Reply to Why don’t schools make you just through some hoops for redshirting?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Just enroll your kid in kindergarten already. Yes, your kid will be among the youngest and the early years of grade school will have more twists and turns, but in the long run it's better.[b] That way, your student graduates from high school at 17 instead of 19 or 20. [/b]

Our summer birthday started college at almost 18 and will graduate with a bachelor's at 21. A lot of her redshirted peers in the same grade are already 23. They'll graduate with a bachelor's at 24/25/26. Half their 20s are already over, and now what? Grad school? They'll be almost 30 by the time they hit the workforce...

Look ahead 20 years, OP. Redshirting actually holds your kid back later.[/quote]

This is….objectively not better. Also (and, again.) if they’re graduating in May at 20 - or, in the vast majority of cases, at 19…it’s not redshirting, something else is going on  [/quote]

That’s what you’re missing. There are now kids who have Jan/Feb birthdays with a Sep 1 cutoff held back for “the gift of time” and the kids are tough additions in the grade. In this case, they boss around the younger kids and there have been issues with teasing. It’s not ideal for the other kids. [/quote]

Where do you live??[/quote]

This is what I want to know.  I have three kids ranging elementary to high school and they’ve attended different schools each, and I’ve NEVER seen redshirted kids with Jan/Feb birthdays in their classes.  My youngest had an April bday, but otherwise it’s been May-August birthdays for those kids.  [/quote]
Agreed.  There was some weirdness around Covid and virtual instruction with kids starting late, but I'm otherwise unaware of anyone redshirted with a birthday earlier than June, and really it's usually July-September birthdays who are redshirted.  I'm pretty sensitive to this as someone with a kid with a labor day birthday who wasn't redshirted, but there aren't a lot of kids who are more than 12 months older than her.  She also has several friends with August and September birthdays who weren't redshirted.

I do think K and 1st grade teachers often have unrealistic expectations for younger students and those were really hard for my kid.  My 4-5yo kindergartner was sent to the office almost daily that first month of kindergarten for pushing to get to the front of the line when lining up.  The principal told her if she came back, that she'd call her parents.  My kid thought that would be a reward, as she'd get a private party with the principal and her parents.  Totally didn't get it.

It ended up being a really traumatic start to school with a 4-5 yo who was crying and upset about going to school every day.  Kindergarten was too much seat time and the behavior expectations didn't work for her.  She's always been far ahead on academics, so that was never the issue.  It's was the other expectations.[/quote]

Did she go to preschool?   Mine went to a strict preschool that set the kids up well so the transition was no problem.  I think these play based programs are part of the problem. [/quote]
Yes, she was in a daycare with a formal preschool program for ages 2-3 and moved to a well respected preschool for age 4.  The issue wasn't with her preparations, but with the expectations for kindergarten--a public school program in the DMV.  There was an enormous amount of seat time at her desk (2+ hours at a time) and expectations that she could sit quietly and read and write independently.  On the very first week of kindergarten the teacher gave all the kids lined paper, told them to stretch out their sounds and write a "personal narrative" telling her about themselves.  No joke.  It was part of the now defunct Lucy Caulkins curriculum--you can Google it.  The whole kindergarten day was really designed for 1st or 2nd grader.  There was too much sitting, too much individual work at desks, they were expected to focus on a single task for too long at a time, etc.  Many of the older kids in the grade really thrived and the younger ones, including mine, were miserable and had lots of behavior issues.  [/quote]

Those academics are not a normal K, so not sure where you are sending your kid.  But, yes, kids should be able to sit at age 5.  You picked a bad school for your child, and that is the issue.  It also doesn't sound like your prek or preschool prepared your child at all.  The only publics that might do that would be a charter and when you knew it was a bad fit, you should have moved your kid.  THat's not normal for a regular public where at least half the class or more cannot read or write.[/quote]
My kid was well prepared could do the academics, even though I think they were absurd.  It was the pace of the day and behavior expectations that were the problem.  The kindergarten program was designed for 7 yos.

It is a well respected public school in the DMV.  I bought a house and sent my kid to the zoned school.  I didn't "pick" the wrong school for my kid.  It wasn't a charter.  It was the neighborhood school.  [/quote]

Then take it up with the school but that is NOT a normal K class where kids are expected to fully read and write.  Most aren't reading or writing at that age which sucks for those of our kids who are.  Guess your well respected school wasn't so great as you thought it was and money can buy you self-segregation from the rest of our kids but not good academics.[/quote]I don't think it's that much of an outlier. Academic expectations in K have increased dramatically from when we were kids.  If I'd known this I would have thought more about redshirting rather than following the cutoffs and starting a 4 yo in kindergarten.[/quote]

The academic standards for K are the same, however, upper grades are much lower.  Your well-respected school was the issue and that's not a typical K curriculum so perhaps the issue was that school and you should have joined the PTA and advocated for a better curriculum.  Or, given it was all rich families and many of those kids went in reading it was developmentally appropriate for that cohort.

Have you ever considered a child's feelings toward being held back?

My kid was terribly bored in elementary school.  Especially the early grades as they were not academically challenging at all.  [/quote]
No, the academic standards in K are not the same.  I went to a public half day kindergarten program where we spent most of the year on the alphabet and held a wedding where Q married U.  That's not kindergarten these days, at least not in NOVA.  Kids working reading and writing, which used to be first grade content.

This acceleration pulls through high school.  I'm not aware of any school offering classes beyond Calc BC when I was in high school in the 90s.  Now local high schools offer several more advanced College level math classes because kids are finishing Calc BC early in high school.  That's a big change. [/quote]

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