I would think what ringstrue is referring to is the constant one upping and bragging parents do about how advanced their babies, toddlers, and preschoolers are. OMG, Little Johnny is so smart, he walked right out of my uterus and started speaking in full sentences when he was six months. But then when it comes time for school, nope, their kid is totally just not ready.
I'm surprised people like this don't just "plan" their pregnancies around school cut off dates.
I'm willing to bet at least some of them do.
I believe we have a Sept 1 cutoff so the kids will be more or less smack-dab in the middle come time for kindy. I want to reduce my costs, so they're going whether they are ready or not!
Oh I got told to hold DS back when I was still pg!!
Idk WTF people think is gonna happen between 4 and 5 to get their kids "more mature" if it hasn't happened in the past year or so. DDs class was full of boys and if anything they could have used the extra structure actual school provides that last year. If they don't learn to be better when they are developmentally ready, they will just learn how to be bad and develop more bad habits to they need to break. I swear, I'd get behind starting school or atleast a structured "school day" with stricter consequences at 4.5 for most kids.
Why is it we work and push kids to develop early their entire babyhood and all their toddler years but then once kindy hits it's like "no wait not ready!!"
They agr greatly between 4 & 5. Wth are you saying ? It is not thr same as 16 & 17. I'm confused by your confusion.
But they don't just get better behaved on their own. You have to actually teach them that. I'm not talking age maturity I'm talking behavior maturity. It's like that cheese commercial.
Post by calmcosmo on Sept 13, 2014 21:49:55 GMT -5
Success in Kinder is more than size and age.
My daughter is a new kindergartener. She has a July birthday so she is one of the youngest, and at 35 pounds she is likely one of the smallest.
However, she tested into the top of her class (they divide by test scores for certain breakout classes) and she is one of the most social. She was absolutely 100% ready and redshirting, in my eyes, had far more disadvantages in the long run than advantages in the short term (just giving her more time to get bigger/taller).
My BIL and SIL redshirted my nephew (also a July birthday) and they regret it completely. He was sooooo bored. Acted out, was miserable and generally had a terrible year. He finally got to kinder and thrived. He also tested at the 4th grade reading level. Redshirting was a trend my SIL bought into and shouldn't have. She listened to her friends instead of looking at her kid and it was a terrible mistake.
Post by penguingrrl on Sept 13, 2014 23:42:09 GMT -5
I had quite a few people express surprise that both girls entered on time with summer birthdays. Julia was a full month before the cut off in our old district (8/30 birthday, 10/1 cut off) so it wasn't even a question for us, but people were aghast and there were kids who were 14+ months older than her in her class. As it turns out she's still thriving academically and I suspect waiting a year would not have helped her at all. Her preK teacher said it would be doing her a disservice (we did double check that there was no reason to consider holding her back just in case). In our new district her birthday is the day before the cut off, so I'll be interested to see where she falls on the age spectrum since I have no idea if red shirting is common here.
I'm sure there are a few kids who truly aren't ready but I think they're few and far between. I would support a strict system where if you enroll a kid who made the cut off the year before in K they simy enter 1st unless you have made the decision in conjunction with the school district and based in their professional recommendation.
This is why I hate that our cutoff is January 1st. DS has a late December birthday and we have full day kindergarten. He would be 4 for four months of kindergarten. Right now he is wiped after 2.5 hours of preschool 3 days a week. If K was still half day it would be one thing but I want to make sure he is mature enough to handle a full day. We will see how he's doing in the spring and talk to some people and decide.
I always vote send them to K upon eligibility. I would rather send them and have them repeat K the next year if needed than hold them out.
With budget cuts I don't think this is so easy anymore. If your kid does "good enough", even if they struggle a lot, they're going to want to pass them on. The schools only get 13 years of funding for your kid. I totally get the whole wanting them to thrive, and not just get by thing. We did end up starting my July birthday DD, and overall I think it was the right decision, but I feel guilty sometimes.
PTS has an October birthday and would have been ready last year. I wish you could greenshirt. K has a June birthday and is also completely age appropriate for his preschool class, but I feel like the older kids in his class sever of whom we're redshirted are having the exact effect I was nervous about - they set the curve higher for my kid who is still learning self control and going to the bathroom by himself. I'm just plugging ahead and giving K lots of support at home, but I hate red shirting. I predicted it was going to be a problem for K, and it is.
This is what we are dealing with. Our cutoff is September 30 and DD's birthday is October 14. So we would be looking at 3 years of daycare, 2 years of preschool, and 1 year of Pre-K. I don't think we need 3 years of K prep. But...if we send her right at 5 she will definitely be the youngest by far.
This is why I hate that our cutoff is January 1st. DS has a late December birthday and we have full day kindergarten. He would be 4 for four months of kindergarten. Right now he is wiped after 2.5 hours of preschool 3 days a week. If K was still half day it would be one thing but I want to make sure he is mature enough to handle a full day. We will see how he's doing in the spring and talk to some people and decide.
My kid is in similar situation to terms of ages and cuts offs. She napped right up to K. She's doing really well to be honest. We let her sleep extra on weekends and try very hard for early bed time to give her the reserves to make it all day. Overall though age is not a perfect predictor of how well kids transition into K. I've seen kids and top and bottom of the age spread crying at drop off.
I wish you could green shirt too. My 4 yo could absolutely go to kindergarten this year and do just fine. His preschool does do some academic teaching but it's mostly still playing. I feel like he needs more but the schools in our area aren't set up to support that (we still have half day kindergarten if you can believe it).
Anyway, we sent my son with a Sept. bday "on time" last year and haven't had any problems. I think a lot of people are making mountains out of mole hills when it comes to this issue. It's normal to be nervous about sending your child to kindergarten! That doesn't mean they aren't ready. YOU may not be but that is a separate issue, lol,
I hate redshirting and I blame the schools for allowing it to continue. Make it a rule that if parents attempt to redshirt for K, their kid will be enrolled in first grade instead.
And congratulations, your kid is ahead of everyone else because they are 19 months older than the younger kids. Not because they are Sheldon Cooper.
.
Not to mention that if you hold your child back to make them more mature how are you accomplishing that by sticking then with kids a year younger?
And the repercussions of this on lower socio economic classes are horrible, but no one cares cause they want their kids to be the best.
I agree with your first point but to the second: doesn't the research suggest that you aren't really doing your kid any lasting favors by holding him back? So then lower income people who send their kids on time because they can't afford not to aren't disadvantaging them, right? The last paragraph of the article indicates that people who begin formal schooling earlier do better.
I do think a lot of it depends on the teacher's abilities. If the teacher isn't capable of doing a lot of individualized teaching and activities then you might run into problems.
Post by irishbride2 on Sept 14, 2014 9:57:34 GMT -5
The decision o hold a child back should be made by professionals, not parents. Or at a minimum, it should be made together.
I'd rather my kid repeat a grade (like junior kindergarten) after being told it is a wise decision by his school, then just decide to hold my kid back from starting at all.
My daycare offers private kindergarden and it seems they're going in the opposite direction. The private kindergarden class is usually mostly 4 year olds who then go to public school kindergarden at 5. I wonder what the point is. Aren't they going to be bored in public K?
My guess is that calling it K is marketing, but it really is more like JK. But I could be wrong. Although talking to my friends who teach public K locally, I think DD would be bored if we switched her next year to public (which we aren't).
Oh I got told to hold DS back when I was still pg!!
Idk WTF people think is gonna happen between 4 and 5 to get their kids "more mature" if it hasn't happened in the past year or so. DDs class was full of boys and if anything they could have used the extra structure actual school provides that last year. If they don't learn to be better when they are developmentally ready, they will just learn how to be bad and develop more bad habits to they need to break. I swear, I'd get behind starting school or atleast a structured "school day" with stricter consequences at 4.5 for most kids.
Why is it we work and push kids to develop early their entire babyhood and all their toddler years but then once kindy hits it's like "no wait not ready!!"
This is a good point. And I agree that having some structure is helpful for kids 4+ getting it together or "maturing."
At DD's school the Pre-K and K kids have a very similar structure to their (full) day, except no nap mats for K. Many of the kids also stay an additional 2 hrs for afterschool programming.
I haven't seen any redshirting going on in my little NYC pocket, thank goodness. Everyone follows the Dec. 31 cutoff and that's that. I haven't seen any kids stay back either in the 2 yrs we've been at the school. DD has a Nov. bday and several kids in her class do as well. And there are couple with Dec. bdays.
It will be interesting to see what happens when we move to PA which has a Sept. cutoff. I can't imagine a couple of months should be that big of a deal.
I don't thing you can redshirt in NYC. I wish the whole state was like this.
Post by sillygoosegirl on Sept 14, 2014 10:15:14 GMT -5
I can't imagine choosing to redshirt voluntarily. I hated it so much when kids less than a month older than me started holding it over my head that they were a grade ahead. (I just missed the cutoff, but didn't really understand that at the time.)
Not to mention that if you hold your child back to make them more mature how are you accomplishing that by sticking then with kids a year younger?
And the repercussions of this on lower socio economic classes are horrible, but no one cares cause they want their kids to be the best.
I agree with your first point but to the second: doesn't the research suggest that you aren't really doing your kid any lasting favors by holding him back? So then lower income people who send their kids on time because they can't afford not to aren't disadvantaging them, right? The last paragraph of the article indicates that people who begin formal schooling earlier do better.
I do think a lot of it depends on the teacher's abilities. If the teacher isn't capable of doing a lot of individualized teaching and activities then you might run into problems.
It absolutely makes a difference for lower class families. While they may even out down the road if you take kids who come from homes where they may not have had any preschool, or have parents who work all the time and can't sit and do flashcards and buy them fancy learning apps, they enter school on time with kids who are not only a year or more older but who have had advantages in that extra year that the lower class families couldn't give their kids. It may make the kids stronger down the road but I can see how it could be deflating to young kids who can't keep up with their peers. It starts a bad cycle. And I think generally speaking teachers don't have the resources to do individualized teaching.
Oh I got told to hold DS back when I was still pg!!
Idk WTF people think is gonna happen between 4 and 5 to get their kids "more mature" if it hasn't happened in the past year or so. DDs class was full of boys and if anything they could have used the extra structure actual school provides that last year. If they don't learn to be better when they are developmentally ready, they will just learn how to be bad and develop more bad habits to they need to break. I swear, I'd get behind starting school or atleast a structured "school day" with stricter consequences at 4.5 for most kids.
Why is it we work and push kids to develop early their entire babyhood and all their toddler years but then once kindy hits it's like "no wait not ready!!"
This is a good point. And I agree that having some structure is helpful for kids 4+ getting it together or "maturing."
At DD's school the Pre-K and K kids have a very similar structure to their (full) day, except no nap mats for K. Many of the kids also stay an additional 2 hrs for afterschool programming.
I haven't seen any redshirting going on in my little NYC pocket, thank goodness. Everyone follows the Dec. 31 cutoff and that's that. I haven't seen any kids stay back either in the 2 yrs we've been at the school. DD has a Nov. bday and several kids in her class do as well. And there are couple with Dec. bdays.
It will be interesting to see what happens when we move to PA which has a Sept. cutoff. I can't imagine a couple of months should be that big of a deal.
I'm pretty sure NYC public schools don't allow redshirting. When we were living there we were told that if you try to register a kid for K whose birthday puts them in 1st the school will simply enroll them in 1st since K attendance isn't compulsory. I like that system a lot.
Where in PA are/might you be moving? We just moved to NE PA and are really happy here! So far the only other kid I know with a summer birthday entered school on time (turned 6 this July and is in 1st now). I can't speak beyond that for our school or district-wide since I haven't met many parents yet, but I've seen far fewer SAHPs here than I saw in NYC or where we were in NJ so I suspect that daycare costs are a factor in that, especially since we're the only district within close to an hour of here that has full day K.
My daycare offers private kindergarden and it seems they're going in the opposite direction. The private kindergarden class is usually mostly 4 year olds who then go to public school kindergarden at 5. I wonder what the point is. Aren't they going to be bored in public K?
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
My daycare offers private kindergarden and it seems they're going in the opposite direction. The private kindergarden class is usually mostly 4 year olds who then go to public school kindergarden at 5. I wonder what the point is. Aren't they going to be bored in public K?
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
In my area, parents do this because private offers full day Kindy while public offers only half day. ETA: just realized you meant people repeating K, which is definitely not the case in my area.
My daycare offers private kindergarden and it seems they're going in the opposite direction. The private kindergarden class is usually mostly 4 year olds who then go to public school kindergarden at 5. I wonder what the point is. Aren't they going to be bored in public K?
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
I agree with your first point but to the second: doesn't the research suggest that you aren't really doing your kid any lasting favors by holding him back? So then lower income people who send their kids on time because they can't afford not to aren't disadvantaging them, right? The last paragraph of the article indicates that people who begin formal schooling earlier do better.
I do think a lot of it depends on the teacher's abilities. If the teacher isn't capable of doing a lot of individualized teaching and activities then you might run into problems.
It absolutely makes a difference for lower class families. While they may even out down the road if you take kids who come from homes where they may not have had any preschool, or have parents who work all the time and can't sit and do flashcards and buy them fancy learning apps, they enter school on time with kids who are not only a year or more older but who have had advantages in that extra year that the lower class families couldn't give their kids. It may make the kids stronger down the road but I can see how it could be deflating to young kids who can't keep up with their peers. It starts a bad cycle. And I think generally speaking teachers don't have the resources to do individualized teaching.
It might depend on where you work but individualized instruction and differentiation were definitely in vogue back when I was teaching a few years ago. Every lesson had to be able to be modified and if the principal, vp, or your supervisor were to randomly pop in, you needed to be prepared to show the modifications in progress. It could be as something as easy as giving an extra credit assignment to the kids who finished the first activity early though. In kindergarten, that might mean having a few chapter books ready to go for the early readers.
As for the lower income students who might be lagging behind due to inadequate preschool prep or preparation at home. If you have a 5 yo who doesn't know his letters, isn't it better for him to be in school working with someone on it? I don't see how keeping him out another year would help improve that situation. Due to Rs, you might have a 5 yo who doesn't know his letters in the same class with a 6 yo who is already reading. But you also have 3 yos out there who are already reading. I think it has always been pretty common for a kindergarten class to contain kids at different levels.
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
In my area, parents do this because private offers full day Kindy while public offers only half day.
This makes sense. We have half day too which is the bane of my existence, lol. I thought we were unusual though.
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
ETA: just realized you meant people repeating K, which is definitely not the case in my area.
Yes, this is what I meant. Doing private k for the full day option and then transferring to public for first grade once it's full day makes sense too. But a lot of people apparently red shirt their boys during the transition so they end up completing kindergarten twice. I don't really get the logic in doing that.
In my area, parents do this because private offers full day Kindy while public offers only half day.
This makes sense. We have half day too which is the bane of my existence, lol. I thought we were unusual though.
***stuck in the box***
IME half day seems to still be more common that full day. It's a shame since there is a ton of information on how important K is, but we've lived in 3 states since having kids and half day K seems to be the default most places with a few districts here and there "generously" offering full day. That was a huge factor in choosing what town we settled in this past summer because we had half day with my oldest and it was a nightmare.
I always vote send them to K upon eligibility. I would rather send them and have them repeat K the next year if needed than hold them out.
With budget cuts I don't think this is so easy anymore. If your kid does "good enough", even if they struggle a lot, they're going to want to pass them on. The schools only get 13 years of funding for your kid. I totally get the whole wanting them to thrive, and not just get by thing. We did end up starting my July birthday DD, and overall I think it was the right decision, but I feel guilty sometimes.
Actually if your kid truly schedules they schools have to educate them to 21.
I am not at all in favor of voluntary redshirting for the hell of it, but the paragraph about how states have changed their cut off dates was striking to me. I've suspected that for awhile just based on what I've seen personally. I think that is adding to SOME of the hysteria I see over the whole concept, since classes skew older even if everyone is following the mandates.
It would not really be an issue if the cutoffs were strict. I don't think making sure everyone turns 5 before they start is that big of deal (which is basically what moving the cutoff to Aug/Sept does). It becomes a problem when people with March/April birthdays consider delaying their kids.
I agree with this. My nephew will start Kindergarten and then turn 6 years old a week later. I don't think that's too old. Now, turning 7 would be a little extreme.
If he started kindergarten at 4 and turned 5 a week later, then his senior year of high school he would be 17. He wouldn't turn 18 until right after his freshman year of college started. I think that would be very hard. He would have a whole year of college where his friends could go to bars and he would still be waiting on turning 21.
My daycare offers private kindergarden and it seems they're going in the opposite direction. The private kindergarden class is usually mostly 4 year olds who then go to public school kindergarden at 5. I wonder what the point is. Aren't they going to be bored in public K?
I don't understand this either. Especially the people who send their five yo to private k and send them to public k at six. Why?? It doesn't make sense to me to do that (unless they're told they should repeat but I think that is pretty rare).
my mom basically did this with me and sent me to a private school. it was technically a 4k but the curriculum was kindy light. i'd call it more of a transitional kindy.
Kindy was basically a redo for me, the main difference was the social and behavioral expectations at the private school were more relaxed since it was largely 4 turning 5 and young 5s in the class.
It would not really be an issue if the cutoffs were strict. I don't think making sure everyone turns 5 before they start is that big of deal (which is basically what moving the cutoff to Aug/Sept does). It becomes a problem when people with March/April birthdays consider delaying their kids.
I agree with this. My nephew will start Kindergarten and then turn 6 years old a week later. I don't think that's too old. Now, turning 7 would be a little extreme.
If he started kindergarten at 4 and turned 5 a week later, then his senior year of high school he would be 17. He wouldn't turn 18 until right after his freshman year of college started. I think that would be very hard. He would have a whole year of college where his friends could go to bars and he would still be waiting on turning 21.
It is not horrible. Most people not of age in college still find a way.