Starting an August birthday (boy) in K in DCPS

[Anonymous]

Interesting. I have a Sept birthday at a JKLM and I can think of at least 10 kids who are older than him (Sept, Aug and even July birthdays that were held back).

[Anonymous]

I sent my August bday boy to PK3 on time in DCPS. He's the youngest in his class and also one of the most advanced academically (and just fine socially). He would have been miserable if I had held him back, so bored. I sent him on time in PK3 because I figured I could always hold him back later but I couldn't undo holding him back. V. glad I did that. You have to judge based on your own kid but it's crazy to hold back just because you assume every other August/September boy will be held back. They won't be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just to add - agree with all PPs above to talk with principal and trust your own instinct. A lot of people say it's not these years that you see the differences, but it's turning 18 in college (rather than high school) and turning 21 after your peers in college that the child really notices it. I agree that academics are usually guided by your intelligence rather than how old you are.

I am parent of a September birthday at JKLM school, and decided to "redshirt". I've had some many rude parents say something to me - I never tell them my child was being evaluated for a life ending illness in Montessori K year. Therefore a second year of K made sense for us. So make your decision and just know that you will get criticism from both sides - too old and too young.

And our principal told us that it was her decision on when the child started and it what grade. Hope this helps!

If all your concerns are post high-school, then it's dumb to redshirt. How do you know your child will even want to go college? College isn't for everyone. What if they want to become firefighters, join the military, become a carpenter, etc.?

[Anonymous]

It is so annoying to me that people redshirt because eventually, when the kids get to Wilson, they will be counted as "at risk" just for being "high school students who are one year older, or more, than the expected age for the grade in which the students are enrolled." That will take up space that should be used to have 10% of students who are truly needy, not rich kids who were born in August and learned to read at 5.5 instead of 4.5.

[Anonymous]

Our son (with an early Aug B-day) started in K as almost the youngest a few years back (he was in daycare until then). OP, he was how you describe your child, neither interested nor capable of reading in any meaningful ways. He knew some letters but not all of them. He started "below basics", so the lowest quartile, in the former classification (thank god we didn't know at the time what that meant). He caught up by about 2nd grade and knocked it out of the park by 4th and 5th grade. Socially, he was always on track. I'm not sure I would conclude that the struggle and the keeping up is what did it but it certainly didn't harm him. Now that he's taking advanced courses in middle school and seems slower than some others (especially girls) to get his stuff in order, we sometimes wonder if we're seeing some of the "brain's just not ready signs" but he still does above average and always eventually somehow gets it together, and fits in socially as well. Hope this is helpful.

[Anonymous]

This thread is a year old .. OP made her decision long ago.

[Anonymous]

I miss New York, and its Dec 31 cut off that made all of this laughable.

[Anonymous]

No matter when the deadline is, there are still going to be kids who just barely make it and those who just barely miss it. Redshirting was so prevalent in NYC that the school board had to issue rules to curtail it: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/02/kindergarten-redshirting-gets-tougher-in-n-y-c-with-repercussions/

But just keep on missing New York. I'll give you one thing: you do have better bagels there.

[Anonymous]

If everyone would just send their child to school when they are supposed to, we wouldn't have these huge age gaps which often lead to wide differences in maturity levels and problems in the classroom. Someone has to be the oldest and someone has to be the youngest. Manipulating the system for your child's benefit isn't fair to those of us who send our children on time. And I'm not referring to kids who have special needs. That is a different story and reason for holding back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If everyone would just send their child to school when they are supposed to, we wouldn't have these huge age gaps which often lead to wide differences in maturity levels and problems in the classroom. Someone has to be the oldest and someone has to be the youngest. Manipulating the system for your child's benefit isn't fair to those of us who send our children on time. And I'm not referring to kids who have special needs. That is a different story and reason for holding back.

The cut-off in our area is September 1st, and DS was born September 9th. At first, we were somewhat relieved that he would have to wait till he was almost 6, but in the months leading up to his 5th birthday, it was very clear that he was ready for K and that waiting another year would drive him crazy. So we had him take an early entrance and he passed with flying colors, so he started kindergarten right before he turned 5. So technically, we didn't send him on time either. Why? Because if we had just blindly followed the guidelines, he would be bored to tears. He's now 8 and in 3rd grade, reading at a 5th grade level, gets his work done early, and his teacher still has to find extra work to give him. I can't imagine what it would be like if he were in 2nd grade. The bottom line is that not one size fits all. If we had a child who made the cut-off, but had not been ready for K, we would have held him or her back. Kids need to be grouped by ability, not age. Just because a child misses the cut-off does not mean that he or she isn't ready for K, and just because a child makes the cut-off does not mean that he or she is ready for K. It all boils down to the individual.