What does your kindergartner know?

[Monica Geller]

The fuck?! I would be questioning the shit out of this conference. I'd want a follow up with the principal to clarify these standards and tests.

[abs]

Yeah, I question the teacher's word choice here. Fail should never be used in regards to a Kindergartener! I am also guessing that the "testing" was just to get a baseline on where his skills are. They are going to be all over the map at the start of Kindergarten.

DD is 6 weeks into Kindergarten as well. I'm absolutely floored by how much they are doing and learning! She went into K knowing her letter sounds and could write all of the letters but not well and no numbers. She could however count to 100 by ones, fives, and tens. Now she is writing sentences quite neatly, spelling out words phonetically, and can write numbers 1-20. They are also working on addition, greater than/less than, and simple graphing (which I swear I was learning in 4th grade!!). She's picking up on all of that pretty easily.

She does not know much about punctuation yet. It had never once occurred to me to teach that. She does know what a period is now but definitely not a comma! She knows a ton of sight words but cannot spell out words yet (and the ones that she can she has just memorized I think). She gets how to do it but it hasn't clicked yet. Some kids in her class are full on reading but DD is not one of them.

The first time projects came back home with grades on them I was stunned. I was like grades for Kinder?! What?? But again it's just so the teachers know where they are so they can get them ready for 1st grade.

[CheeringCharm]

For our school district, those are things they were expected to know by the end of the year, not the beginning. Perhaps your teacher was just testing to make sure the curriculum is still appropriate for the whole group? (i.e. Maybe you have some kids in there who are already reading fluently for example and she wants to make sure she is still teaching to the whole class? If you're going to differentiate instruction effectively, you need to know where each student's level is first). I wouldn't worry too much about teaching him the purpose of a question mark or whatever, I'm sure that will come naturally as he learns to read fluently.

eta: and I sure hope she didn't use the word "fail" with you! that is extremely inappropriate, if so.

[anaps28]

That seems like bad delivery on the teachers part. My Kindergartner is learning sight words and math wise they are counting objects and showing which group has more kind of thing for homework. They are also working on fine tuning their hand writing.

[circa1978]

My mom asked about the teacher, too. He's at the end of his career and has mostly been a principal. He seems caring and DS likes him but he was super rushed and didn't explain the test really. After I said I was concerned about what I could be teaching him at home he was like "well, I don't expect him to know what I haven't taught him" and said it was a benchmark. But I was like, OK you just said he couldn't do those things and that's the only thing you are telling me.

He started off showing me the "math test" which was a 0/12. That really freaked me out because I KNOW Henry knows addition and subtraction and all his numbers and can count in groups of 10.

I'm not mad about the counselor thing. I think a lot of this is that Henry does know stuff but is so afraid to try and fail. He'll try something once and if he's not "good at it," he gives up. I'd rather see he gets some coping skills around that now than hope he grows out of it - especially since both H and I have anxiety. Also, it came up because Henry entered kindergarten at the same exact time my H was having surgery for kidney cancer. So we don't really know what anxiety is school related and what's due to what's going on at home.

Parenting is so hard.

[cleo29]

That sounds like a lot to expect after only a month and change of school. I doubt C really understood all punctuation at that point either.

[candreco]

Sept 30, 2016 5:49:51 GMT -5 truckentruck said:

It would seem the teacher's word choice and delivery are the problem here. My guess is she gave some sort of assessment to see what students already know when they came in. I don't know of any kindergarten where this would be expected knowledge at the start of the year. "Failed" is a completely inappropriate term for her to use because I doubt any of that has been explicitly taught thus far.

I'm here, there are assessments at this point in the year to see where kids are relative to the end-of-year benchmark, but it's not expected that the kid already KNOW all of it.  They were just introducing capital letters and end of sentence punctuation toward the end of K at DD's school.

[rex]

that is bullshit. it sounds like you've done a great job though.

whatever happened to kindergarten being about playing and learning letters? of course he doesn't know those things-he's five and school just started!

[melissa]

He definitely doesn't have experience as a teacher per say. We just got interims for my son who is in kindergarten and they are only practicing upper case and lower case letters, numbers and sight words. Compared to my daughter, he is a little behind but he is also a totally different kid. He is afraid to try and also has a speech delay so I'm sure that plays a factor.

I don't put a lot into the interim as I know he is trying and it is still early in the school year.

[notsopicky]

I'm a teacher and a mom to a K boy, and while some of that stuff my son knows how to do, some of it he definitely doesn't.

WTF to that teacher. Agree w/ PPs that her choice of words was the failure here.

Hang in there, circa.

[bananahannah]

My kindergartner is doing exactly what yours is doing and his teacher said that he was "doing great and is right where he needs to be academically".

[mel]

I agree with everyone else that he was probably just bench-mark testing him and worded his explanation extremely poorly to you. Hang in there, you're doing great! I think it's great that he already "gets" addition and subtraction...those are great skills!

[cjcouple]

My youngest was pretty far behind with reading and sight words in K but I knew that going in.  He didn't even have his letter sounds entering K despite 2 years of preshool.
We were very fortunate that he somehow ended up in a class of only 8 kids (unheard of) and made leaps and bounds that year.  I think he just needed to mature a little and get older to grasp it. IMO expectation on K are very high and not all kids can master them at 5 or 6yo's.  

However, I wanted to share with you some games we got for them that really helped him and we had a lot of fun. I wasn't drilling him with sight word list or flashcards etc. 

"Sum Swamp" Math game that had 2 dice 1-6 and a die with + or - on it and it would say if you had to add or subtract to move your spaces. It's not a long game so it held his attention well. often we played 2 rounds. Up to 4 players.

Also "Pete the Cat Groovy Words" game.
all sight words and it's similar to bingo.  Only need to get 3 in a row.  Again, short rounds and fun. 

My oldest even liked these games even though he obviously didn't need sight words or math help...lol
HTH
CJ

[NandaB]

I think everyone pretty much summed our up, but it sounds like a mix of poor wording and not having a great "bedside manner" my son started k at the beginning of Aug. and will have conferences next week. He can write his name and all letters and can do basic addition and subtraction and can sound our words, BUT he didn't learn it in kinder, he learned it in preschool and remembered it because he's a smart kid who is interested in that kind of stuff. He also seems to be one of the higher kids in his class academically. They have been practicing letter names and sounds, sight words, writing numbers 1-10. He wrote his first independent sentence yesterday: I like elephants (not at all how he spelled elephants). I doubt any of them know what you described.

If you are really concerned I would send him an email asking specifically about the things he said you kid failed. As far as counseling, if you otherwise trust his judgement I would follow up. even if he is not a good conference holder, it seems like he has seen lots of kids over the years. I know we here love to be all, "THAT GUY SUCKS YOUR KID IS JUST LIKE MY KID WHO REGULARLY REFUSES TO TRY ANYTHING AT SCHOOL TOO AND HE'S TOTALLY FINE!!!??!?" but if his anxiety is inhibiting his ability to try and practice new skills enough that his brand new teacher sees it it's better to address it now, Ya know?

[jaylea]

Look, I'm just trying to get my kid into the classroom every day at this point in the third week of K. He can write his name, that's about it. And he's a smart kid.

This stuff is nuts. My Dd is in 4th grade, knew none of this in early K and is now super smart and reading at a high school level. Don't worry about it.

[Gato]

It sounds to me like you're super caring and concerned, and that's all you need to be for Kindergarten. If I were you, I'd consider it my job to make learning relaxing and fun, and shield him from any pressure he or you might be getting for him to know this stuff. Many places (Finland comes to mind) don't even begin teaching reading/writing until 2nd grade.

DD1 did know how to read when she started K, but she didn't know all that other stuff. For reading, I didn't teach her anything, but she started looking at books with CDs. She was super into the Little Mermaid and must have listened to that story 100 times, and voila! She was reading for real. So if you're interested in a no-pressure way that your DS could pick up reading, you might try read-along books.

[jlt19]

DD was in K last year and knew the math problems by the end of the year, NOT this soon. I also am fairly certain she didn't know about ? until later on either. Commas? I don't know if she understands that now, in 1st. I think she knows to "pause".

DS is in PreK and I know he'll be way further behind than she was in handwriting. But I really think that's a boy/girl difference.

What district is he in or do you do private?

[cayl]

My kids are in preschool, and the program they attend works very closely with the local kindergarten teachers. Punctuation wasn't even on the list of skills that they work on. They are in the process of doing an evaluation of all the kids now to see where everyone is, but if they can't, for example, organize the numbers 1-10 in order it's listed as a skill to work on. I could understand having a conference now to go over where your child's baseline is for the skills they tested for, but I would be PISSED if the word "failed" was used, and I hope to God he didn't say that to the kids. Is he a new teacher? Hopefully he's a good teacher and his delivery with parents just sucks.

[clairedunphy]

What is the purpose of kindergarten if he's supposed to know this stuff before Kindergarten? My son didn't know any of that this time last year. He does now. Well, I'm not sure if he knows what a comma is but I guess he does.

[circa1978]

jlt19, He's in Parkway. I'm excited to have an older male teacher but it is his first year back in the classroom after a long while and I do think that probably has something to do with the "bedside manner."

NandaB, I agree about the counseling. I've already talked to our pedi. Frankly, this was just the push for me anyway. With H's diagnosis, I think it's good to just check in with someone no matter what. My mom struggled with anxiety and I never learned healthy coping mechanisms. I want him to have those as early as possible.

[jlt19]

Ok, my nieces go to a Marquette/Rockwood elementary and my SIL is very involved. I was going to ask if she had any intel if he went there, b/c I remember you mentioning west county.

I definitely think his years being out of the classroom are playing a part in this. Why did he leave an admin position? That's not very typical, is it?

[HiC]

Fuck them! Seriously! (I know this is not at all helpful to you.)

[momof2]

My parents were in education administration. I would be highly suspect of any principal that has been put back in the classroom. This is the kind of thing that is done to try to force someone to quit/retire. Of course, it always possible (but not probable) that he decided on his own and advocated to get back in the classroom.

But really, I would just assume that this is going to be a "meh" year and not listen to much this dude says.

[sandyapples]

Sept 29, 2016 21:46:21 GMT -5 Que? said:

??
My kid doesn't know any of this stuff, and they want to move her into a K-1 split because they're worried that she's bored. Maybe Canada has lower standards?

Canada definitely has lower standards. I just asked DD1 (grade 1) what a comma is and she gave me a wtf look. This week she had sight words sent home. One of them was "a".

[gennyu]

Sept 30, 2016 15:25:32 GMT -5 sandyapples said:

Sept 29, 2016 21:46:21 GMT -5 Que? said:

??
My kid doesn't know any of this stuff, and they want to move her into a K-1 split because they're worried that she's bored. Maybe Canada has lower standards?

Canada definitely has lower standards. I just asked DD1 (grade 1) what a comma is and she gave me a wtf look. This week she had sight words sent home. One of them was "a".

Well I just came into this thread to post that DS brought home his first sight word today (week 4 of kindergarten).

It is "I".

And we live in the U.S.

There's just no WAY he will be learning about commas this year. NO. WAY.

[dochas]

He THINKS he has a great chance at being successful in Kindergarten??? I think his expectations are absolutely ridiculous. Mine just started kindergarten and no, I don't think he knows punctuation. He really likes math and would know that answer but does not reliably know his right from his left. Our school has changed this year and will only do one parent teacher conference because having one a few weeks into school is ridiculous and makes no sense.