I know this actually happens, I guess. But as a kid even though I always got really good grades I still loved summer vacation more than school. So to me the idea of having to actually repeat an entire year was tantamount to a prison sentence. I simply could not fathom the idea.
So did anyone actually have to do this? How did you deal with all you friends being in the next grade? With being an inch taller than everyone else? Did anyone ever straighten up & fly right after being left back? Or was it always the first step to just dropping out entirely?
One of my cousins is slightly older than me, and we were in the same grade until she got held back at the end of first grade. But she went on to graduate college two (three?) years before me, at the same college even. She became a better student while I was just slacking and coasting, you see. I didn’t fail a whole grade, but after high school I screwed around for a few years working at stupid jobs and going to punk shows in Berkeley. And playing far too many games for my own good. Oh wait, I still do that last one.
I had to repeat my junior year. Fortunately, it was at a different school (much better than the one I was in before). Pretty much made it worth it, since I’m still good friends with my classmates from the new school.
The reason I was held back? I failed Weight Training and didn’t satisfy my electives requirements for the year. Bogus. :rolleyes:
My best friend took either kindergarten or first grade twice. Since he was very young for his grade to begin with, he’s only four months older than I am. He says that he was pretty small until he was about 16, so I doubt he had to deal with everyone being shorter than he (though now he is quite tall).
We’re in college together and he is a really bright guy. His grades are great and he will be graduating on time. I don’t think being left back as a little kid has affected him at all.
I’ll join in, I suspect that being on a forum ranging from somewhat intelligent folks to downright brilliant people you may not get many who just all out failed a grade of school and/or went on to drop out all together…but this was just the case with me.
It was early on that i learned that were wasn’t much of a link between actually being smart and being a good student. It became evident that the american school system was based more around memorization of textbooks and responsibility than actualy intelligence. I spent most of my early life being very reclusive, i had a few friends (most of whom were bigger nerds than me) but for the most part i just sat back and observed everyone else.
I was smart, there was no doubt about that…i aced standarized testing where i was always in the top percentage of my class…i was unpopular but kids knew me as the brainy type, however i had absolutely no ‘study skills’ or drive whatsoever to do my homework or show any kind of academic responsibility. This made life very hard for me when i became more intrested in self education (the things i was intrested in, often far more advanced that what was being taught in class) than what was being taught, i would just sit in the back and read my books…not even humouring the idea of doing classwork.
This behavior eventually caught up with me and i was to repeat the sixth grade. As far as how i took it, i think it actually helped me more than anything. I had already abandoned any hope of actually succesfully going through school so being a year behind didn’t bother me. There was also the benifit of almost starting anew with a new group of kids (where it didn’t take me long to become unpopular again). Still i was always the teacher’s favorite, even all through high school i was the student picked to read out loud in class as i was far and above the best reader. I think most of my teachers saw my “potential” which mystified them as to why i never turned in my homework yet mastered every test.
I began to form outside intrests (theatre, sociology) that made school just a daily obstacle for me until i could get home and do some real learning. My junior year i ended up dropping out all together, while having society deem me a “drop out” or a “failure” was troubling…the idea of getting a GED and starting college early absolutely thrilled me…i thought maybe i could get some actualy learning done in a college enviroment where busy work isn’t assigned…where you are not treated like a prisoner or a criminal and where learning was actually encouraged…i was absolutely right.
My first semester of college was grand and i accomplished what i never could in high school, granted i only took classes that intrested me and applied to my major as opposed to any basics. In short i don’t think the school system is made for people like me, any learning i actually could have done in high school i was distracted from by small town crap (football worship, social injustice, idiot “authority figures” throwing around power). I sure am glad i didn’t listen to the countless people who would have told me i was worthless or a failure for dropping out of high school, it was the best decesion i ever made as i am well on track to get the education i need to counsel troubled youth.
I’m not sure if this counts, but I was in a bad car accident in 2nd grade and missed so many days of school that I had to repeat the grade. It wasn’t a big deal since I was initially very young for my grade anyway.
It was still embarassing though, having to come back when all my friends had moved on (especially since I was known as “that crashed-up girl”).
Ooops! I hit reply to soon. I meant to add that I really didn’t miss all that many days (I was only out of commission for about 8 weeks), but the school board had a policy about missing X number of days and I was past that. We tried to get me in for the 2nd semester, but they wouldn’t have it. This was back in 1974, so hopefully policies are a bit more lenient now.
Like a few others, I scored well in standardized testing, but struggled in school. I was later diagnosed with Attention Defecit Disorder. I guess I could blame it on that, but I’m honestly not sure if that was the case.
For my situation, part of it was just simply laziness. My parents sat with me to make sure I did schoolwork, but as I got older, the left it to me. I guess this is the problem. I had very low willpower/motivation. Nintendo and bicycles were far more interesting than long division and the Mayflower. I was bored with 99% of the stuff in school during elementary school. I wouldn’t attribute this boredom to the ease in which I would learn things- in fact some concepts such as long division, and fractions took particularly long amounts of time for me to master. If something was hard, it was extremely easy to get discouraged. I didn’t go for help, because if I asked for help, I figured it was even MORE time I’d have to spend doing something I hated.
Repeating a grade wasn’t nearly as bad as a lot of people make it seem. My parents had a choice- have me repeat 3rd grade or cross their fingers and hope I could handle 4th grade. They decided to err on the side of caution, and had me repeat 3rd. However, since we moved and I was in a new school, it wasn’t that bad. And the second time around I did much better (obviously! ). I am actually grateful things went the way they did, because I was a decent student through 4th-12th grade, getting A’s and B’s, with the occasional C here and there. And if I didn’t repeat 3rd grade I would have never met my best friend! (we’ve known each other for ~15 years now)
In the school system my brother first went to they tested kids to see if they were ready for school. Those deemed too immature for first grade ('cause you know how mature you need to be to do 1st grade work :rolleyes: ) were put into a class called “Readiness” which was just like first grade but somehow you could be less mature even though you spent the same amount of the day in class. Then they really went to first grade. My brother went to readiness, and later skipped 6th grade.
Sort of. We had grades like Elfkin477 mentioned - Kindergarten, Prep, then Grade 1. Most kids skipped prep, I had to go through it because of fine motor coordination problems. Subsequently I skipped grade four, but that was mostly because we’d moved to a small, country school, and grades 2, 3, and 4 were taught together, and taught at the pace of the slowest learner. After I sat through grades 2 and 3 in that classroom, my mother insisted that they promote me up to the grade 5/6 classroom which for reasons unknown to me was taught at grade 6 level. So that was a fun transition indeed.
I should have repeated grade 10 due to being out for large chunks of the year with glandular fever, and not doing any work for the rest of the year because I was so behind and discouraged, but somehow they just passed me in all my classes and let me go on to grade 11. I had to repeat one class from grade 11 in grade 12, because I failed it due to poor work ethic left over from the year before, but in grade 12 I had a great friend who hammered me to get my work done, and generally encouraged me to both believe that I could do the work, and apply myself to get it finished, and thanks to him and him alone, I passed grade 12 and was able to go to Uni. Otherwise I believe I would have had to repeat grade 12, not for want of intelligence, but from a crucial lack of self-confidence and fear of even trying to do the work demanded of me.
I was held back in 8th grade, kicked out a year later. I bounced around to a few different “magnet” schools, not earning very many credits and taking a year off somehwere in there to work. When I was old enough to take the GED without the obligatory prep courses, I did so. Then it was time for college, and that’s where I am now.
My sister was nearly held back because she couldn’t skip. You know, like “Tra la la, here we go” that kind of skipping. My parents switched schools. She returned to the same school in the fifth grade and finished there, third in the class. I’m not sure if she could skip at graduation. Hmmm…
Then there were the two sisters, one in my grade and the other in the grade above me. The sister in my grade was pretty smart, but the one above us was, um, less so. So she gets held back when we’re in the first grade, moving up to second. Now the two sisters are in the same grade. At the end of the year, the parents apparently decided to hold the younger one back so they wouldn’t be in the same grade. At the end of the next year, the older one was going to be held back again, and they both left.
-Lil
My mum was made to repeat a year at school because she was a year younger than everyone else, but that was back in the dark ages. She totally hated it and didn’t do well the second time around.
She could read and write before she started school too, but because she didn’t write the way they wanted, she sort of had to unlearn and start again.
She has always been one to buck the system - I can kind of see why.
Whilst quite intelligent myself, I don’t consider myself to be super brainy, I have high EQ more than IQ, however amongst my friends and colleagues over the years, I have noticed those with really high intelligence, get bored really easily. I believe there have been some studies on this (too lazy to look up at mo).
I worked with an American guy in Japan who was probably the brainiest guy I have ever met, but he only wanted to plod along doing sweet FA, when he could have run the world! It was a good lesson for me - just because you are really smart, doesn’t mean that you are motivated to achieve. It could well be that there is no correlation between high IQ and great success?
I think it would be too much to say that there is absolutely no correlation. I can’t imagine that, statistically speaking, if you took 100 genii* and 100 people of average IQ, you wouldn’t find that the genii had an overall higher level of academic, professional, and financial success. Nevertheless, according toMensa’s own website, their ranks do include Welfare clients and high school dropouts as well as professors and other stereotypically bright people.
And now my own little story for the thread: I was skipped ahead one year, in grade school, but probably shouldn’t have been. Though I was considered bright and channelled into “gifted” programs, and performed well in most subjects, I was weak in math. And that was a problem that plagued me throughout my academic life. In retrospect it would have made more sense to have me stay with the group I was in, in order to beef up my elementary math skills.
). I am actually grateful things went the way they did, because I was a decent student through 4th-12th grade, getting A’s and B’s, with the occasional C here and there. And if I didn’t repeat 3rd grade I would have never met my best friend! (we’ve known each other for ~15 years now) 