Reply to Poll - if you were the youngest or oldest of your school class..

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]So we have a summer birthday son who we are debating whether to send on to K later this year.  He would be the youngest in his class.  We think he is likely ready academically and emotionally enough to try.  Here's the thing - in our neighborhood there seems to be a disproportionate (Alexandria/Arlington border) number of families who delay their kids going into K.  For example, my son has peers born in May who will not be going to K.  In other words, not only might he be 11 months younger than some kids, he may be 16-17 months younger than his K class.  As a result of this cascade effect, we are trying to figure out if delaying him into K makes sense only because he is so shy, sensitive and had a speech delay that has only been getting better since age 4.

While we are not so much worried for the K years - we do worry about the impact of being the smaller/youngest one when he is age 12-13 when according to research is when some kids are more affected by their age/grade level.  My husband was oldest and I was youngest in our classes.  I have always been very driven/ambitious while my husband has not.  While my son is shy, sensitive, timid he is also quite into challenges, persevering, intelligent and seems to love to learn.  He is timid but I would not suggest he suffers from no confidence as he can be strong willed when he finds an interest.  We do not worry so much about bullying as he's a sweet kid and somehow he is quite popular with everyone :)  I don't think he cares about other kids but boy do they adore him!  He is thin but of average height.

This is really more about long term impact going into K much younger than his peers and always being the youngest until he's college bound.  So, if you were the youngest/oldest of your class, how do you feel your experience affected you from your age/grade level in school later in life?  How did it impact you with grades, socially, professionally at a much later age?  Do you think you would have benefited more if you were youngest/oldest?
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I have a summer birthday and skipped a grade, so maybe not directly comparable, but I did have the experience of being the youngest (by 18 months+) throughout school. It was fine. I didn't get my license until the summer before senior year, but luckily my parents were able to give me an old car so I could "make up" for having my friends drive me around for two years. In both high school and college I found that I did so many things with kids in other grades (clubs, sports, etc.) that it didn't matter so much that I was youngest in my grade. We didn't go to bars much in college so that wasn't an issue (plenty of beer at parties :) In elementary and middle school stuff was organized more by grade, but as a tall girl I didn't stand out from the other girls in my grade. I graduated from college at 20, which was fine with me, I considered it quite a head start.[/quote]

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