Why I'm grateful mum started us at school a year later

I LOVED being a little older than my friends so I can totally understand more parents choosing to delay sending their children to school.

I LOVED being a little older than my friends so I can totally understand more parents choosing to delay sending their children to school.

I was so ready for my first day of grade one after mum made this choice to start my brother's and I a year later.

I even remember pushing mum away as we walked through the front doors of the classroom.

For the first time, researchers have looked at data from about 221,500 Queensland state school students and scoured parenting blogs for what drives the trend that saw the number of delayed starts double between 2010 and 2014.

Parents are making this choice because they struggle with knowing when their children are ready for school.

My mum is a teacher.

So we were lucky enough to be able to have the play based learning and education at home while we were children so I guess we weren't really missing out on anything starting a year later.

If anything I believe we were learning more practical life skills at home on the farm.

However these days there is so much pressure on kids to succeed and get the good test results.

I believe this may be having an impact on parents thinking when it comes to the decision to keep their kids at home in fear their child would fall behind.

Why can't we go back to more of a play based learning?

I think children need more time to explore their creative side rather than basically being tested from day one.

Yes I see the benefits but kids are just growing up way too fast these days.

Tell us what you think and have your say below.

Originally published as Why I'm grateful mum started us at school a year later