Thank you Chay and Question202 for taking the time to share your experiences. And thanks to everyone who has shared their ideas and time with me. We have decided we will send DD to year 1 and hopefully with the support of the OT her handwriting will progress, and we will support her reading at home. I think the social benefits of her staying with her peers is a really big factor at the moment. And my gut feeling is that she will make a breakthrough with the reading.
The idea that her repeating is less a repeat than readjusting her grade placement to what it should be for her age had me thinking the research on repeating was not necessarily that relevant in our case, but really that is an adult way of looking at it. From DD's perspective, it would still be doing a year again, and I worry about the effects that will have on her self-esteem, self-efficacy, and motivation. I guess at this stage, these concerns weigh heavier than the possibility of a rough, struggling year 1.
Hopefully we are not back here this time next year deciding whether to repeat year 1 or not, but if we are, we will deal with that in light of an additional year's worth of knowledge about DD's academic life.
