My son's kindergarten class has several 7 yr olds in it.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote]I agree that graduating high school at 19 or 20 fifty years ago would sound bizarre given a life expectancy of 60 or so years but with the life expectancy now stretching to 80 it would not surprise me that kids graduate from high school at 19 or 20 or begin college at 19 or 20. Take a look at the exponential numbers of students delaying entry into your beloved Ivy league schools (even encouraged to defer admissions). It's more important to get education right than rush to the "finish line" ill-prepared for graduate education or the real world. [/quote]

So parents who want their children to be 5-years-old in K are pushing their children to get into their "beloved" Ivy school. Funny, we just wanted our children to be a kindergartener when they were in kindergarten and 18 when they graduated from high school.

[Anonymous]

funny...are you sure you don't mean a kindergartener in Kindergarten and a senior when graduating from high school?

What does age have to do with it?

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]
So parents who want their children to be 5-years-old in K are pushing their children to get into their "beloved" Ivy school. Funny, we just wanted our children to be a kindergartener when they were in kindergarten and 18 when they graduated from high school.[/quote]
schools are changing.
Every kindergartener is not going to be 5.
If you have a problem with that then send your kid to K when it is 6. Or homeschool
Or start a new private school on your own where you can set the admission criteria according to height

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote]I agree that graduating high school at 19 or 20 fifty years ago would sound bizarre given a life expectancy of 60 or so years but with the life expectancy now stretching to 80 it would not surprise me that kids graduate from high school at 19 or 20 or begin college at 19 or 20. Take a look at the exponential numbers of students delaying entry into your beloved Ivy league schools (even encouraged to defer admissions). It's more important to get education right than rush to the "finish line" ill-prepared for graduate education or the real world. [/quote]

So parents who want their children to be 5-years-old in K are pushing their children to get into their "beloved" Ivy school. Funny, we just wanted our children to be a kindergartener when they were in kindergarten and 18 when they graduated from high school.[/quote]

Funny, if you "just want" your children to be 18 when they graduate from high school, then you'll just have to hold those summer bday kids another year before kindergarten. Just do the math. And this is all some parents of summer bday kids want too.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]

Or start a new private school on your own where you can set the admission criteria according to height[/quote]

Love this.

[Anonymous]

Should we not frame this discussion around Kindergarten classes meeting/fitting the intellectual, physical, social and emotional needs of the Kindergartener rather than a discussion of the age of the child? Isn't this the primary function of Kindergarten (or any elementary school classroom) not a triage or filter around the chronological age of a child? What does age have to do with this fit? Some 5-year-old will be ready, some will not.

I like the ass-backward discussion revolving around chronologic age rather than a launching pad for a great education. I'll take great teachers and classmates and a stimulating and challenging educational menu any day over a homogeneous class defined soley by chronological age in years and months, height in feet and inches, or weight in pounds and kilograms.

[Anonymous]

Here's some formal research on this topic.

http://www.econ.wisc.edu/workshop/ELApril4.pdf

p. 32 appears to conclude that trend of advancing age in K increases academic performance by grade, but when controlled for age, decreases it by age, throughout k-12 schooling. Suggests that's a bad result.

Hmmm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here's some formal research on this topic.

http://www.econ.wisc.edu/workshop/ELApril4.pdf

p. 32 appears to conclude that trend of advancing age in K increases academic performance by grade, but when controlled for age, decreases it by age, throughout k-12 schooling. Suggests that's a bad result.

Hmmm.

I agree and additionally, take a look at this: http://www.greatschools.org/students/4165-redshirting-kindergarten.gs?page=2.

Anti-redshirter

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's some formal research on this topic.

http://www.econ.wisc.edu/workshop/ELApril4.pdf

p. 32 appears to conclude that trend of advancing age in K increases academic performance by grade, but when controlled for age, decreases it by age, throughout k-12 schooling. Suggests that's a bad result.

Hmmm.

I agree and additionally, take a look at this: http://www.greatschools.org/students/4165-redshirting-kindergarten.gs?page=2.

Anti-redshirter

People are just lazy. Redshirting is their way of making up for it. Teachers and schools are not trained to deal with high-activity, high-ability people; so, they dumb them down and make them sit. Newsflash people - being quiet and inactive in a class does not necessarily equate to being able to learn. My child reads books, adds and subtracts, multiplies, and is extremely interested in learning more about everything. He is busy as hell, and won't sit for long periods of time; like me. He is not pushed. He asks for information. He just turned 5. He will go to first grade, not K. He finished K last year. There is no reason to redshirt him because he asks a lot of questions and likes to move around. Hell, I don't just sit at my desk all day either. I even get up and take breaks during boring meetings. My high level of activity and boredom helped me move to the top of the org chart in corporate America, while I earned my Phd. If I was able to sit still too long, I would not get bored, would not be interested in things, and would not question everything.

Teach your child to think critically and he will be better off. Learn to question things, people. Stop being followers. Relying on your nanny who speaks another language is probably why your child is not prepared for school and needs to be redshirted.

Wake up and raise your expectations. Schools need to learn new and innovative ways of teaching young kids. The old system is outdated. Get with it people. Japan gets it, we don't.

Just a thought!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Should we not frame this discussion around Kindergarten classes meeting/fitting the intellectual, physical, social and emotional needs of the Kindergartener rather than a discussion of the age of the child? Isn't this the primary function of Kindergarten (or any elementary school classroom) not a triage or filter around the chronological age of a child? What does age have to do with this fit? Some 5-year-old will be ready, some will not.

I like the ass-backward discussion revolving around chronologic age rather than a launching pad for a great education. I'll take great teachers and classmates and a stimulating and challenging educational menu any day over a homogeneous class defined soley by chronological age in years and months, height in feet and inches, or weight in pounds and kilograms.

Thanks, you are soooo correct! People are just followers, so they don't get it. Their expectations are so low, they don't realize the schools are punking them with this whole concept of allowing them to redshirt. The schools don't know how to teach modern minds. Half of the damn teachers are scared of technology integration, the principals do not care, and this allows them to get away with it. Stop it. Demand more for your money folks. Oh, I forgot, we just complain to each other, not the Board of Ed and the people who need to change it.

Wake up!

[Anonymous]

In addition to saying the older kids end up doing less well, the paper says having older kids in the class causes a higher diagnosis of learning disabilities among the younger children - Authors believe this is because teachers and administrators can't help but assess children against the room of children, a room that is skewed towards older behavior.

The study shows an increase from about 9 percent of total to about 20 percent of total in the number of kids who enter K at age six. This is comparing 1980 to 2002.

http://www.econ.wisc.edu/workshop/ELApril4.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's some formal research on this topic.

http://www.econ.wisc.edu/workshop/ELApril4.pdf

p. 32 appears to conclude that trend of advancing age in K increases academic performance by grade, but when controlled for age, decreases it by age, throughout k-12 schooling. Suggests that's a bad result.

Hmmm.

I agree and additionally, take a look at this: http://www.greatschools.org/students/4165-redshirting-kindergarten.gs?page=2.

Anti-redshirter

There's a lot of research going both ways. I tried reading it a couple years ago, but got frustrated because lots of the research is pushed by agenda-drive groups. It seems this issue is a bit of a football.

[Anonymous]

Would be very interested to see links to any research showing evidence that any of the affected kids are helped once you get beyond the first years of elementary school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a lot of research going both ways. I tried reading it a couple years ago, but got frustrated because lots of the research is pushed by agenda-drive groups. It seems this issue is a bit of a football.

PP again. One comment on the research I've read. It often is not really applicable to the practical realities of what people are discussing here. This is because most research compares children who are starting school for the very first time. So it is comparing children who start K at age 5, versus those who start at age 6. And what it really ends up assessing is the impact of delaying the beginning of a child's education.

But for most people on these boards, it seems that children are pretty actively enrolled in preschool and PK programs. So children who delay K entry for a year are not just sitting at home without any school development. Instead, they're effectively getting an extra year of schooling, since they will be repeating a year of school.

I'm not sure that this dynamic cuts for or against redshirting, but it does present a big disconnect with lots of the research.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Would be very interested to see links to any research showing evidence that any of the affected kids are helped once you get beyond the first years of elementary school.

If you look at some of the prior DCUM threads on redshirting, they link to several articles that talk about the benefits.