Reply to Spouse and I disagree about redshirting son

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I hate this red-shirting trend. If your child is age eligible to start send them. We now have Kindergarten classes with huge age swings just because Sally’s or Billy’s parents wanted them to be the tallest, fastest, smartest, the list goes on. Absent extreme situations it’s bullshit in my mind. [/quote]

Totally agree. And the acceptable redshirting month seems to push earlier and earlier. It used to be just August and maybe some July. Now there are kids in my DD's grade that are March redshirts. In a local mom group, I've seen people consider it for JANUARY birthdays which is just wild to me. My DD is July 22 and the only other July birthday kids we've met are born the year before her with the exception of maybe 3? All August birthday kids we've met were born the year before her. She is quite possibly the youngest in her class and she was born 6 weeks before the cut off. [/quote]

I think it varies a lot by demographic. If it’s this prevalent in the school your kid goes to, then you have two choices:
1. Complain about it and try to get all the other parents to make different decisions for their children
2. Accept that the de facto cut off is December (or whenever) and make your own choices for your own children accordingly.

For what it’s worth, winter redshirting is still quite rare, and unlikely to significantly influence the makeup of your child’s class. But summer redshirting is common in certain demographics. Of the two strategies above, one of them is much more likely to lead to the outcome you want.[/quote]

Well, too late, she's in 3rd grade now I already made my choice. I just never would've guessed there would be so many redshirts, particularly earlier than July. [/quote]

This -- many of us make these choices well before discovering what kind of culture we are in regarding redshirting. Especially with first or only children.

We are in a jurisdiction where redshirting is really rare because the school district is extremely restrictive about it. So our kid with an August birthday is not out of step and often has kids younger than her in class. However, we are anticipating a move for work at the end of elementary, and the area we are moving to is likely to have a ton of redshirting. I am stressed about it because middle school is hard no matter what, moving for middle school sounds like it could be tricky, and now I need to think about whether DD will be over a year younger than many classmates right as they are all starting puberty. We are working on getting the lay of the land no and considering having her repeat 6th depending on how things line up age-wise and academically, but she's currently working well above grade level in major subjects so that could be a mistake too.

It's not that I expect all the other parents to change their behavior, I'm just noting that redshirting as a practice impacts others, not just your kid. It's like when a bunch of parents give their kids phones really early. Like yes, it's up to them to make that decision for their kids. And also I resent their decision if it makes things harder for me as a parent.[/quote]

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