Enough is enough with the redshirting!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-oldest-kids-in-the-class-may-get-an-edge-in-college-admissions-1503052268

That says oldest in class and doesn’t stratify by whether that’s natural or redshirting.

So no.

There is always going to be an older group in any K class and yes, that older group shows an advantage.

It doesn’t follow that those who redshirt have the same benefits or more as those naturally older kids.

So much weird gaslighting. Just say it’s an advantage. That’s the annoying part. The denying it’s an advantage in any way.

It may be an advantage to be the oldest but it is a huge disadvantage to send a not ready very young kid to kindergarten. Shouldn’t be surprising which side parents err on.

That’s fine for a summer kid but a winter? It’s scary for most kids to go to K. No one is totally ready.

I don’t know any winter redshirted kids.

That’s what the discussion is about, 10 year olds in Third in December.

I just don’t think this is happening in large enough numbers to make a big stink about it. Redshirting of winter birthdays (so they turn 7 in K, 10 in 3rd grade, 19 senior year of HS, etc.) is very rare. Even with COVID closures messing everything up. The vast majority of redshirted kids have summer birthdays close to the cutoff and are thus 6 all of K, 18 all of senior year of HS, etc.

I think in certain private schools and areas it’s getting pushed back further and further. That’s the point of the discussion. There needs to be some sort of understanding from parents that their kids might just go and not be the best at everything. This seems like anxiety over kids succeeding more than anything. It’s not rational to want to hold back a kid who is already older for the year even if they do have adhd. They can benefit from services.

That seems to apply equally to the parents who send their kids as early as possible and then freak out they’re not in gifted math. The rules specify a range of dates in which to start. Choose the one that works for you and let others choose what works for them but unless someone is outside the allowed range, it’s still “on time”

It's not "on time" if you have to fill out paperwork with the country checking a box that says "my child needs a maturity waiver to start one year later". You are legally allowed to do it, yes, but it is not "on time". Lol.

I didn’t have to fill out any paperwork to redshirt.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-oldest-kids-in-the-class-may-get-an-edge-in-college-admissions-1503052268

That says oldest in class and doesn’t stratify by whether that’s natural or redshirting.

So no.

There is always going to be an older group in any K class and yes, that older group shows an advantage.

It doesn’t follow that those who redshirt have the same benefits or more as those naturally older kids.

So much weird gaslighting. Just say it’s an advantage. That’s the annoying part. The denying it’s an advantage in any way.

It may be an advantage to be the oldest but it is a huge disadvantage to send a not ready very young kid to kindergarten. Shouldn’t be surprising which side parents err on.

Let’s say my kid starts K at age 4, turning five in late September. He is the youngest in his class. He will absolutely have a natural disadvantage against the kids who are already five some of whom will turn six end of year. Parents and pre K teacher think it’s best for him to wait. Why should I have to deal with this lottery of a birthday and suck up my “disadvantage” rather than make the choice to send my child next year when he is five? Because it would upset OP? Too bad.

The issue isn’t this. It’s kids who are born in the early part of the year red shirting to have an outrageous advantage.

Ah so some redshirting is ok aka if you agree with it.

NP to this thread.

Obviously the debate is over where to draw the line. Even you have a line. Do you think kids should be allowed to start K at age 7, at their parents' discretion, because they "aren't ready" (even if no demonstrated developmental delays)? Are you okay with your kid attending 4th grade with kids in full blown puberty? Do you want your children going to high school with kids who can drink legally? I'm guessing no.

So everyone has a breaking point with redshirting. It's fine and reasonable until it's not and everyone draws that line in a slightly different place but they all draw the line *somewhere*.

If your issue is where to draw the line then take it up with your school district. Or in OP’s situation it’s an easy fix - go to a different private! You don’t like the line that was already drawn and that’s your prerogative, but other parents are following the rules as they are laid out as they are redshirting. But it’s ridiculous to blast redshirting and then when I point out a perfectly standard reason a parent does it, you say “oh but that’s an acceptable time to redshirt.”

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:There are two ten year olds in my child’s third grade class. When will a school draw a line with this?

In practical terms, how does this impact you?

I'm not someone who redshirted BTW.

I'm not someone who redshirted either, but holy moly isn't it obvious? If there are still many developmental differences at this age, it can badly affect kids that are on the younger side emotionally, socially, physically, mentally, academically, etc. and it must be frustrating if they are in the grade they are supposed to be, and other kids are not.

DP but my kids go to Montessori where there are three grades per class. Never any issues with younger kids being negatively impacted by the mere presence of older kids.

That’s a completely different environment and learning style which I’m positive you already know.

Sure, but it doesn’t change the fundamental nature of kids, and the PP I responded to rather dramatically said this:

“it can badly affect kids that are on the younger side emotionally, socially, physically, mentally, academically, etc.”

Maybe they should back up that claim with specifics. Or admit their outrage is pure competitiveness.

And I repeat, it's a completely different learning environment, so it doesn't apply. At all. 5 year olds in Montessori mixed age classes are not expected to act like their 8 year old classmates. They do different work than them. They aren't compared to them, when their drawings get hung up in a line down the hallway. I could go on, but if you don't get it, you don't get it.

You have yet to provide examples of them being negatively affected “ emotionally, socially, physically, mentally, academically, etc.”

You are just making stuff up because you’re mad Larla is getting silver stars and not gold.

there were already articles posted like 7 pages ago.

You too dumb to cite or?

Those articles weren’t about redshirting and didn’t document harm to other students. The articles were about natural age differences within a classroom. Can no one read?

[Anonymous]

I was the previous poster who held their September kid back. The amount of money I spent on support is in the thousands. He got terrible support from fcps for his fine motor delay (a teacher who never showed up to his daycare and went radio silent during covid). They even reduced his hours during his initial meeting to “support” us because it would be easier for us to make them up if his chronic condition had a flair up(I admit I was naive and didn’t realize what they were doing). He learned more in preschool than he would have in kindergarten and the extra time allowed his brain to develop some of the executive functioning skills needed to manage it after an extra year.
As a previous poster said ADHD is an executive functioning delay. School now requires kids to succeed in these areas with limited support or time from the teachers to teach it (they truly have too many things being asked of them right now).

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I redshirted my mid-September. Kindergarten would have been virtual and he had a chronic illness that could keep him out of school at the time. I am happy I did it because we found out he was adhd and like many boys his age is behind in executive functioning skills. I think some parents aren’t sure what to do to when their kid is either academically or socially behind their peers and they feel the only option is redshirting. I think excessive redshirting is a symptom of the problem that parents feel that is their only option.

I understand this, health is of course most important, but redshirting an ADHD kid is typically a bad idea. It's worse because they are older and get bored and act out more.

I will have to disagree with you on this and this is a very broad and misunderstood statement about ADHD. Your assumption here is that their preferred task is academics. You also do not realize that a significant percent have another condition(both my sons have dyslexia). You are also minimizing the impacts of delayed executive functioning skills in school To understand how behind on executive functioning ADHD kids are you take 30% off their age which means at 10 in that specific area a child is 7.
Emotionally he is mature and confident in his grade. When I see parents push their kids ahead often to maintain services I feel for them because their kids are struggling in school and are behind maturity wise. You can say they catch up by high school but that is several years of these kids feeling left out. My main point was that parents are doing the best they can. You can feel superior because you didn’t redshirt but at the time they made the best decision (your kid was never a factor in their decision) for their kid often recognizing that there are limited resources in public schools. Are there parents who did it for the wrong reasons I am sure there are, but I agonized over this decision for months and even hired a professional psychologist to do testing and she suggested we hold him back.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:There are two ten year olds in my child’s third grade class. When will a school draw a line with this?

In practical terms, how does this impact you?

I'm not someone who redshirted BTW.

In a competitive environment for academics and sports it impacts my young June birthday. We have 38 boys in our private and 17 from this class are redshirted. He had to constantly be held to a higher standard because his peer group is so much older and that’s across the board.

You should’ve redshirted your child.

That’s what it comes down to isn’t it? OP is in a nice private school and is salty that she didn’t realize that redshirting of the summer birthday kids, and perhaps even the late spring kids, is somewhat expected. She could switch to public where most June birthday kids go on time and her kid would no longer be the youngest.

But she would *never* consider sending her snowflake to public school with the poors, the behavior problems, and the overcrowded classrooms. Because she wants the… what’s that word?… advantage of an expensive private school.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I redshirted my mid-September. Kindergarten would have been virtual and he had a chronic illness that could keep him out of school at the time. I am happy I did it because we found out he was adhd and like many boys his age is behind in executive functioning skills. I think some parents aren’t sure what to do to when their kid is either academically or socially behind their peers and they feel the only option is redshirting. I think excessive redshirting is a symptom of the problem that parents feel that is their only option.

I understand this, health is of course most important, but redshirting an ADHD kid is typically a bad idea. It's worse because they are older and get bored and act out more.

Also redshirted my late September born son with adhd. We’re in NY, so this means he turned 6 in kindergarten. It has been a great move for him. He did a transitional K program last year while we figured out diagnosis and meds, and got accustomed to the structure of kindergarten. He is doing well academically and was able to handle the adjustment to kindergarten this year - he would not have been able to do this last year. Being on the young side of the class was not good for him emotionally academically, but he also has other fall birthday friends who are doing just fine being on the younger side.

Kids with ADHD receive so much negative feedback as a baseline that they don’t need any additional factors like natural immaturity or being nearly a year younger than a lot of their peers working against them. DS’s private school says about 50% of fall birthdays redshirt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP. Wow, this thread grew fast. I assume the crazy anti-redshirters are frothing again? I don’t have the energy to wade through it.

OP: This is not a serious issue, speaking as a parent of teens and young adults. I did not redshirt. In fact one of my kids is a young spring birthday and has often been the youngest or close to it. I read the absolute meltdowns about redshirting from anti-redshirting posters and understand why kids have no resiliency these days — their parents can’t model it. Crazy, sad people.

OPs kid has suffered not at all as she will be quick to tell you not so humbly. He is in gifted, plays a year up in some sport, super popular, no challenges, yet, she just can’t get past the birthdays of a few classmates for no particular reason. This is her hobby in life, to perseverate on a non issue because she thinks someone else is getting something she’s not. Then she whines about “advantages” as she pays another month of tuition at her posh private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP. Wow, this thread grew fast. I assume the crazy anti-redshirters are frothing again? I don’t have the energy to wade through it.

OP: This is not a serious issue, speaking as a parent of teens and young adults. I did not redshirt. In fact one of my kids is a young spring birthday and has often been the youngest or close to it. I read the absolute meltdowns about redshirting from anti-redshirting posters and understand why kids have no resiliency these days — their parents can’t model it. Crazy, sad people.

OPs kid has suffered not at all as she will be quick to tell you not so humbly. He is in gifted, plays a year up in some sport, super popular, no challenges, yet, she just can’t get past the birthdays of a few classmates for no particular reason. This is her hobby in life, to perseverate on a non issue because she thinks someone else is getting something she’s not. Then she whines about “advantages” as she pays another month of tuition at her posh private school.

You’re a nut job. Someone said multiple times he isn’t doing well and he’s not making a team, I responded that wasn’t true, he’s doing fine but it’s an annoying thing to be dealing with as you can imagine that the interests of older kids are more mature and he went straight into that with his friends. He never really had a chance to be his age. Never said he was in gifted! That’s a lie, we don’t have gifted. He does fine academically, no where near a top student among peers, and has plenty of friends. He plays up in an age level sport (soccer), probably because he’s used to playing with older kids in his grade for school teams. He’s fine but I never said anything close to what you’re saying.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:NP. Wow, this thread grew fast. I assume the crazy anti-redshirters are frothing again? I don’t have the energy to wade through it.

OP: This is not a serious issue, speaking as a parent of teens and young adults. I did not redshirt. In fact one of my kids is a young spring birthday and has often been the youngest or close to it. I read the absolute meltdowns about redshirting from anti-redshirting posters and understand why kids have no resiliency these days — their parents can’t model it. Crazy, sad people.

OPs kid has suffered not at all as she will be quick to tell you not so humbly. He is in gifted, plays a year up in some sport, super popular, no challenges, yet, she just can’t get past the birthdays of a few classmates for no particular reason. This is her hobby in life, to perseverate on a non issue because she thinks someone else is getting something she’s not. Then she whines about “advantages” as she pays another month of tuition at her posh private school.

You’re a nut job. Someone said multiple times he isn’t doing well and he’s not making a team, I responded that wasn’t true, he’s doing fine but it’s an annoying thing to be dealing with as you can imagine that the interests of older kids are more mature and he went straight into that with his friends. He never really had a chance to be his age. Never said he was in gifted! That’s a lie, we don’t have gifted. He does fine academically, no where near a top student among peers, and has plenty of friends. He plays up in an age level sport (soccer), probably because he’s used to playing with older kids in his grade for school teams. He’s fine but I never said anything close to what you’re saying.

You’re dumb AF. Your kid is fine and you’re the annoying one. Find a real issue to worry about.

[Anonymous]

As some have mentioned earlier there should be a nationwide birthday cutoff (August or Sept 1st) and redshirting would only be allowed if a documented developmental delay is shown.

Also, if you transfer from a private then for K-2 you go into the grade you are aged for to avoid those who want to exploit the system that way.

That is true equity.

But I'm sure all the wealthy parents on here would bemoan the chance to game the system and get their neurotypical children ahead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I redshirted my mid-September. Kindergarten would have been virtual and he had a chronic illness that could keep him out of school at the time. I am happy I did it because we found out he was adhd and like many boys his age is behind in executive functioning skills. I think some parents aren’t sure what to do to when their kid is either academically or socially behind their peers and they feel the only option is redshirting. I think excessive redshirting is a symptom of the problem that parents feel that is their only option.

I understand this, health is of course most important, but redshirting an ADHD kid is typically a bad idea. It's worse because they are older and get bored and act out more.

I’m not the PP but I don’t think this is true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As some have mentioned earlier there should be a nationwide birthday cutoff (August or Sept 1st) and redshirting would only be allowed if a documented developmental delay is shown.

Also, if you transfer from a private then for K-2 you go into the grade you are aged for to avoid those who want to exploit the system that way.

That is true equity.

But I'm sure all the wealthy parents on here would bemoan the chance to game the system and get their neurotypical children ahead.

They would just rush to get their kids diagnosed with something. DMV going to DMV.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a friend who teaches fifth grade and she has talked about having older girls get their period in fifth grade. This was not something she was expecting to deal with in elementary school. It gets a little weird when some kids are going through puberty and for others it is still several years down the line. Girls playing with Barbies and those who are interested in boys and dating.

The girl dynamics extend to crushes on boys and mean girl dynamics. You can absolutely tell who is older in the grade.

As someone with a kid who is the youngest in her grade but academically advanced, you tend to see the gap with a younger kid not being able to sit and focus for as long, struggle to follow multi step instructions, and navigate social disagreements. When many kids in a grade are redshirted, expectations for the group go up and kids who started on time look like outliers. They end up in trouble for age appropriate behaviors.

I have a young-for-grade 5th grader. Since kids also get their periods at 8-9 due to whatever environmental factors these days, I don't think the teacher should be surprised. As far as crush and dating dynamics, that's also a thing across old and young for grade 5th graders. Did she think she was teaching 2nd?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP. Wow, this thread grew fast. I assume the crazy anti-redshirters are frothing again? I don’t have the energy to wade through it.

OP: This is not a serious issue, speaking as a parent of teens and young adults. I did not redshirt. In fact one of my kids is a young spring birthday and has often been the youngest or close to it. I read the absolute meltdowns about redshirting from anti-redshirting posters and understand why kids have no resiliency these days — their parents can’t model it. Crazy, sad people.

OPs kid has suffered not at all as she will be quick to tell you not so humbly. He is in gifted, plays a year up in some sport, super popular, no challenges, yet, she just can’t get past the birthdays of a few classmates for no particular reason. This is her hobby in life, to perseverate on a non issue because she thinks someone else is getting something she’s not. Then she whines about “advantages” as she pays another month of tuition at her posh private school.

Wait, OP is one of the crazy anti-redshirters who doesn’t understand how private school admissions work at an extremely basic level? Hahahahahahaha. The stereotypes just write themselves.

I love the DCUM anti-redshirt threads because the absolute crazy of the anti-redshirters comes out every single time. They can’t keep a lid on it.