourne says that how well a child settles into school has a long-term implication on their education. Children unprepared for school may fall behind and might have to repeat a year which can subsequently have a poor effect on their progress and future schooling. The school environment requires many adjustments of a child: new behaviours for new environments.
It is possible that children cannot learn as well in school earlier in their developmental life. On the other hand, if starting school age has an impact on finishing school age, it raises the question of whether children are advantaged or disadvantaged later on in life.
There may be an egalitarian reason for starting school early. Parents in poorer families might be less able to help their children, as a result of which their development might be held back if they do not start school until six or seven.
What happens elsewhere?
Children in Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden start school at the age of seven, whilst in Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Republic of Ireland, Italy, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain, Turkey and Ukraine children start school aged six. It is clear that seven year olds are usually well prepared to begin school life.
In England, Malta, Netherlands, Scotland and Wales schooling starts at five and in Northern Ireland and India at four, though if they start at five, they don’t join other children of their age but start at the beginning. In England and Wales, the cut-off coincides with the start of the school year, so most children go to school aged four. In Scotland the cut-off is normally in March, which means that most do not start below the age of four and a half. Children in the UK start school earlier compared with other European countries, whose children will be at kindergarten at comparable ages.
Review
The University of Cambridge’s Primary Review considers the debate. Research Survey 9/1 describes difficulties in finding evidence and evaluating impacts of school structure, concluding: ‘The assumption that an early school starting age is beneficial for children’s later attainment is not well supported in the research and therefore remains open to question.’
