Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is OP - It's not that I'm afraid of the older children hurting my son, it's that I can't see how a teacher can teach multiple children aged 5-8 at the same time. I assume the older kids might be reading, writing etc., while kids like my son aren't anywhere close to that. How can the teacher conduct lessons with kids of varying ages?

I doubt you'll find any 8-year olds in Kindergarten. There will be some who may be turning 7 during the school year, but even those probably wouldn't turn 7 until springtime.

Her son will be placed in a K-2 mixed age classroom, thus the 5-8 range.

+1. We held back our DD one year (first year in private K, second year entered FFX K). Best decision for her -- the extra year of maturity and focused intervention/therapy made a world of difference. In four years she went from iep qualified to AAP level iv center eligible. Every kid has their own pace - trust your gut instinct. Good luck!

We held our June birthday DS back, in a private JK program, and moved him to public K at 6 (with an IEP). He started in FFX Child Find at age 3 b/c of significant speech delays. At age 5, b/c he was public school age, the level of public services available drops significantly if you are in private, so we just did private services (OT, speech) for a year. This plan worked out really well for our kid. He just finished 1st grade (still with an IEP), and is at grade level for all academics and now loves school and has a steadly declining need for any special ed services. We expect that by grade 3 he will no longer ned an IEP. So, for us, holding our DS back worked really well. He just wasn't ready for K at 5. But this is a really kid-specific decision.

It won't work. You need to send.

Sorry, I mistyped! There were two dc in the fours preschool
Class last year who were already *five* at the start of the year. So given the sept 30 kindergarten cutoff, they should have technically been in kindergarten, but instead were in preschool.

Anonymous wrote:Hi OP, I checked with my dc after school today (the childrens school/reed school graduate) and dc confirmed that 2 of her friends were 6 when school started last year. Since the cut off is Sept 30, that means Arlington definitely "allows" special ed kids an extra year.

This is OP. Thanks for checking!!! Just to clarify - they had two six-year-olds in a 4-year-old class? Do you know if those children were in the APS Spec Ed system before last year? That is, was it their first year of preK on an IEP, or their second (or third)?

Hi OP, I checked with my dc after school today (the childrens school/reed school graduate) and dc confirmed that 2 of her friends were 6 when school started last year. Since the cut off is Sept 30, that means Arlington definitely "allows" special ed kids an extra year.

In MCPS, if you want services, you have to send them on time. They will not just give you an extra year...it all comes down to the cost. If you want to do private for a year and delay K you are fine.

Anonymous wrote:eta-here's a link.
http://www.apsva.us/domain/2860

OP here - that school sounds really good. It's interesting to me that they say they serve children "2-5" - that means 5 y.o. kids could be in preK, no? Regardless (or as Tony Soprano used to say, "irregardless") we are talking with his Spec Ed coordinator tomorrow, so I'll bring it up. Thanks for the rec!

eta-here's a link.
http://www.apsva.us/domain/2860

Sorry, I missed your earlier post that you were happy with his current placement. The childrens school is a regular preschool for APS employees. There is a small Arlington County special ed preschool housed at the childrens school called Reed School/Integration Station. The facilities are great (ST on staff, separate OT/sensory room, gym for PE, nice playground with lots of room to roam) and the library is in the same building.

There are 3 or 4 special ed preschool kids placed in each of the "regular" Childrens School classes. There is a special ed teacher in with them to facilitate social skills etc. Then they spend a smaller part of the day with just the smaller group of special ed kids. We were really happy with the program.