It's their Happy Families podcast.

It's their Happy Families podcast.

It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just wants answers.

It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just wants answers.

Now, the school year is almost over, report cards on their way into hands, mail boxes and inboxes, email boxes all over the place, and this is that time of the year where some families start to have a conversation around how's our child doing and are they doing okay?

Now, the school year is almost over, report cards on their way into hands, mail boxes and inboxes, email boxes all over the place, and this is that time of the year where some families start to have a conversation around how's our child doing and are they doing okay?

Or more to the point, we know they're not doing okay. There's some pretty serious gaps in their knowledge. Should they repeat a year? Sometimes it's not their fault. Sometimes there's inconsistency with the school they start in your school, there's challenges teachers and so on, maybe serious illness. But in other cases we just look at how child's fairing and think, oh my goodness, they did not master the material this year. Do you think they should repeat? What should we do about it? Kylie? That's our topic today on the Happy Families Podcast.

Or more to the point, we know they're not doing okay. There's some pretty serious gaps in their knowledge. Should they repeat a year? Sometimes it's not their fault. Sometimes there's inconsistency with the school they start in your school, there's challenges teachers and so on, maybe serious illness. But in other cases we just look at how child's fairing and think, oh my goodness, they did not master the material this year. Do you think they should repeat? What should we do about it? Kylie? That's our topic today on the Happy Families Podcast.

I'm really surprised we're having this conversation. As far as I was aware, repeating is just number one. It's not something that the Education Department would encourage in any way, shape or form, And I just I feel like it's not a conversation these days.

I'm really surprised we're having this conversation. As far as I was aware, repeating is just number one. It's not something that the Education Department would encourage in any way, shape or form, And I just I feel like it's not a conversation these days.

You might be surprised. We don't have a whole lot of really great data in Australia. There's not a lot of well kept publicized research on this. But the last start of that I've got is ten years old, and that's from twenty fourteen. In that research, about seven and a half percent of fifteen year olds had repeated one year over the course of their schooling, So whether they repeat a grade one or grade three or grade eight, whatever, it was just under ten percent. Seven and a half percent of fifteen year olds had repeated one year, which was down slightly from eight percent in two thousand and nine. So seven and a half eight percent of kids are repeating at some point. And one of our daughters has we got hurt, although it wasn't really repeating a year of school. We just got her to do that preschool year a second time because we wanted her to be a bit older. So I guess that doesn't doesn't quite count well.

You might be surprised. We don't have a whole lot of really great data in Australia. There's not a lot of well kept publicized research on this. But the last start of that I've got is ten years old, and that's from twenty fourteen. In that research, about seven and a half percent of fifteen year olds had repeated one year over the course of their schooling, So whether they repeat a grade one or grade three or grade eight, whatever, it was just under ten percent. Seven and a half percent of fifteen year olds had repeated one year, which was down slightly from eight percent in two thousand and nine. So seven and a half eight percent of kids are repeating at some point. And one of our daughters has we got hurt, although it wasn't really repeating a year of school. We just got her to do that preschool year a second time because we wanted her to be a bit older. So I guess that doesn't doesn't quite count well.

I kind of think the conversation would be more useful in do we delay starting our kids schooling journey as opposed to putting them in at the appointed time and then recognizing that there's too many gaps in their learning and doing it again.

I kind of think the conversation would be more useful in do we delay starting our kids schooling journey as opposed to putting them in at the appointed time and then recognizing that there's too many gaps in their learning and doing it again.

Yeah, so that's called red shirting, and research certainly indicates that overwhelmingly that's what most parents are doing now. They're just saying, want my child to grow up a bit more. I want them to be a bit older, let's start school an extra year down the track, and that's what the push is. Interestingly, around the world there's a really big shift or there are lots of differences in various countries. So for example, in France and Spain and Portugal, it's really quite common for kids to be retained free. It's called grade retention or repeating year, that is, doing the academic year over again. Places like Australia, the UK, the US, New Zealand doesn't happen very often at all, under ten percent, seven eight percent, that sort of thing. And places like Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Norway, Sweden, those Nordic countries, the Northern European countries pretty much never happens. It's not part of the conversation. It's simply not what they do. They focus more on, Okay, this child struggling, individualized teaching, student learning plans, student differentiation, that kind of thing. So I find it really fascinating just the different way that this plays out around the world. But Australia, I mean, nearly ten percent of kids will repeat a grade at some point in that first fifteen years of life.

Yeah, so that's called red shirting, and research certainly indicates that overwhelmingly that's what most parents are doing now. They're just saying, want my child to grow up a bit more. I want them to be a bit older, let's start school an extra year down the track, and that's what the push is. Interestingly, around the world there's a really big shift or there are lots of differences in various countries. So for example, in France and Spain and Portugal, it's really quite common for kids to be retained free. It's called grade retention or repeating year, that is, doing the academic year over again. Places like Australia, the UK, the US, New Zealand doesn't happen very often at all, under ten percent, seven eight percent, that sort of thing. And places like Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Norway, Sweden, those Nordic countries, the Northern European countries pretty much never happens. It's not part of the conversation. It's simply not what they do. They focus more on, Okay, this child struggling, individualized teaching, student learning plans, student differentiation, that kind of thing. So I find it really fascinating just the different way that this plays out around the world. But Australia, I mean, nearly ten percent of kids will repeat a grade at some point in that first fifteen years of life.

So why do people think repeating is a good idea?

So why do people think repeating is a good idea?

There are three main reasons that come up from all the research that I've looked at. The first one is just this idea that maturation, That is, the building blocks weren't quite there, but as you mature, you're more cognitively mature, you're better able to regulate your emotions and your behaviors, You've more socially mature, so you're probably and you're going to have the cognitive architecture to learn the stuff you need to learn this year because you didn't do it last year. So the whole putting the building blocks in place, that's the idea. Unfortunately, unfortunately the research doesn't necessarily support that, and that is a lot of kids will feel incompetent because we've asked them to repeat a year, and they'll also be quite bored because there might be a few areas where they are failing, where they're really struggling, whe they're not up to standard, but they've kind of got their head around most of it anyway. So they show up at the first part of the new year and the first three, four, five, maybe six months are just dead set boring for them because they were mostly okay. And this is making sense because they're a year older and they actually feel worse, not better. It doesn't help them.

There are three main reasons that come up from all the research that I've looked at. The first one is just this idea that maturation, That is, the building blocks weren't quite there, but as you mature, you're more cognitively mature, you're better able to regulate your emotions and your behaviors, You've more socially mature, so you're probably and you're going to have the cognitive architecture to learn the stuff you need to learn this year because you didn't do it last year. So the whole putting the building blocks in place, that's the idea. Unfortunately, unfortunately the research doesn't necessarily support that, and that is a lot of kids will feel incompetent because we've asked them to repeat a year, and they'll also be quite bored because there might be a few areas where they are failing, where they're really struggling, whe they're not up to standard, but they've kind of got their head around most of it anyway. So they show up at the first part of the new year and the first three, four, five, maybe six months are just dead set boring for them because they were mostly okay. And this is making sense because they're a year older and they actually feel worse, not better. It doesn't help them.

I think this is where individualized teaching is so important, and making sure that your children's school has the capacity to cope with the differences in learning.

I think this is where individualized teaching is so important, and making sure that your children's school has the capacity to cope with the differences in learning.

And so the differences in learning is the second reason that people promote it that there's a term that you might hear of now and again called heterogeneity. In other words, if there's enormous heterogeneity in the group, you've got a lot of variation. You've got the really you're smart kids that are learning everything and the kids that are lagging and really struggling. And the argument is by getting kids to repeat, you create more homogeneity in the group. That is, everyone's a lot more aligned similar levels, and the more homogenize the group, the easy they are to teach. So by asking a child to repeat, by retaining the grade, what you're effectively doing is you're letting all the kids who are at the same level move up. But you're asking the kids who aren't to stay back. That's the argument. And then of course there's just the competency argument, like if you're competent, you're going to feel better about yourself, your self esteems going to be higher, it's going to be a refresher rather than new material, You're going to be more experienced, you do well. Some arguments for grade retention as well is that the threat, the threat of retention can actually be the motivated to get kids to continue and work hard, which I think is a pretty unhelpful approach, but they're the main reasons that people would argue that grade retention is a good idea.

And so the differences in learning is the second reason that people promote it that there's a term that you might hear of now and again called heterogeneity. In other words, if there's enormous heterogeneity in the group, you've got a lot of variation. You've got the really you're smart kids that are learning everything and the kids that are lagging and really struggling. And the argument is by getting kids to repeat, you create more homogeneity in the group. That is, everyone's a lot more aligned similar levels, and the more homogenize the group, the easy they are to teach. So by asking a child to repeat, by retaining the grade, what you're effectively doing is you're letting all the kids who are at the same level move up. But you're asking the kids who aren't to stay back. That's the argument. And then of course there's just the competency argument, like if you're competent, you're going to feel better about yourself, your self esteems going to be higher, it's going to be a refresher rather than new material, You're going to be more experienced, you do well. Some arguments for grade retention as well is that the threat, the threat of retention can actually be the motivated to get kids to continue and work hard, which I think is a pretty unhelpful approach, but they're the main reasons that people would argue that grade retention is a good idea.

So I know from our personal experienced. We have two children who were born in April. We lived in New South Wales, and so they were able to start school as four year olds turning five in the April, and in both cases completely competent children, very articulate, very capable of learning the material. But what we noticed with our older daughter was that it didn't really start to matter until about grade three. Then we started to see some gaps in her social capacity and emotional regulation because she was so much younger than her peers and so as a result. That meant that with our youngest, we decided we would do the opposite to that, and we gave her an extra year in preschool. I was really concerned about that at the time. It was a really hard decision. I felt like I was doing bad by her. But my one concern was is she going to be bored? Is she going to come next year doing the same things, And just we've wasted a whole year of learning and growth for her. And I was so grateful for a school structure that just said, no, of course, not. Whatever she's ready for, we're going to give her. And so the following year, while all of her friends were still learning their letters, she was actually writing and she wrote her own story that year, completely written from start to finish, illustrated and put together. And it was such a beautiful experience watching her in the same environment, but stretched and extended.

So I know from our personal experienced. We have two children who were born in April. We lived in New South Wales, and so they were able to start school as four year olds turning five in the April, and in both cases completely competent children, very articulate, very capable of learning the material. But what we noticed with our older daughter was that it didn't really start to matter until about grade three. Then we started to see some gaps in her social capacity and emotional regulation because she was so much younger than her peers and so as a result. That meant that with our youngest, we decided we would do the opposite to that, and we gave her an extra year in preschool. I was really concerned about that at the time. It was a really hard decision. I felt like I was doing bad by her. But my one concern was is she going to be bored? Is she going to come next year doing the same things, And just we've wasted a whole year of learning and growth for her. And I was so grateful for a school structure that just said, no, of course, not. Whatever she's ready for, we're going to give her. And so the following year, while all of her friends were still learning their letters, she was actually writing and she wrote her own story that year, completely written from start to finish, illustrated and put together. And it was such a beautiful experience watching her in the same environment, but stretched and extended.

Yeah, so advantage there really for red shirting the idea of holding the kids in their childhood for an extra year before they head off to school, giving them that opportunity to mature. Unfortunately, it seems that great retention doesn't provide the same advantages as what you've just described. By waiting till the kids rolled before they start school. So looking at the research, there's a research paper that came out in twenty twenty I think it was maybe it was twenty twenty one, and it's called Effectiveness of aid retention A systematic reviewer meta analysis eighty four methodologically sound studies from two thousand to twenty nineteen from around the world, looking really carefully at this one major thing, and here's what they found in the data. They found the disadvantages. Repeaters are not universally incompetent, and so learning outcomes end up being lower rather than higher because they get bored, they get frustrated, and they start to feel like that, well, they're internalizing this idea that I'm a dummy, that's why I had to stay back. There are social consequences. The major social consequences consist of two things. Number One, the kids who left you behind are no longer part of your social group, So all those friendships that you've had several years developing and strengthening and creating those foundations are no longer there. And number two, it seems that the younger kids actually pick on the kids that have been retained, the kids that are repeating are at much greater risk of being picked on by their new peers who are saying, oh, look at you, you're not smart like us. You've had to stay back with us. Where the babies, but you're the actual baby, which is just kids again, the casual brutality that you see in kids, and that of course is associated with a decrease in self esteem. And the research has found that there's a decreased pleasure in learning. Learning is no longer seen as something that you innately do or something that you can derive pleasure from. It's something that you have to do to avoid the awfulness of looking like a dummy. And that's obviously not going to be great. And the last couple of things they highlighted. Number one, it causes stress and anxiety for the kids who are being retained for that year. And it's also terrible from a cost point of view, like the government or the family or whoever's footing the bill, it ends up costing a lot, so they're on the disadvantages to retaining kids. It seems like if you're thinking about repeating, the evidence is firmly against it.

Yeah, so advantage there really for red shirting the idea of holding the kids in their childhood for an extra year before they head off to school, giving them that opportunity to mature. Unfortunately, it seems that great retention doesn't provide the same advantages as what you've just described. By waiting till the kids rolled before they start school. So looking at the research, there's a research paper that came out in twenty twenty I think it was maybe it was twenty twenty one, and it's called Effectiveness of aid retention A systematic reviewer meta analysis eighty four methodologically sound studies from two thousand to twenty nineteen from around the world, looking really carefully at this one major thing, and here's what they found in the data. They found the disadvantages. Repeaters are not universally incompetent, and so learning outcomes end up being lower rather than higher because they get bored, they get frustrated, and they start to feel like that, well, they're internalizing this idea that I'm a dummy, that's why I had to stay back. There are social consequences. The major social consequences consist of two things. Number One, the kids who left you behind are no longer part of your social group, So all those friendships that you've had several years developing and strengthening and creating those foundations are no longer there. And number two, it seems that the younger kids actually pick on the kids that have been retained, the kids that are repeating are at much greater risk of being picked on by their new peers who are saying, oh, look at you, you're not smart like us. You've had to stay back with us. Where the babies, but you're the actual baby, which is just kids again, the casual brutality that you see in kids, and that of course is associated with a decrease in self esteem. And the research has found that there's a decreased pleasure in learning. Learning is no longer seen as something that you innately do or something that you can derive pleasure from. It's something that you have to do to avoid the awfulness of looking like a dummy. And that's obviously not going to be great. And the last couple of things they highlighted. Number one, it causes stress and anxiety for the kids who are being retained for that year. And it's also terrible from a cost point of view, like the government or the family or whoever's footing the bill, it ends up costing a lot, so they're on the disadvantages to retaining kids. It seems like if you're thinking about repeating, the evidence is firmly against it.

Yeah, I know. When I moved over from New Zealand, I had finished five years of schooling. So when we moved over at the end of my fifth year of school, in my mind, I should be going into year six. But I was actually again like our April babies, I was at the younger end of the scale. But I chucked such a mental tantrum with my parents and the principal that they decided that they would put me into year six. Having gone through that process, now, I would one hundred percent have said they did wrong by me, as the two adults in the room who know better, they did wrong by me. I needed to be in year five because there was so many gaps in my learning.

Yeah, I know. When I moved over from New Zealand, I had finished five years of schooling. So when we moved over at the end of my fifth year of school, in my mind, I should be going into year six. But I was actually again like our April babies, I was at the younger end of the scale. But I chucked such a mental tantrum with my parents and the principal that they decided that they would put me into year six. Having gone through that process, now, I would one hundred percent have said they did wrong by me, as the two adults in the room who know better, they did wrong by me. I needed to be in year five because there was so many gaps in my learning.

What he's saying, you could have been a lawyer, or an engineer or a doctor instead.

What he's saying, you could have been a lawyer, or an engineer or a doctor instead.

No, not at all, just my level of competence. I spent the rest of my high school years feeling completely incompetent because I never felt like I caught up. I was never at the same stage as my peers.

No, not at all, just my level of competence. I spent the rest of my high school years feeling completely incompetent because I never felt like I caught up. I was never at the same stage as my peers.

It's so important get the kids into school at the right time and then just let the system do what it's supposed to do from an education point of view. Having said that, there will always be children who struggle. So I want to talk about a couple of things that we can do to help our children if they are struggling, because this really matters. There were some studies that showed that in countries where there was what's known as ability grouping or streaming to deal with heterogeneity, to deal with different abilities, that retention could have some advantages, but the size of the effect overall was essentially zero, and it seems that the net effect of retention or repeating a grade is it's better to avoid it. It's just really hard to make the argument that it is a good thing. So the other options differentiation, and that's really a teacher thing where teachers identify who's doing well and who's not. They provide additional support to the kids who are not doing well, which can sometimes be hard because the kids who are not doing well, the kids that you identify as struggling, can quite often be emotionally and behave really challenging as well, usually because they're struggling. So it's hard to see past that and say I'm here to support you in spite of the fact that you hate being here and you feeling competent and you're making life really hard for everybody. It seems to be a really really big impact on whether the kids will do well or not, so that individualized teaching. But it seems from everything that I've read that the best thing that you can do for your kids if they're struggling academically is to get extra tutor in support, to get somebody external from the school to come in and do a bit of help with the maths or the English or the French or whatever it is. And I know that that's sort of a privileged thing. You've got to have the money, you've got to be able to afford it. But it seems that that is it. The advantages of being able to stick with your friends and maintaining as much stability in that schooling situation, the advantages are far greater than any advantages that might come from allowing encouraging the children to repeat a year. It just seems that those advantages don't exist.

It's so important get the kids into school at the right time and then just let the system do what it's supposed to do from an education point of view. Having said that, there will always be children who struggle. So I want to talk about a couple of things that we can do to help our children if they are struggling, because this really matters. There were some studies that showed that in countries where there was what's known as ability grouping or streaming to deal with heterogeneity, to deal with different abilities, that retention could have some advantages, but the size of the effect overall was essentially zero, and it seems that the net effect of retention or repeating a grade is it's better to avoid it. It's just really hard to make the argument that it is a good thing. So the other options differentiation, and that's really a teacher thing where teachers identify who's doing well and who's not. They provide additional support to the kids who are not doing well, which can sometimes be hard because the kids who are not doing well, the kids that you identify as struggling, can quite often be emotionally and behave really challenging as well, usually because they're struggling. So it's hard to see past that and say I'm here to support you in spite of the fact that you hate being here and you feeling competent and you're making life really hard for everybody. It seems to be a really really big impact on whether the kids will do well or not, so that individualized teaching. But it seems from everything that I've read that the best thing that you can do for your kids if they're struggling academically is to get extra tutor in support, to get somebody external from the school to come in and do a bit of help with the maths or the English or the French or whatever it is. And I know that that's sort of a privileged thing. You've got to have the money, you've got to be able to afford it. But it seems that that is it. The advantages of being able to stick with your friends and maintaining as much stability in that schooling situation, the advantages are far greater than any advantages that might come from allowing encouraging the children to repeat a year. It just seems that those advantages don't exist.

So, based on everything we've talked about, doctor justin where are we sitting.

So, based on everything we've talked about, doctor justin where are we sitting.

Don't repeat if you can avoid it now. Now there will be a small percentage of kids who it really is the best option. But over on average, when we look at the results globally, the researchers in this particular paper said and I quote great retention provides a zero net effect. That is, it is not associated with the positive outcomes that we hope that it will be, and there are many many disadvantages. We're not seeing academic advantages, we're not seeing the attendant growth in self esteem or cognitive development or social development, like across the board, no matter what variable you look at, we're just not seeing the positive outcomes. With a handful of small exceptions that are too small and too context dependent to talk about here. In an Australian context, it seems like finding alternatives and investing in additional extracurricular educational support tends to be the better outcome. Hold them back, yeah, yeah, give them an extra year of childhood.

Don't repeat if you can avoid it now. Now there will be a small percentage of kids who it really is the best option. But over on average, when we look at the results globally, the researchers in this particular paper said and I quote great retention provides a zero net effect. That is, it is not associated with the positive outcomes that we hope that it will be, and there are many many disadvantages. We're not seeing academic advantages, we're not seeing the attendant growth in self esteem or cognitive development or social development, like across the board, no matter what variable you look at, we're just not seeing the positive outcomes. With a handful of small exceptions that are too small and too context dependent to talk about here. In an Australian context, it seems like finding alternatives and investing in additional extracurricular educational support tends to be the better outcome. Hold them back, yeah, yeah, give them an extra year of childhood.

And let them mature, let them start too early.

And let them mature, let them start too early.

That's that's a really big one. In fact, I'm so glad you said that. As we move towards the end of the year and people get ready for next year, if you can give them an extra year of being a kid, it will be so worth it. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. To get more information about making your family happier, visit happy families dot com dot au. And if you'd like more information about the study that I was specifically citing, check the show notes. We'll have a link to that study right there.

That's that's a really big one. In fact, I'm so glad you said that. As we move towards the end of the year and people get ready for next year, if you can give them an extra year of being a kid, it will be so worth it. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. To get more information about making your family happier, visit happy families dot com dot au. And if you'd like more information about the study that I was specifically citing, check the show notes. We'll have a link to that study right there.