Attention all disgruntled parents who red-shirted...

[Anonymous]

Please share the cons from your own personal experience. I have read every article out there I think and talked and read posts of many pleased parents, but I am curious to hear from people who actually did this for their child and REGRETTED it. If you would be so kind...please share

Child's gender
Reason for red-shirting
Why do you regret it?

[Anonymous]

OP again...in light of the other "holding boys back" thread I find it interesting that nobody has regrets about making this choice. Apparently, us parents may really know what's best for our kids.

[Anonymous]

We are a family who regrets redshirting one of our sons. We have 2, and held them both back. They are now 16 and 14. The decision to hold back the 16 year old was a good one. However, if we could go back again and do it all over for our 14yr old, we would not have held him back. He is definitely not being challenged enough academically, and says he's bored most of the time. He also has felt out of place socially, as he is so much more mature than his classmates. He wants to socialize with older children and if asked, will say that he wished we had sent him on when he was supposed to move forward. Kind of sad for him, but there is nothing we can do about it now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are a family who regrets redshirting one of our sons. We have 2, and held them both back. They are now 16 and 14. The decision to hold back the 16 year old was a good one. However, if we could go back again and do it all over for our 14yr old, we would not have held him back. He is definitely not being challenged enough academically, and says he's bored most of the time. He also has felt out of place socially, as he is so much more mature than his classmates. He wants to socialize with older children and if asked, will say that he wished we had sent him on when he was supposed to move forward. Kind of sad for him, but there is nothing we can do about it now.

was the one u regretted redshirting close to cutoff, e.g., days or even just a few weeks, or was he further out, e.g., months?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are a family who regrets redshirting one of our sons. We have 2, and held them both back. They are now 16 and 14. The decision to hold back the 16 year old was a good one. However, if we could go back again and do it all over for our 14yr old, we would not have held him back. He is definitely not being challenged enough academically, and says he's bored most of the time. He also has felt out of place socially, as he is so much more mature than his classmates. He wants to socialize with older children and if asked, will say that he wished we had sent him on when he was supposed to move forward. Kind of sad for him, but there is nothing we can do about it now.

We likewise held back both boys, each of whom met the cutoff by a couple of weeks (10 days for the younger one). We absolutely did the right thing for the older son (now 13yo) but the younger one, now 10yo, would have been fine had we sent him along. He is not unhappy, but is a bit bored in school. I think it will even out when he hits middle school.

[Anonymous]

Not OP, but have to say it is interesting that the two responses received were very similar. I think that perhaps when you have two siblings only a few years apart, the younger sibling will tend to be more advanced because he learns a lot from his older sibling; thus the reason holding the younger one back probably may have been unnecessary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are a family who regrets redshirting one of our sons. We have 2, and held them both back. They are now 16 and 14. The decision to hold back the 16 year old was a good one. However, if we could go back again and do it all over for our 14yr old, we would not have held him back. He is definitely not being challenged enough academically, and says he's bored most of the time. He also has felt out of place socially, as he is so much more mature than his classmates. He wants to socialize with older children and if asked, will say that he wished we had sent him on when he was supposed to move forward. Kind of sad for him, but there is nothing we can do about it now.

was the one u regretted redshirting close to cutoff, e.g., days or even just a few weeks, or was he further out, e.g., months?

He's about 3 weeks from the cut-off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not OP, but have to say it is interesting that the two responses received were very similar. I think that perhaps when you have two siblings only a few years apart, the younger sibling will tend to be more advanced because he learns a lot from his older sibling; thus the reason holding the younger one back probably may have been unnecessary.

19:58 here. You may be right, but in our case, the reasons we held him were very specific to him: We not only had our own doubts, but also had several of his preschool teachers who were quite sure, for very specific reasons, that we should wait a year. In the spring of that year he was eligible (by 10 days), he was very socially and emotionally immature, and we were all pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to send him. I know that we were right, at the time.

Around January of the year that he could have gone to K, though, he had a developmental growth spurt of sorts, and suddenly seemed ready. Obviously, though, it's not possible to send a child to K mid-year.

I think we made a good decision, but had we sent him (specifically him - not e.g. his brother), it probably would have been ok. Probably. We'll never know for sure.

We have neighbors whose son is a few years older than our oldest, and who met the K cutoff by a day. Despite their doubts, and the comments of his preschool teachers, they sent him (they told us they didn't want to pay for preschool & daycare any longer). The boy is now in high school and it is not going well at all - he really struggles and socially/emotionally is very immature. The mom has commented to me several times that she wishes she had done what we did - that her son really is not in the right grade for his needs.

In the absence of a crystal ball, I think this can be a very hard decision.

[Anonymous]

From a parent who has been there. We retained our child at the advice of DCs kindergarten teacher. In the end this delayed the identification of learning disabilities. If you have a child that you suspect has learning issues, the gift of time does not always work and can obscure issues. We told DCs teacher that we suspected LDs, but were put off and told that the gift of time was all that was needed. This can happen with very bright kids who are barely at grade-level. Not enough evidence to support referral to sped but clearly something amiss. Often chalked up to immaturity. Be careful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:we were all pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to send him. I know that we were right, at the time.


In the absence of a crystal ball, I think this can be a very hard decision.

We're struggling with what to do with our dd, who makes the cut-off by 4 days. It's particularly hard because we can, at best, know what's good for her NOW; it's impossible to know what will be good for her 10 years from now.

My brother missed the cut-off for K by 7 days, so he was the oldest in his class. As my mom says now, that was unquestionable the right thing for him up until about 2nd grade. After that, intellect started to matter more than development and he was very, very bored. But she doesn't regret the decision because it was the right one at the time. My brother, however, very much thinks it was the wrong decision, since his memories of being bored later in school are stronger than his memories of the early grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:we were all pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to send him. I know that we were right, at the time.


In the absence of a crystal ball, I think this can be a very hard decision.

We're struggling with what to do with our dd, who makes the cut-off by 4 days. It's particularly hard because we can, at best, know what's good for her NOW; it's impossible to know what will be good for her 10 years from now.

My brother missed the cut-off for K by 7 days, so he was the oldest in his class. As my mom says now, that was unquestionable the right thing for him up until about 2nd grade. After that, intellect started to matter more than development and he was very, very bored. But she doesn't regret the decision because it was the right one at the time. My brother, however, very much thinks it was the wrong decision, since his memories of being bored later in school are stronger than his memories of the early grades.

PP you quoted here. Where the child is so close to the cutoff (within weeks or a month at most) and is held back, I don't think the eventual outcome ("we could have sent him on time") is as troubling as it might be if the child weren't close (e.g. a June or July birthday). My second son, who met the cutoff by ten days, is not the oldest in his class and is only a few weeks older than those who were sent "on time." I don't think his occasional boredom is related to him being "too old" for his grade (ten days is ten days); I think it's because he is bright and the material can be dull sometimes.

He is headed for a GT magnet program in the fall, which will help enormously, and I am confident that his academic life will be fine. I'm really not worried about having waited, given his specific situation.

With your DD so close to the cutoff, I would make the decision based on NOW. There is really no other way to do it. In ten years, she will find her way (either way).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:we were all pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to send him. I know that we were right, at the time.


In the absence of a crystal ball, I think this can be a very hard decision.

We're struggling with what to do with our dd, who makes the cut-off by 4 days. It's particularly hard because we can, at best, know what's good for her NOW; it's impossible to know what will be good for her 10 years from now.

My brother missed the cut-off for K by 7 days, so he was the oldest in his class. As my mom says now, that was unquestionable the right thing for him up until about 2nd grade. After that, intellect started to matter more than development and he was very, very bored. But she doesn't regret the decision because it was the right one at the time. My brother, however, very much thinks it was the wrong decision, since his memories of being bored later in school are stronger than his memories of the early grades.

why didn't they consider having him skip a grade. We had several kids in my school do this in elementary...seems it would solve the 'boredom' issue. Also--today's schools have a much wider variety of 'gifted' programs and division according to individual level that I think it is less of a problem today. Given a bored kid vs a kid struggling to learn the material every step of the way...I'd take the bored one and find ways to challenge him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:we were all pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to send him. I know that we were right, at the time.


In the absence of a crystal ball, I think this can be a very hard decision.

We're struggling with what to do with our dd, who makes the cut-off by 4 days. It's particularly hard because we can, at best, know what's good for her NOW; it's impossible to know what will be good for her 10 years from now.

Our DD also made the cut-off by four days and in her kindergarten year she was the youngest child in the school. At every PT conference we've asked if the teacher believed we had made the right decision in sending her on-time, and every time we've been told YES. I think it's very child-dependent/situationally-dependent. I think we made the right choice for OUR child who seems to be thriving now, several years after the decision was made. Who knows what will happen in high school, but you have to go with what you believe to be the right choice.

[Anonymous]

My sister regrets red-shirting her son, now 10. He is a July birthday, so she really should have sent him. He was slightly behind physically, she thought, but she realizes now that really he was just somewhat less athletic, but did catch up so that now he is an average athlete. But he knows he is older, asks about it, gets asked if he was held back, and had to have a 10 year old bday when other kids were having 9 year old bdays. so it is quite obvious. Don't do it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My sister regrets red-shirting her son, now 10. He is a July birthday, so she really should have sent him. He was slightly behind physically, she thought, but she realizes now that really he was just somewhat less athletic, but did catch up so that now he is an average athlete. But he knows he is older, asks about it, gets asked if he was held back, and had to have a 10 year old bday when other kids were having 9 year old bdays. so it is quite obvious. Don't do it.

I would never redshirt for a 'physcial' reason. that one always kills me...esp when some of the parents of the kids that have done RS for this reason are physically small themselves. If you have always been 10th percentile...one more year isn't going to turn you into a giant...you will still be one of the smallest in the class.