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holding boys back?
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Anonymous
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"Try getting a grip, chill out, and let your kids go to school at the appropriate time."
The point is that other parents don't get to judge what is the appropriate time for my child. If you read over this thread and others that have cropped up in the past about this subject, you will see that those of us who have made the very difficult decision to keep our kids back are called all sorts of names by other parents who really truly have no idea what they are talking about. I would never judge you for the decisions you make abut your kids. Why are you judging me? Why are you calling me names? Do you teach your children to be this mean? |
Anonymous
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Dear 15:26 poster: You shouldn't take any of these posts so personally. Of course some parents are holding their kids back for a legitimate reason. But don't think that there aren't some parents who are holding their kids back for silly reasons (to give their boys an advantage in sports) or for their own insecurities or because they are buying into the DC metro area redshirting mantra. I know parents who held their boys back but didn't hold their girls back because "boys just need more time to catch up with girls." Whatever. I know parents who compared kid #2 to their older sibling and opted to hold their second ones back b/c they weren't reading or writing yet like their older sib had done at that age. Again, whatever. So PP 15:26 -- yes, you may have valid reasons for holding your kid back and no one is judging you for that. But please don't judge the other posters who happen to know parents who have held their kids back for no apparent reason.
FWIW, I've discussed this with friends who live in the mid-west, the south , etc. and they thought I was crazy -- the redshirting philosophy isn't universal nationwide. My friend in Oklahoma City (a partner at a big firm who sends his kids to a private school) said the only kids that get held back from starting kindergarten on time have abundantly apparent issues -- and teachers make the call. Parents don't opt to hold back otherwise average kids. I know someone who moved to the Philly burbs after living in NoVa for 5 years. Kid #1 went to school in McLean. When they moved to the Philly burbs area, she met with pre-K programs to discuss redshirting kid #2 (a boy) since he had a summer birthday (and for no other real reason). The principals and the pre-K programs were confused -- they said they don't "redshirt" there. |
Anonymous
| If you are in Montgomery County and your DC birthday is within 6 weeks of the Sept. 1 cutoff you can apply to have them start that year instead of waiting. I know several kids (boys!) in my neighborhood who were accepted to start even though they didn't turn 5 till Sept. Is this mainly a private school DC thing? B/c I have also heard (and I have summer birthday kids- a boy and a girl) that many, many summer birthday kids are starting on time. That while you hear about the redshirting, it is not the norm in Montgomery Cty at all, more of an exception than a rule. |
Anonymous
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"But please don't judge the other posters who happen to know parents who have held their kids back for no apparent reason."
No APPARENT reason. That's the point. Their true reasons may not be apparent to you because they know you will be judgmental and don't care to share them with you. Or perhaps some parents trying to make this decision don't want to broadcast to their friends that there are emotional/other issues going on with their children that warrant giving them extra time. All I want to know is why do you care so much what other families decide to do with their children? And how could you possibly purport to be in a better position to assess the propriety of these decisions than the parents' themselves? In other words, since when is how I decide to raise my child ANY OF YOUR BUSINESS??? If, as you say, it's often not necessary to give the extra year and that a year does not make a difference, then how does this even affect you. My guess is that unlike those of us struggling to make the right choice for our children based on their social and emotional needs, what gets most of you who are so opposed to this practice is how it might affect your children's comparative success in academics, sports, etc. I have had conversations with multiple moms trying to make this decision and I can tell you that I am not aware of any one who has made the decision to wait a year because it will give their kids a competitive edge. So I am judging you and wishing you had better things to do with your time than to criticize other parents for their own, difficult decisions. |
Anonymous
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And just like your experience is that there are not parents trying to gain a competitive edge, it is my experience that many of the redshirted boys are in their circumstance because of some perceived advantage by their parents.
To each their own, but for the kids that are held back and have no other issues, it provides an uncomfortable and in the future untenable situation. |
Anonymous
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"All I want to know is why do you care so much what other families decide to do with their children? And how could you possibly purport to be in a better position to assess the propriety of these decisions than the parents' themselves? In other words, since when is how I decide to raise my child ANY OF YOUR BUSINESS???"
I don't care about what other families decide to do with their children -- I'm merely commenting on people I know (friends and relatives) who have held their kids back for no apparent reason. While I do not purport to be in a BETTER position to assess these decisions than the parents themselves, I AM equipped to observe that redshirting a boy with a summer birthday so that he will be older, taller, stronger and smarter than the 5 year olds when he starts K as a six year old is not a valid reason to hold an otherwise average (and sometimes smart) kid back. I'm baseing this on open and ongoing conversations with parents that I am very close to (friends and relatives). These folks fall into the category of "everyone else is doing it, so I have to." And again, I am not passing judgment on how YOU raise your child (is this the 15:26 poster again?). I don't even know you. I was merely participating in this DCUM thread and throwing in my two cents based on my own experience with a September kid and a summer kid (both boys) as well as my observations of parents who redshirt simply because it has become the norm in the DC metro area recently (b/c I know these kids very well, I know that they don't have emotional issues or attention problems or some secret issue -- they are normal 5 year old boys). If this is the 15:26 poster, then I must ask you why you are so defensive about this? And why are you taking comments posted on this thread as a personal attack on you and your decisions? Perhaps you aren't as comfortable with your decision as you purport to be. |
Anonymous
| 15:26 again, but that wasn't me. There are obviously several posters here who feel as I do. I don't think it is defensive to be angry when other people call me names. And I get really angry when I feel like people are attacking my child. |
Anonymous
I think when you start anonymously criticizing other people's children and how they're being raised then you don't get to be surprised when those people get defensive. In fact you're lucky it's not worse. I wonder if you're this much of unwelcome nagging busybody in real life. |
Anonymous
| I would also add that if 11:53 is using this forum to criticize only people she knows (nice try by the way, but that wasn't how it read) she isn't being a terribly supportive friend to those parents she knows. I have friends who have made parenting decisions that were different from mine, but listening to them and what they have gone through in the process of making these difficult decisions only gives me more appreciation for the idea of supporting each other's approaches, not less. |
Anonymous
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I can't believe that this thread has been resurrected and once again degenerated into self-righteous types denouncing what they PRESUME to be the motivations of other parents. Do what is right for your kid, plain and simple - that's your foremost responsibility as a parent. It is not your responsibility or your place to judge what other parents do.
-- From the mother of an April birthday boy who will not be redshirted. fwiw |
Anonymous
| My son's birthday is at the end of July. He went to K last year, we didn't redshirt him, as we even didn't know about such a trend. We REALLY regret about it now, when he is in the 1st grade, the last one in his class in reading and math... |
Anonymous
What kind of school is your son at that the school ranks 1st graders? I know that in most public schools at least, many kids are still learning to read in first grade -- our DS likely will be among them. It all evens out by second or third grade. From following this discussion, it seems the private schools are a big source of the red-shirted kids in this area. Echoing a previous poster, I grew up in an area in the Midwest with public schools like the very best ones around here. No one red-shirts there. This phenomenon is just another manifestation of the crazed parenting that reigns around here. |
Anonymous
| There you go again with the name calling. I'm not "crazed." And PP with the first grader shows why having the option is actually a good thing. Choices. Isn't that a good thing? |
Anonymous
He is in the Montgomery Public School System. |
Anonymous
I personally think that parents who want "choice" in this regard should go private. Public schools are designed to handle a broad range of kids and are more than capable of handling the wide range of abilities of kids who enter kindergarten at 5. The whole curriculum is built on this premise and any child development expert will tell you that 5-year old kindergarteners exhibit a huge range of abilities. Heck, if choice is a good thing, why not let parents start their kids in kindergarten at 8 or 9? |