kids with summer birthdays

[Scooby]

So my boy will turn 5 June 20th, and is eligible to start kindergarten this fall. Was wondering if yall held off till the following year those of your kids with summer birthdays...If he starts this yr, he will turn 18 after he graduates from high school assuming late may/early june graduation schedule. Plus he'll be getting his drivers license later that most of his peers. I'm having trouble deciding what to do. I am thinking about keeping him at his montessori school for kindergarten this yr, then put him in public school kindergarten the following yr. He will be one of the older ones in his class and may also help if he's involved in athletics later down the road. I think he is academically & mentally ready to start public school kindergarten, but just wanted to get some input here. TIA!

[Skippy]

I consider two things:

 

1. Is he extra bright? If he is then get him going as he will only end up being ahead of the class curve and depending on the child this can be very bad.

 

2. Is he very mature? If he is then you may not want to wait. If he is not then you probably should wait.

 

There will be others with good opinions but these were the tools I used when I had to make that same choice. I started mine on time and with my first one I probably should have waited. With the next two it was the right thing to do.

[MrTed46]

So my boy will turn 5 June 20th, and is eligible to start kindergarten this fall. Was wondering if yall held off till the following year those of your kids with summer birthdays...If he starts this yr, he will turn 18 after he graduates from high school assuming late may/early june graduation schedule. Plus he'll be getting his drivers license later that most of his peers. I'm having trouble deciding what to do. I am thinking about keeping him at his montessori school for kindergarten this yr, then put him in public school kindergarten the following yr. He will be one of the older ones in his class and may also help if he's involved in athletics later down the road. I think he is academically & mentally ready to start public school kindergarten, but just wanted to get some input here. TIA!

 

I don't have a kid, but if I felt the way you did (in bold) I would let him start.

[T_bone65]

Our daughter will be 5 in July and she will start Kindergarten this fall. She goes to an all girls Catholic school and has since pre-K3. I wouldn't think twice about it if he is ready for it. My son graduated 2 years ago and will turn 20 in Sept of this year.

[Azazello1313]

for a summer b-day, you would essentially be holding him back, which I don't think I would do. yeah, a lot of the kids will be a little older, but a lot of them will be younger, too (anyone born between june 20 and mid september or wherever they draw the line) -- that's basically 25% of the kids that will be his age or younger. he would be slotting in where he ought to.

 

the thing I think is really ill-advised, is all these parents who think their kid with like a november b-day is so smart and advanced that he has to start early. and maybe they are that smart, but it's still a really bad idea, especially for boys, who tend to get picked on ruthlessly.

[Double Agent]

I had an August birthday and started school on time. Graduated at 17...one of the youngest in the class. I really wish I would have been held back one year for sports reasons. I still got a scholarship but feel like my opportunities would have been better if I had another year. Academically I never had a problem starting "early".

 

We're in the same boat. Both of our babies were born in August. Not sure what we'll do.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

Our daughter turned 5 in December. She goes to daycare where she is being taught some kindergarten level stuff. In Arizona, kindergarten is not required so she could test into 1st grade this summer, but we're going to put her in kindergarten. We look at the education she's getting now as a nice head start. As noted earlier you have to look at both how advanced your child is already as well as their emotional level.

 

Part of me also feels that kids grow up so fast I'd hate to push it and make it faster! Not only that, by pushing her ahead early she'll be another year ahead of her sister who will already be 4 years behind her.

[Azazello1313]

I really wish I would have been held back one year for sports reasons.

 

I read something, I think in one of the freakonomics books, about high-level athletes being VERY disproportionately represented toward the birthdays where they end up being the oldest ones in their class.

[montster]

i believe the most important thing is if he's socially ready (i.e. he's ok at school if you're not around, he can play with other kids, sit still, listen to the teacher, etc.). from your description, it sounds as if he is. the stuff about school sports, driver's license, graduation -- that stuff is at least 10 years away. if your son is ready now and you hold him back a year, he could very well spend the next 10 years in classes where the other kids are below him academically and in maturity. that could lead to a bored student, which is never good.

[T_bone65]

for a summer b-day, you would essentially be holding him back, which I don't think I would do. yeah, a lot of the kids will be a little older, but a lot of them will be younger, too (anyone born between june 20 and mid september or wherever they draw the line) -- that's basically 25% of the kids that will be his age or younger. he would be slotting in where he ought to.

 

the thing I think is really ill-advised, is all these parents who think their kid with like a november b-day is so smart and advanced that he has to start early. and maybe they are that smart, but it's still a really bad idea, especially for boys, who tend to get picked on ruthlessly.

 

I agree with this totally, we have some friends that have a daughter that will be 5 this April and she is already in Kindergarten now. She is only 3 months older then our daughter but her parents think she is just so much smarter and more developed blah blah blah. It is a shame becuase our daughter really likes her and wants to play with her but they play so badly together it isn't funny. They have had her in a different school every year because they don't like the feedback they were given on how their daughter acted, they got the same feedback from me 1 day when I watched them both play for a few hours at our house. She hasn't been back to play in over a year since I mentioned it to them

[Czarina]

I wouldn't be in a hurry to send him. Boys mature later than girls do, and while he might seem ready now, it could be harder for him down the road. I think you have to go with your gut in terms of how he's maturing socially at this point. Once you get into the "school years" life passes by so much more quickly. Grab this last year.

[Yukon Cornelius]

it depends. there some kids that should not start till 9 and some that could start at 4.

[Gonkis]

I didn't read all the other responses, but I would recommend waiting. I have a daughter who turned 6 right before starting Kindergarten this past fall. She is a superstar although probably not ready last year she is older than 90% of her classmates. She is ahead of the other kids, but not bored. It also helps that she is the youngest of 4 kids.

I also have a boy turning 8 in a couple weeks who is in 2nd grade. A March bday made him younger than most, but basically in the middle of the pack. I wish he had gotten one more year before getting into this. Kindergarten is not the best gauge of it and (in Ohio at least) has not been affected by the significant changes in elementary school curriculum. 1st and 2nd grade are very different even from a few years ago when my stepdaughter went through the same public school. There is a lot of pressure now on the district to adopt faster paced learning, my 2nd grader has 45 minutes to an hour of homework each night, 15 word spelling tests weekly, 2 computer tests on books read, etc. He is struggling with some things and I know it is simply because he is developing at his own pace. His IQ is high (the school tested it) and he is considerate, friendly, outgoing.... but he is not yet an independent learner. A few years down the road it may be different for him, but right now it hasn't clicked. He's a 7 year old boy! We didn't see any signs of anything through kindergarten, but the level of learning jumped significantly in 1st grade and then again in 2nd grade. The 2nd grade teacher writes the assignements on the board and relies on the students to copy that to their planner... yeah. He get's it correct about 3 times a week. We have a group of parents who are constantly calling to check what the 14th spelling word is because Billy didn't write it neat enough, for example.

 

Probably wrote too much here, but the chances of you regretting the decision to wait are slim compared to the risk associated with thrusting them into it early.

[Caveman_Nick]

I was the youngest kid in my class when I was growing up. It was difficult at times, because I was behind other kids in a lot of ways. Learning the material at school was never one of those ways. I think I had a little bit of an easier time with that because I was younger.

 

I was almost a year younger than some kids, and so from a social and physical standpoint I had troubles, until HS when I "caught up"

 

Even so, as an adult I wouldn't consider trading the chance to finish a year earlier against having an easier time had I been one of the oldest kids in the class because I started a year later.

Edited February 18, 2010 by Caveman_Nick

[westvirginia]

I was the youngest kid in my class when I was growing up. It was difficult at times, because I was behind other kids in a lot of ways. Learning the material at school was never one of those ways. I think I had a little bit of an easier time with that because I was younger.

 

I was almost a year younger than some kids, and so from a social and physical standpoint I had troubles, until HS when I "caught up"

 

Even so, as an adult I wouldn't consider trading the chance to finish a year earlier against having an easier time had I been one of the oldest kids in the class because I started a year later.

 

+1. My birthday is October, so I started kindergarten at 4 and graduated HS at 17. If the kid is bright enough and mature enough, I'd say give him the advantage of starting earlier.

[polksalet]

Jr.'s b'day is in February. He was extra large and extra bright for his age but I still held him out until he was 6 because I wanted him to stay with us for another year. He is now freakishly bigger than any other kid in his grade, faster than any of the other kids, and makes straight A's. I can't say his level of achievement would be as high if I started him at 5. FWIW most kindergarten teachers in this (your) area that I have talked to think kids should be held until they are 6 no matter when they become eligible. He has kids in class who started when they were 4 and are almost 7. He is almost 9 and is far more mature and intelligent than the ones who started early. My opinion? Keep him home, you know you want to and it will do nothing but benefit him.

[Jimmy Neutron]

Our youngest was born 8/3. We were leaning toward keeping him home for another year, but he freaked. "All of his friends were going."

 

In hindsight, we probably should have kept him home despite his feelings. He does very well acedemically, but he is small for that age group and emotionally immature.

[Clubfoothead]

Born 8/7. I was one of the youngest in my grade. You'd probably find the following link of great interest:

 

http://www.gladwell.com/outliers/index.html

 

I love reading Gladwell and maybe since my experience is the opposite, that is why I disagree with him on this one. I was the smallest and youngest of my peers. We moved a lot but that was consistent. So you had my "natural" age group, most of whom started school a year after me and then you have the age group that were my peers who were generally older and bigger. Gladwell correctly points out that my peers had a competitive advantage over me but I think I have an advantage over my "natural" age group because of the experiences I gained constantly competing against those older, bigger and wiser than myself.

 

My oldest daughter was born on 9/3 so we didn't get to choose. She is one of the oldest in her class. She's having a perfectly fine experience doing it the opposite way I did.

 

You give a $hit. That is probably more important than when you start.

[twiley]

for a summer b-day, you would essentially be holding him back, which I don't think I would do. yeah, a lot of the kids will be a little older, but a lot of them will be younger, too (anyone born between june 20 and mid september or wherever they draw the line) -- that's basically 25% of the kids that will be his age or younger. he would be slotting in where he ought to.

 

the thing I think is really ill-advised, is all these parents who think their kid with like a november b-day is so smart and advanced that he has to start early. and maybe they are that smart, but it's still a really bad idea, especially for boys, who tend to get picked on ruthlessly.

Pretty much agree with all points and as for me - I have an August birthday, excelled in school and sports.

[untateve]

Our youngest was born 8/3. We were leaning toward keeping him home for another year, but he freaked. "All of his friends were going."

 

In hindsight, we probably should have kept him home despite his feelings. He does very well acedemically, but he is small for that age group and emotionally immature.

 

my youngest was also born 8/3 (he's 10 now). We held him back and had him do an extra year of pre-k. Academically, he was (and is) fine. However, he was not the most mature boy then and he still isn't. For my wife and I (and our son) it was clearly the right decision.