Re: holding back kindergarden

[Guest guest]

First I'll say it really depends on every individual child.

Our experience has been a positive one. had severe apraxia at

age 3 and spent 2 years in the pre-school disabled program in our

district. He turned 5 last june. Our cutoff is October 1st. So age

wise he was at the younger 25%.

For him kindergarten has been a great experience. He receives speech

Ot and resource and also attends a private kindergarten 2 afternoons

a week. His progress has been remarkable. For him this was a huge

year. For a child who could barely write his name a year ago he is

now writing sentences reading books to me and doing simple (very

simple math).

I have no regrets. The academic challenges have stimulated him and

his self esteem has increased as well. Socially he has also made

progress. For us it was a win win year.

Again it is up to each individual as to how well they can handle

kindergarten. I recommend observing the included kindergarten classes

to see what these kids are doing.

I have also found that there are kids who have never attended pre-

school, some who have and the kids are at all different levels

academically.

I was just in the classroom today and all the kids have matured so

much since September.

I think some parents may hold their kids in pre-school while others

do have them repeat kindergarten. Personnally I prefer the latter b/c

if he did have a great year then 1st grade is still a viable option.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

denise

> hi everone,

>

> I'm very confused about the holding back kindergarden. Its not

hard

> to confuse me...lol.

> is it that you keep the child in preschool another year or that the

> child goes to kindergarden and then repeats it?

> My son's b-day is March so when he attends kindergarden he will be

5

> years 6 months. would i start him in kindergarden on time?

> I'm very concerned because of the social aspect of holding him back?

> I read the articles posted here about kindergarden and like I said

> I'm confused.

> My client who has PDD>NOS, (also was diagnosed with apraxia but

> doing great) is going to repeat kindergarden also. He is starting

> kindergarden in sept with a shadow, his mom wants to repeat

> kindergarden without the shadow next year is this wrong?

>

> thanks

> chris

[Guest guest]

In my experience ... the answer is " it depends " . My son is 5

and was eligible for K this year. However, the child study team and

our family knew it wasn't the right thing. He stayed in the

preschool program for another year. There are others who are sent

to K but then, at the end of the year aren't ready for 1st grade.

I know two families whose kids repeated K. While this is better

than repeating 3rd grade, its still tough on the kids. They know

their friends moved up ... they see them on the bus and around

school. They might have participated in grade-specific afterschool

activities (church school, Daisy Girl Scouts, soccer), which will

also be affected.

It is a tough decision. Like everything else, there is no right or

wrong answer.

Margaret...'s Mom

> I'm very confused about the holding back kindergarden. Its not

> hard to confuse me...lol.

> is it that you keep the child in preschool another year or that

> the child goes to kindergarden and then repeats it?

[Guest guest]

it's confusing even the professionals so don't feel bad.

Age to start kindergarten has come up over and over. The real

questions are simple however. What are the downsides of each -and

which gives the child the best chance of a successful school career?

The research says why 'not' start them at 5. So if it's a child

with a severe impairment of speech who still requires intensive

therapy -why 'not' start them at 6 in kindergarten?

Just like early intervention -some may say they never had early

intervention -their child was " a late talker " and " he's talking just

fine now " . Due to this some still argue there is no need to put a

late talker child into early therapy... in spite of the overwhelming

research. I see this happening with age to start children in

kindergarten.

Bottom line is that, yes, it's up to you as the child's parent. I

would recommend reading all the professional research which tracks

the children over the years in school. The key aspect is not to

just check how children are doing in kindergarten which is not much

different than a really good preschool in many ways, but are they

ready and how are they doing in the grades 'after' kindergarten.

First, second...'third' (a key grade) etc. all start one after

another very quick -the summer after kindergarten ends.

Even without any type of developmental delays in a child there are

heated debates on the best age to start a child in kindergarten.

The fairly affluent and well educated town I used to live in NJ (In

Somerset County) -most parents in our old home town didn't start

their kids until 6 in kindergarten for " academic and athletic

reasons " " to give them an edge " . So also see what other parents

are doing in your town -because starting your speech impaired child

at 5 when the rest of the class, also known as " the mainstream " are

all a year older is setting your child up, and not for a good

thing. Happened to us.

The bottom line is that if the child is ready in all areas,

including maturity, then start him at 5. If there is the discussion

and concern that " he may have to repeat kindergarten if he's not

ready for first grade at the end of the year " then it's my opinion -

don't start him/her. Research shows that children that repeat a

grade -even kindergarten -don't do as well.

http://www.ascd.org/publications/ed_lead/200304/holloway.html

What do you do for that year? In our town we had Tanner in 'out of

district placement' at the Summit Speech School for hearing impaired

in New Providence, NJ -an awesome school that knows the importance

of starting children with impairments in kindergarten at 6 (much

more research and awareness for hearing impaired children) Each

child is entitled to a FAPE and if your local town school can't

provide placement for your child with appropriate services than they

are required to provide some type of alternative placement. Sounds

like most have to fight for this. If your child is already in an

out of district placement preschool for hearing impaired children -

probably won't have to fight for this at all. We didn't.

I wish someone gave me this advice for my oldest son who is still an

honor roll student. Grades, social and being ready had nothing to

do with it. We followed our gut and started Dakota in kindergarten

at 5 because he was bright -and we thought " ready "

Dakota's maturity as a summer baby (July 30th) has always been an

issue -and today we know we were wrong to have started him at 5.

All Dakota's classmates were 6 -and as the year went on some were

7. Dakota was 5 the entire year -and until July 3oth. It's

horrible to have a child be yelled at because he's being compared to

children that are developmentally a year to two older than your

child. That's how we learned the hard way that being ready

for 'kindergarten' isn't the only thing to look for.

For our son Tanner who exhausted from therapy and preschool at 5 -we

are thrilled we didn't start Tanner in kindergarten until 6. I

shudder to think of where he would be today if we started him at 5.

It would not have been fair to him -that I know for sure. Tanner

transitioned out of OT by the end of (mainstream) kindergarten -at

6. Now at 7 Tanner is able to sit up in a chair for hours and write

notes just like the other students sitting next to him. And (again)

he is a straight A student -and one that the teachers love to have

in their class.

Not many articles out there on what age to start a child in

kindergarten when they are still in intensive therapy so as a group

over time the truth will shine through.

" studies have shown that many children, even those who have attended

pre-kindergarten, would benefit from starting kindergarten at the

age of six rather than five. In private schools, headmasters often

delay a child's entry into kindergarten until the age of six because

educators deem that such a program will benefit that particular

child. This strategy is particularly true for boys, who experience

language delays more frequently than girls. "

http://www.gothamgazette.com/article/feature-commentary/20040316/202/913

If however the plan by anyone is to start a child in kindergarten

with the notion that " if he doesn't do well we can just have him

repeat kindergarten " may want to wait until 6. The research is in

on this and those kids do not do as well.

" Research Link / When Children Aren't Ready for Kindergarten

H. Holloway

How can schools promote the achievement of children who are old

enough to enroll in kindergarten but who are not developmentally

ready to succeed? Two approaches that parents and schools commonly

use are delaying the child's entry into kindergarten and retaining

the child in kindergarten for an extra year.

Giving children an extra year, whether through delayed entry or

kindergarten retention, makes sense in view of the ample research

suggesting that the youngest children tend to lag behind their

classmates. West, Denton, and Reaney (2000) found that in the spring

of their kindergarten year, younger children had lower reading and

mathematics knowledge and skills on average than did their older

counterparts. These researchers also found that older kindergartners

were more likely to persist at tasks, more eager to learn, and

better able to pay attention.

Delayed Entry Versus Kindergarten Retention

To avoid the disadvantage suffered by younger students, some parents

choose to delay the entry of their children into kindergarten. Zill,

Loomis, and West (1997) found that children whose kindergarten entry

was delayed so that they started kindergarten when they were older

performed better than their younger classmates in grades 1 and 2.

These researchers concluded that the extra year before starting

kindergarten does not harm the children who are held out and may

help most of them.

In contrast, the researchers discovered that children who repeated

kindergarten were doing worse than their younger classmates on most

school performance indicators by 1st or 2nd grade. For instance, two-

thirds of the retained students had received some negative feedback

from teachers compared with less than half of the nonretained

students. The retained students were also much more likely to have

problems concentrating, to perform below their capabilities, and to

act up and disrupt the class. Zill, Loomis, and West concluded that

repeating kindergarten had not helped those children and may have

actually made matters worse.

Reasons for the Differences

What explains the difference between the school performance of

delayed-entry children and those who repeat kindergarten? Both

groups of students are older than most of their classmates, so why

don't the beneficial effects of being older apply to both groups?

Some possible answers are that

The underlying developmental problems of the two groups may differ.

The two groups may have different socioeconomic backgrounds.

Parents who choose to delay their children's school entry may have a

higher level of awareness and involvement.

The stigmatizing effect of being required to repeat a grade may harm

children's academic progress.

(read full article)

http://www.ascd.org/publications/ed_lead/200304/holloway.html

or if you have awhile may want to read

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2000/2000039.pdf

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs98/98097.pdf

and my son Tanner's page

http://www.cherab.org/information/familiesrelate/letter.html

=====

[Guest guest]

This topic is near and dear to my heart because of '

experience. So forgive me if I come off strong. Forgive me for

retelling this story for those of you who have heard it a million

times.

At the beginning of this year, we were trying to figure out what to

do with ' placement. He has a late birthday. The school

assured me that kindergarten was the way to go since *cognitively*

he was ready. They assured me that the it was a Montessori-style

class so he wouldn't feel pushed, etc. Blah, Blah, blah!

A good family friend from Wisconsin (who has a special needs child

who is now 40, went back to school to be a school psychologist and

has been practicing as a school psych for years) sat on the phone

with me this past summer and told me that it was my decision but she

wanted to strongly encourage me to keep in preschool another

year. Especially for kids whose neurological systems are immature,

why not give them extra time to get up to speed on their social

skills, attention skills, endurance, etc. She made the mistake of

putting her son in kindergarten at 5 years of age because the school

said he was so tall that he really needed to be in kindergarten.

She followed the school's advice and has regretted it ever since.

Despite her advice, I gave into pressure from my husband and the

school who all assured me that needed to be challenged and

he would be bored repeating pre-K.

was put into a mainstream kindergarten class. He started

coming home depressed from school every day. He never wanted to talk

about his day. He had some friends at the beginning of the year but

the " friends " soon were saying mean things to him and he felt

socially isolated. He was so immature compared to them. Then the

situation exploded! I found out that (starting in late November) the

teacher was using an adaptive chair as a time out for my son's

refusal to complete fine motor tasks and for not staying seated. I

think the teacher had tried everything she could to get to

adapt to the kindergarten class and got frustrated. That is no

excuse for the abuse however. Yes, this teacher is an exception (at

least we hope!) but the point here is that my son wasn't ready to

function in a K classroom. It was a full-day program which makes a

big difference also I think. He got so tired by the afternoon.

During his 4 months in his K class, he hated life and really did not

learn anything. I thought it was just because he had learning

difficulties.

When we switched him to a mainstream Pre-K, he was like a new kid.

He loved school and had friends. The funny thing is that he learned

more in his first 4 weeks of pre-K than in his 4 months in

kindergarten. I think this is because he felt comfortable enough to

explore and learn there. He is now sight reading and starting to

decode words. he knows all his letter and corresponding letter

sounds. He knows all the continents and can tell you something

about each one. He is writing words and is starting to love to

write and draw. At our first parent-teacher conference with his pre-

K teacher, she talked about how he is one of her top students. She

can give him an assignment and walk away and he just does it. I

asked if had been upducted by aliens. If you compared

the progress notes from his Kindergarten teacher and the ones from

his pre-K teacher, you would think they were talking about different

children. It is just astonishing to see how differently

responded to the two environments.

I hate that had to go through what he did in order to get

back to preschool. However, I am grateful that it worked out the

way it did. He will be able to start kindergarten next year on top

of his game. He will already be reading and writing and will

socially be part of the group. He has always felt like he was behind

everyone else and he hates it. His deficits drive him to try harder

but he needs a comfortable environment to develop. He felt too self-

conscious on kindergarten because he felt like he did not fit in.

My advice is if there is even a grain of doubt, I would hold a child

back. The benefits of holding a child back could be numerous, the

draw backs...are there any? On the other hand the costs of starting

a child at age 5 can be great for a child who has an immature

neurological system anyway. In our case, the benefits of starting

at age 5 in kindergarten were none...it was disastrous!

Sorry this is so long and much of it is a repeat.

Tricia Morin

North Carolina

, " christinerome "

<christinerome@y...> wrote:

> hi everone,

>

> I'm very confused about the holding back kindergarden. Its not

hard

> to confuse me...lol.

> is it that you keep the child in preschool another year or that

the

> child goes to kindergarden and then repeats it?

> My son's b-day is March so when he attends kindergarden he will be

5

> years 6 months. would i start him in kindergarden on time?

> I'm very concerned because of the social aspect of holding him

back?

> I read the articles posted here about kindergarden and like I said

> I'm confused.

> My client who has PDD>NOS, (also was diagnosed with apraxia but

> doing great) is going to repeat kindergarden also. He is starting

> kindergarden in sept with a shadow, his mom wants to repeat

> kindergarden without the shadow next year is this wrong?

>

> thanks

> chris