What are your thoughts on Red-shirting Kindergartners

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Cut off in Iowa is September 15th.  I am born in December so I didn't get a choice I had to start kindergarten at 6 instead of 5.

For me personally it sucked, school was super easy for me and they didn't allow skipping a grade so I was bored most of the time.    And if I had a dime for every time some idiot asked me if I had been held back (I was always the oldest in the class) I could retire.

Gwen was born in July.   I wrestled with it at first b/c of all the debate on here but when I looked at Gwen as an individual she was ready for school.   She loves learning and loves the social aspect of school. I would have been doing her a major disservice keeping her out of school for another year.

Abby was born September 10th so I am assuming we can start her at 5 years of age just like we did Gwen.    Too early to tell what we are going to do with her as far as kindergarten.

She will start pre-school at 4 years old though.   Pre-school is free in Iowa so all we have to pay for is before/after care.  Our daycare bill will drop from $540 a month to $230 a month.   It's a no brainer.

[NoNamePerson]

Dec 17, 2015 9:30:47 GMT -5 steph08 said:

The cutoff at our school is August 31.  I was born August 8, wasn't held back, and graduated second in my class.  I never struggled academically in elementary or high school and rarely in college.  My brother has a June birthday, he wasn't held back, and also did well academically.

It is all very dependent on the child.  For us, redshirting us for kindergarten would have been terrible.

My DD is a late June birthday and this new one will be sometime in April/May. I doubt I will hold them back.

Someone mentioned in the WIR kids thread that they know people who play on having babies in the Fall (where the cutoff is 9/1 or whatever) so they will have the oldest kids in the class, providing them an "academic advantage." However, I can think of some of the oldest kids in my class and no, that was not true at all. The top students were August, March, and January.

    Parents - know your child!!

[NoNamePerson]

Dec 17, 2015 7:32:30 GMT -5 Cookies Galore said:

My birthday is September 1, which was the cut off date for my school district. I was not ready for kindergarten and ended up repeating. Not just anyone can say they failed nap time!

 

[giramomma]

DS has a late spring birthday, and the question of having him start school a year later came up. We decided to have him enter kindy at age 5 instead of 6.

For me, it's not about when the kid is young, it's how you handle things when the child is in the final years of HS.

What do you do if your kid starts senior year of HS at age 18 and decides school is not for them? Or, how do you prevent your senior from moving out of the house if they want to? How do you enforce "rules" with an adult that can leave at any moment...

How do you handle dating? In some places, the age of consent is not always just an age, but also a specific number of years between the ages of those having sex. Is it OK for said 18 yo high school student to be dating college students? Rules on the age of the person you date?

How will driving be handled? Does your kid then become the kid chauffeur for all friends, as much as graduated licenses allow?

I guess, unless there were something big, I'd personally prefer to avoid the whole high schooler being a legal adult thing.

 

[tskeeter]

I'm a late August BD, so I have personal experience with this situation.  I made the cut off by a couple of days, so was the youngest kid in my class during grade school.

While parents need to judge based on their child's development, I think many kids benefit from waiting a year.  For me, being the youngest meant that I was one of the least developed, socially, that I was one of the smallest, and that I was one of the least coordinated.  Academics weren't a problem, but I suspect that my lack of playground skill and size contributed to my being a target for bullies.  And always being the last one picked for playground teams sure sucked.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

I was always the oldest and was (and still am) one of the most uncoordinated people you'll ever meet.   I didn't get picked last for the team, I was never even asked to play.   The PE teachers had to force people to take me onto their team. 

[zibazinski]

Dec 17, 2015 11:00:49 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I was always the oldest and was (and still am) one of the most uncoordinated people you'll ever meet.   I didn't get picked last for the team, I was never even asked to play.   The PE teachers had to force people to take me onto their team. 

Bad teachers. I never allowed my students to pick. I always chose the teams before the days classes even started. Wastes time doing otherwise as well.

[Cookies Galore]

Dec 17, 2015 10:52:30 GMT -5 giramomma said:

DS has a late spring birthday, and the question of having him start school a year later came up. We decided to have him enter kindy at age 5 instead of 6.

For me, it's not about when the kid is young, it's how you handle things when the child is in the final years of HS.

What do you do if your kid starts senior year of HS at age 18 and decides school is not for them? Or, how do you prevent your senior from moving out of the house if they want to? How do you enforce "rules" with an adult that can leave at any moment...

How do you handle dating? In some places, the age of consent is not always just an age, but also a specific number of years between the ages of those having sex. Is it OK for said 18 yo high school student to be dating college students? Rules on the age of the person you date?

How will driving be handled? Does your kid then become the kid chauffeur for all friends, as much as graduated licenses allow?

I guess, unless there were something big, I'd personally prefer to avoid the whole high schooler being a legal adult thing.

 

It really wasn't an issue at all when I was in high school. I turned 18 a few days before my senior year began, there were people who turned 18 a few months before, people who turned 18 in the middle of the year, and some who were 17 the whole year. I don't think there are many issues with being 18 in high school at all.

[HoneyBBQ]

Dec 17, 2015 9:38:03 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

Cut off in Iowa is September 15th.  I am born in December so I didn't get a choice I had to start kindergarten at 6 instead of 5.

For me personally it sucked, school was super easy for me and they didn't allow skipping a grade so I was bored most of the time.    And if I had a dime for every time some idiot asked me if I had been held back (I was always the oldest in the class) I could retire.

Gwen was born in July.   I wrestled with it at first b/c of all the debate on here but when I looked at Gwen as an individual she was ready for school.   She loves learning and loves the social aspect of school. I would have been doing her a major disservice keeping her out of school for another year.

Abby was born September 10th so I am assuming we can start her at 5 years of age just like we did Gwen.    Too early to tell what we are going to do with her as far as kindergarten.

She will start pre-school at 4 years old though.   Pre-school is free in Iowa so all we have to pay for is before/after care.  Our daycare bill will drop from $540 a month to $230 a month.   It's a no brainer.

See, I think this is why I need to find a 'private' kindergarten, as loathe as I am to do this. My child will be bored and up causing problems or doing meth or something. 

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Dec 17, 2015 11:04:27 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Dec 17, 2015 11:00:49 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I was always the oldest and was (and still am) one of the most uncoordinated people you'll ever meet.   I didn't get picked last for the team, I was never even asked to play.   The PE teachers had to force people to take me onto their team. 

Bad teachers. I never allowed my students to pick. I always chose the teams before the days classes even started. Wastes time doing otherwise as well.

Yeah I had shitty PE teachers from middle school onward.  It left me with a lifelong hatred of group sports.  I've tried to get over it but six years of being humiliated/ridiculed every other day for nine months out of the year tends to leave an impression.

I was bored in school but found plenty of ways to entertain myself that didn't involve doing meth.    I'm an avid reader so I carried books around with me every place I went.  

[cael]

I keep seeing the title of this thread and thinking "jeez, why would you want to relegate kindergartners to a sure and swift death by phaser/alien/explosion etc?!"

(.....clearly I was not a sports-playing kid.)

[zibazinski]

I'm so sorry. I hope it's has improved since then. I never did anything like that. I wanted as even teams in all ways as possible and I didn't want to waste precious time letting people choose their own teams.  Even though I was always short in school, I did well athletically so I never was last picked unless we had two boy captains. Which we did a lot now that I recall. Boys in school never liked me until I was fifteen. 

[Lizard Queen]

Dec 17, 2015 10:55:55 GMT -5 tskeeter said:

I'm a late August BD, so I have personal experience with this situation.  I made the cut off by a couple of days, so was the youngest kid in my class during grade school.

While parents need to judge based on their child's development, I think many kids benefit from waiting a year.  For me, being the youngest meant that I was one of the least developed, socially, that I was one of the smallest, and that I was one of the least coordinated.  Academics weren't a problem, but I suspect that my lack of playground skill and size contributed to my being a target for bullies.  And always being the last one picked for playground teams sure sucked.

My brother was a gifted athlete, but small and short. He always made the little league all star team as a pitcher, but never made the team in his small junior and senior high. After graduation, he shot up to 6-1 or 6-2. It's a damn shame he wasn't held back.

[Deleted]

Dec 17, 2015 11:11:06 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

Dec 17, 2015 11:04:27 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Bad teachers. I never allowed my students to pick. I always chose the teams before the days classes even started. Wastes time doing otherwise as well.

Yeah I had shitty PE teachers from middle school onward.  It left me with a lifelong hatred of group sports.  I've tried to get over it but six years of being humiliated/ridiculed every other day for nine months out of the year tends to leave an impression.

I was bored in school but found plenty of ways to entertain myself that didn't involve doing meth.    I'm an avid reader so I carried books around with me every place I went.  

This was me too...only I think it started in grade school for me.

[mojothehelpermonkey]

My birthday is in September, and I was close enough to the cut off that my mom brought me in to see if I was ready to start when I was 4. Apparently, they said I could enroll, but my mom decided she still wanted to keep me home for another year. I was around 12 or 13 when she told me this. I remember being really annoyed because I was usually one of the first kids to have a birthday, and I was always worried about people assuming I had been held back.
I did well in school academically, but I was shy and had a hard time making friends. I was never bullied, but I went from having "mean girl" friends in junior high to being mostly a loner on high school. My mom didn't tell me why she didn't let me start kindergarten early, but it was probably because she was worried about me having trouble making friends. Looking back, that extra year of maturity probably did make it easier for me to resist peer pressure and stay out of trouble. A less mature version of me probably would have stayed friends with the "mean girls".
In college, being the first to have a birthday almost felt like an advantage. Some of my younger friends started feeling left out as everyone started turning 21 and wanting to go to places that did not accept fake IDs.

[Waffle]

Dec 17, 2015 11:13:07 GMT -5 cael said:

I keep seeing the title of this thread and thinking "jeez, why would you want to relegate kindergartners to a sure and swift death by phaser/alien/explosion etc?!"

(.....clearly I was not a sports-playing kid.)

Thank you, cael.

I was afraid I was the only one whose mind went straight to Star Trek and thought "Of course it's wrong to red-shirt the kindergartners"

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Dec 17, 2015 11:13:54 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

I'm so sorry. I hope it's has improved since then. I never did anything like that. I wanted as even teams in all ways as possible and I didn't want to waste precious time letting people choose their own teams.  Even though I was always short in school, I did well athletically so I never was last picked unless we had two boy captains. Which we did a lot now that I recall. Boys in school never liked me until I was fifteen. 

I have no idea if it has or not, we haven't reached that point yet with our kids.   I do have to work against my bias when Gwen says things like she wants to be a cheerleader.   They're my hang-ups, not hers.

DH on the other hand loved PE.  He was the guy who would have been targeting me in dodge ball.   I said of course you loved PE, you weren't the one being bullied you were doing the bullying!

[Ryan]

Dec 17, 2015 9:38:03 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

Cut off in Iowa is September 15th.  I am born in December so I didn't get a choice I had to start kindergarten at 6 instead of 5.

For me personally it sucked, school was super easy for me and they didn't allow skipping a grade so I was bored most of the time.    And if I had a dime for every time some idiot asked me if I had been held back (I was always the oldest in the class) I could retire.

Gwen was born in July.   I wrestled with it at first b/c of all the debate on here but when I looked at Gwen as an individual she was ready for school.   She loves learning and loves the social aspect of school. I would have been doing her a major disservice keeping her out of school for another year.

Abby was born September 10th so I am assuming we can start her at 5 years of age just like we did Gwen.    Too early to tell what we are going to do with her as far as kindergarten.

She will start pre-school at 4 years old though.   Pre-school is free in Iowa so all we have to pay for is before/after care.  Our daycare bill will drop from $540 a month to $230 a month.   It's a no brainer.

I think school is a lot different now so I don't think boredom is really a big risk.  I'm sure most schools do this, but teachers are evaluated based on the growth of each student based on where they tested in the FALL (Map tests).  So a kid that comes in with a low Map test has a goal to meet in winter/spring.  Kids with higher grades, have their own individualized goals.

[Ryan]

Dec 17, 2015 0:23:44 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

I thought it was such a silly thing to do bc all it did is make most of the Kers in those classes 6 yrs old and not really give anyone any advantage over anyone else.

Why do you think they wouldn't have an advantage if more people held kids back with summer b-days?  There are only so many summer b-days in a given year, so it's not like EVERYONE is delayed going into kindergarten.  My son is the oldest in his class this year, but there are probably 6 kids that are within a few months of him (b-days right after cutoff).  Even if those kids with summer b-days were held back, he'd still be one of the older kids in the class.

[yogiii]

Dec 17, 2015 11:24:07 GMT -5 @anne81 said:

Spending some time in the kindergarten classroom before your kid is enrolled is a good idea.  I'm surprised at what they are expecting from young kids in some schools here. For example in two of my friends say their kids have to go in the classroom and start the worksheets on their desk independently.  One is being sent home with homework because if he can't copy all the letters in the time given it has to be completed by the next day.  He's 5.

I've volunteered in my son's kindy class a few times and I've been very impressed. The first time was only a couple weeks after school had started. The kids were expected to move through their stations and work independently. They have visual instructions on what to do (like a pair of scissors if they are expected to cut something out) and at the end, they each filed their work into an appropriate folder. 

[alabamagal]

I am against it.  You are saying the only way your kid will do well is if they are the oldest. I think it is better to challenge your kids to do well in any situation, not give them an artificial advantage

DS1 (now 23) had a late July birthday.  Cutoff was Sept 1.  His K-4 teacher wanted to hold him back.  He was "immature" and struggled paying attention.  We put him in K-5 anyway.  He did have challenges (ADD, socially awkward) but he would have had those challenges if we held him back.  He always got good grades, but was never the perfect A student.  In high school things really started to change and he was did very well even got the award for STAR student (highest SAT/gpa combination, he was in a small private school).  College was even better

DS2(now 21) has Sept 13 bday.  He was born 2 weeks past his due date.  He was reading and doing math at 3 years old.  So we put him in private school so he could start "early", and I kept thinking if he had been born 1 day before his due date this wouldn't be a problem.  He was top of his class even though he was the youngest.  There was NEVER any problem, and him being the youngest became a challenge for him to strive to be the best.  Even in sports (which he was good at) it gave him a challenge to do as well as the older kids in his grade.  He played offensive line in high school football, and it would have helped ave been better for him to be in the "correct grade" but he managed pretty well.  He is 6'3" now, but was about 6'1" at the start of his senior year in high school, but even with him growing late he still did well.

It was always funny when the kids were getting driver license.  I remember driving them to summer practice and other kids in their grades were driving and my kids didn't even have learners permits.  

Sometimes my kids were competing against kids who were up to 2 years older than them, but they were never behind, they managed well and they are successful because of it.  

[teen persuasion]

Dec 17, 2015 11:24:07 GMT -5 @anne81 said:

I've spent a lot of time volunteering in DS' classroom over the last few years so I have a few observations. My overall opinion is that it really depends on the intersection between the kid and the expectations of the school/teachers.

One observation is that 6 months makes a staggering amount of difference at every level in that age group.

Related to that kids can be intellectually ready but not physically ready.  Holding a pencil and some other activities requires quite a bit of fine motor control.  It's sort of odd to watch how something that is incredibly difficult for one age group is much easier for the kids who are a just few months older to do in the same classroom. An additional marker of physical readiness is the need to nap or not. The kids that are clearly more exhausted by the end of the day tended to be the younger ones.

Doing well in preschool doesn't translate cleanly into doing well in a larger school environment where there can be really different standards of behavior and readiness.

Verbal readiness for a girl seems huge.  Girls that can't keep up in terms of talking are creamed by the other girls even at 5.

Spending some time in the kindergarten classroom before your kid is enrolled is a good idea.  I'm surprised at what they are expecting from young kids in some schools here. For example in two of my friends say their kids have to go in the classroom and start the worksheets on their desk independently.  One is being sent home with homework because if he can't copy all the letters in the time given it has to be completed by the next day.  He's 5.

I see more differences between individual kids, than I do by age.  Yes, age makes some difference, but why do we segregate by age at all?  

DS5 has been in AYSO soccer for a while, and the age levels are in 2 year bands, with birthday cutoffs in July, I believe.  So he would be playing with kids up to 2 years older or younger than him, depending on year.  Even if he was on the older end, he was always one of the smaller ones.  Teams are coed, too.  Gender makes a difference in sports, too.  The best players were not necessarily the oldest, or the biggest, or the boys.  Quite often the best player was a scrappy little girl on the team, one who out competed her older brothers.  Often the reason that individual was best was because they had started early, and had competed with those bigger/faster/stronger (aka, little sister), and had the opportunity to learn from the more experienced players. Just waiting wouldn't teach them anything.

While camping this summer, my boys had a great time playing a pickup game of soccer with some other kids.  Little by little, more and more people joined the game.  Little 3-4 year olds played with groups that included my 10 yo and then 16 yo, and eventually college kids and young parents.  No one wanted to quit, even for meals or a movie.  There were easily 50 people at some point, playing for 5+ hours.  Why do we think things can only work if absolutely everything is even?

[Abby Normal]

I think it depends on the kid.  When DS was three, he was already more "mature" than other kids his age, and he was in the 95% percentile for size.  Had he had been born just a bit earlier, we would have had to make the choice- and it would have been easy to move him up a year.  Had he been smaller, and more "immature" I would have happily started him later.

As it is, he is one of the older kids in his grade, and still more mature than most.  But when he was about 5, we were together with a bunch of kids.  DS, who would be one of the oldest, and a friend who would be one of the youngest.  It was a really big difference in their development levels. 

I don't think it's about giving your kid an advantage by being the oldest in class (though I'm sure there are parents out there who do it for sports)- its about "are they ready for it" when they are the younger ones.

[alabamagal]

Also since this is YM, my 23 year old (despite taking one extra semester in college) has a good paying job nearing his 1 year work anniversary, just got promoted, is paying his student loan, saving for retirement and saving for his wedding.

So it really doesn't matter that he was immature in kindergarten and couldn't pay attention and had terrible handwriting. He is on his own one year earlier and has 1 more year in the working world than the kids who were held back.

[yogiii]

Dec 17, 2015 13:25:03 GMT -5 alabamagal said:

Also since this is YM, my 23 year old (despite taking one extra semester in college) has a good paying job nearing his 1 year work anniversary, just got promoted, is paying his student loan, saving for retirement and saving for his wedding.

So it really doesn't matter that he was immature in kindergarten and couldn't pay attention and had terrible handwriting. He is on his own one year earlier and has 1 more year in the working world than the kids who were held back.

Glad to hear it!  Mine hates coloring, the handwriting has improved a lot in the past 4 months though

[yogiii]

Personality is another factor too. DS will conform to expectations. If someone expects less of him, he will act to that level. I've seen it many times. I think he will always take the easy way out if available, so he benefits from a bit of a challenge.

It's a little early but even at 2, I don't think DD's personality is that way at all.  She is more competitive by nature.

[whoisjohngalt]

Dec 17, 2015 12:40:53 GMT -5 Ryan said:

Dec 17, 2015 0:23:44 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

I thought it was such a silly thing to do bc all it did is make most of the Kers in those classes 6 yrs old and not really give anyone any advantage over anyone else.

Why do you think they wouldn't have an advantage if more people held kids back with summer b-days?  There are only so many summer b-days in a given year, so it's not like EVERYONE is delayed going into kindergarten.  My son is the oldest in his class this year, but there are probably 6 kids that are within a few months of him (b-days right after cutoff).  Even if those kids with summer b-days were held back, he'd still be one of the older kids in the class.

What I was saying is that it seems silly to hold your child back if 99% of other parents are doing it too.  You still all end up in the same place, just in a lower grade.

But then again, I think expectations of 5-6 yr olds in US school system are crazy. 

[Ryan]

Dec 17, 2015 13:58:00 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

Dec 17, 2015 12:40:53 GMT -5 Ryan said:

Why do you think they wouldn't have an advantage if more people held kids back with summer b-days?  There are only so many summer b-days in a given year, so it's not like EVERYONE is delayed going into kindergarten.  My son is the oldest in his class this year, but there are probably 6 kids that are within a few months of him (b-days right after cutoff).  Even if those kids with summer b-days were held back, he'd still be one of the older kids in the class.

What I was saying is that it seems silly to hold your child back if 99% of other parents are doing it too.  You still all end up in the same place, just in a lower grade.

But then again, I think expectations of 5-6 yr olds in US school system are crazy. 

Well if everyone in the whole class was held back then you would, but it's typically only summer b-days that are held back. So even if all the summer b-days are held back in a class, that's likely 2-3 kids max.  So you're still one of the older in the class.

[chiver78]

Dec 17, 2015 8:46:00 GMT -5 swamp said:

Dec 17, 2015 8:43:19 GMT -5 oped said:

It's so strange how widely cutoff dates vary from place to place...

NY seems to be alone with the 11/30 cut off, so if DD goes to college outside of NYS and I did not hold her back, she definitely would be one of the younger ones. I don't want her to be the youngest one at college. Mostly I'm worried about her getting arrested for using a fake ID if all her friends are legal and she wants to go out with them.

I'm in MA, and it varies between towns as well. the town where I started K had a cutoff of 12/31, the town where I graduated HS had a cutoff of 8/31 at the same time.

my birthday is 9/2, but I've been told that the cutoff in the new town wasn't exactly black-and-white. since I was ahead of the curve academically, I likely would have been allowed in. hell, the town I started in wanted me to actually skip 1st grade, but because I was socially immature my parents said no. the neighborhood I lived in when I started K, I was the youngest kid by easily 7 or 8 years.

[Ryan]

Dec 17, 2015 13:29:50 GMT -5 @anne81 said:

Testing and grade level standards have made a large difference in the classroom. There is a lot of pressure for all the kids to be in the same place at the end of the year which may not be developmentally appropriate. Kids that may be able to do the work with help and unlimited time can struggle in large classrooms on a schedule. Some of my son's friends are in kindergarten classes with 26 kids and are expected to read by the end of the year.

I don't think they expect kids to be in the same place as everyone else, but they expect them to meet minimum standards.

I seriously think I went to school during a time when school was the worst (80's and 90's).  The teachers seemed extremely lazy (even to me as a kid).  

Teachers now are much more on the ball for the most part.