Getting to know your child - before contact

You may think that you don’t know much about your child, if you have never had contact or not for a very long time. So start by focusing on what you do know or can work out.

Do you know their name?

Do you know their date of birth?

If you know their date of birth, then you also know their age and you can work out what year they are in at school and what developmental stage they are likely to be at.

The school year runs from the start of September to the end of August. If your child is 4 by 1st September this year, they will probably start in the reception class in the autumn term, or they may already have started.

If your child is or was 5 on 1st September this year, they will either start in Year 1 in the Autumn term coming (if you are reading this in January – September) or they will have already started (if you are reading this in September – December).

For the primary ages (aged 4 – 11) your child will usually have one main teacher who will teach them most subjects. They may have classroom helpers, or mentors, or learning assistants and sometimes other teachers will come in but mostly they will have one teacher and most children at this age still like school and their teachers.

Age 6 on September 1st = year 2 at start of Autumn term
Age 7 = year 3 at the start of the Autumn term
Age 8 = year 4 at the start of the Autumn term
Age 9 = year 5 at the start of the Autumn term
Age 10 = year 6 at the start of the Autumn term

From year 7 onwards, they will have a different teacher for each subject and usually one teacher specifically responsible for looking after their class or tutor group.

Age 11 = year 7 at the start of the Autumn term (usually start secondary school)
Age 12 = year 8 at the start of the Autumn term
Age 13 = year 9 at the start of the Autumn term (SATs at the end of this school year in June)
Age 14 = year 10 at the start of the Autumn term
Age 15 = year 11 at the start of the Autumn term (doing GCSEs at the end of this school year, also choosing A levels or college plans)
Age 16 = year 12 at the start of the Autumn term (start 6th form or sixth form college or other college, doing AS level exams or vocational exams at end of this school year)
Age 17 = year 13 at the start of the Autumn term (last year at school, doing A levels or vocational exams at end of this school year, applying for university or college)

If you know your child’s age, you can find out about which developmental stage they will be at – stuff like whether they can walk or talk, if they can feed themselves, if they can reason, how independent they might be, if they are approaching puberty, that sort of thing.

You can find more information on Dads’ Space about developmental stages here.

You can also find out more from other parenting websites or books. You can also think about other children you may know well, like cousins, nephews and nieces, friends’ children and so on.

Every child is unique and they will not all stick to fixed ages for particular stages. Your child might walk early but take their time to learn to talk. Some children are much more independent than others at a young age. Some learn to feed themselves quicker than others. Some seem to take forever to be toilet trained.

Use books and websites as a guide only. If your child has a disability or learning difficulty this may also affect their development. If you know what disability your child has, you can use the internet to find out more about what this means for their development. So already you probably know the following about your child:

• Their name
  
• Their age
  
• What sorts of basic things they are likely to be able to do, such as walking, talking etc
  
• Their year at school
  
• Whether or not they have exams coming up in the next year

Bear in mind you can start to find out more when (and if) you get indirect contact with your child – there’s still a lot to learn!

Next: Getting to know your child before indirect contact