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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The notion that "'redshirting" is some trick that rich people use to get an unfair advantage for their kid seems utterly and completely ridiculous. It's not going to give them a leg up academically or athletically. If anything, it's going to give the kid a complex about why he or she is older than everyone else. But if the parent sees some problem that will be exacerbated by pushing their kid along, then I don't know why we don't give the parent the benefit of the doubt. They know their kid better than anyone else. [/quote]

This is some Pollyanna nonsense. Redshirting is a thing in sports precisely because being a year older gives a huge advantage. Looking for an academic edge (over others, though they don’t say the quiet part aloud) is why some parents do it for school. [/quote]

You obviously know nothing about sports. That's not even why college athletes redshirt. They generally only get four years of eligibility. If you're trying to make it to the pros, it may not make sense to burn a year of eligibility sitting on the bench if it's clear you're not going to play because you're not good enough. But sitting out that year, not officially being on the team, doesn't make you any more attractive as a prospect the following year. It's still just as possible that someone new will come along, who is younger than you, who will also be better than you. Redshirting can mark you as a marginal talent. [/quote]

The reason you would spend your first year on the bench and not, say, your 4th is because for non-superstars, coaches often want them to gain a year of physical maturity, because — gasp — being a year older gives you a comparative advantage physically. Like you are tiptoeing sooooo close to the truth, but can’t bring yourself to say it. Also, the whole reason there are only 5 years of eligibility (normally), is to stop multi-year redshirting for non-injury precisely because folks would otherwise do it. We do agree that if your kid was a superstar, you wouldn’t feel the need to hold him back… but here you are.[/quote]

Have you....been to a children's soccer game? Or to a school classroom? There is zero correlation between a child's age and how good they are at math or at driving the ball down the field. The imagined benefits of redshirting seem a little fanciful. [/quote]

People generally cite emotional maturity as the reason to redshirt. Which I think can be a very valid reason to do it -- some kids really are not ready to sit still, follow directions, resolve minor disputes with peers, and other things that are expected in a K classroom but not at the pre-K level.

But we should be careful with this, because as many posters have noted, Kindergarten expectations have increased in recent years, with the grade becoming more academic than it used to be. A generation ago, many K programs were not even full time, and they more resembled PK, with more time dedicated to free play, and lighter academics delivered largely through fun interactions like songs and games. It would have been unusual to see a classroom of K kids listening to a lesson on phonics or doing a math worksheet. Now those things are quite standard.

So what's the danger with redshirting? It further shifts expectations for ALL the students in the classroom, when already expectations are really pushing the limits of what is appropriate even for children who are 5.5 or close to 6 at the start of the year. The more 6 year olds you have in a K classroom, the more likely teachers are to view it as "normal" for kids to be be quiet, compliant, less prone to tears, etc. But actually it is typical for kindergarteners to struggle with those things, and traditionally the whole point of kindergarten was to help kids develop those skills so that they would be set up for success in 1st.

So allowing very emotionally immature kids to be redshirted occasionally shouldn't be an issue, as it will bring those kids more into line with other children in the classroom. But allowing broad discretion by parents results in too many kids being redshirted, which leads to classrooms that lean older, which leads to higher expectations from teachers, which then means that kids who are not even young for the grade (but now are young for the classroom) and who have no real maturity issues, are suddenly viewed as problems simply because they are not as mature as the average kid in class.

All of which is why redshirting decisions should be made in collaboration with the school, not independently by parents (and not by private preschools who have a major incentive to recommend redshirting -- it means they get an extra year of tuition from that family), and should only be done in more extreme situations and not when a child is simply at the lower end of normal for kindergarten maturity. If you are within the range of normal for the age, you should start on time.[/quote]

So many if's!

If the choice is between a parent who has reluctantly concluded that their kid should be held back because they don't want to exacerbate some deficiency and your extremely theoretical parade of horribles, I will go with helping a child who actually exists. [/quote]

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