Parents often struggle with the idea of when they should have their child start Kindergarten. Especially if the child will be entering Kindergarten at the age of 4. It’s a hot topic. There are many articles circulating the internet stating that holding your young child back a year could be detrimental in the long run. Meanwhile, many schools and Kindergarten teachers see first hand that starting Kindergarten before turning 5 can also have a negative impact.
This post is about looking at children that have birthdays in September and later in the year. Redshirting a child that is already 5 is a different issue, unless that child is displaying social/emotional issues or trauma. We will look at three sides of the situation; cons to redshirting, pros to redshirting, and the teacher’s point of view. However, at the end of the day, you know your child best. Use what you know about your child’s skills, what they excel in and what they struggle with. Go by your gut feeling as a parent.
Side 1: Redshirting Could Do More Harm Than Good
Many articles state that redshirting your child will put him or her at a disadvantage in the long run. I read an article from educationnext.org, Is Your Child Ready for Kindergarten, by Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach and Stephanie Howard Larson.The article goes into detail about redshirting. I’ll quickly summarize why the article is against redshirting. For physical maturity, if the child starts on time, his or her size will be comparable to classmates size. “Studies find that the benefit of being older at the start of kindergarten declines sharply as children move through the school grades. In the early grades, an older child will tend to perform better on standardized tests than his younger peers simply by virtue of being older. This makes perfect sense—a redshirted kindergartner has been alive up to 20 percent longer than his on-time counterpart, which means his brain has had more time to develop and he has had that many more bedtime stories, puzzles, and family outings from which to build his general knowledge. This initial advantage in academic achievement dissipates sharply over time, however, and appears to vanish by high school when, as a 9th grader, the redshirted student is at most 7 percent older than his peers.”
“Looking at the evidence, we advise parents to redshirt their child only in unique circumstances. Just what are those situations? Here we have less research to draw upon, but experience suggests a few scenarios. One is extreme developmental delay, outside of the normal range, to such an extent that another year’s development will potentially put the child in range of his classmates. Another is when a child is experiencing trauma, such as having a terminally ill parent or sibling.”
“Many instances of redshirting, however, involve parents who are trying to gain an advantage for their child down the line. Parents sometimes ask us whether redshirting their child will make him more likely to be accepted into gifted and talented programs. Although we could find no direct evidence in the research literature that this is the case, we can extrapolate from the literature that older children may indeed be more likely to be placed in a gifted and talented program. This depends on how schools assign students to such programs, in particular, whether a child’s eligibility is based on a comparison to other children in his grade or to other children his age. With variations according to individual talent, children’s test scores increase both as they get older and as they experience more years of schooling. So, within a given kindergarten classroom, a six-year-old will, on average, score higher than a five-year-old by virtue of being older. And a six-year-old in 1st grade will, on average, outscore a six-year-old in kindergarten, because the 1st grader has had an extra year of schooling.”
The article also goes into the issue that if a child is redshirted, he or she may be more physical mature (taller/bigger) than classmates. The child will graduate high school a year later, hence starting and graduating college a year later, and starting the work force a year later.
“In sum, we find that redshirting at the kindergarten level bestows few benefits and exacts some substantial costs. Both research and experience suggest that the gains that accrue from being an older student are likely to be short-lived. Because of the important role of classroom peer effects, redshirted children can be educationally and socially harmed by being with others who are performing and behaving at lower developmental levels. Furthermore, while it is hard to predict a child’s likely growth trajectory in the months prior to his expected school entry, the perceived developmental delays and immaturity that prompt parents to choose redshirting in the spring have often resolved themselves by fall.”
“As any good educator will tell you, parents know their children best. There are multiple factors to weigh when deciding whether a preschooler is ready to thrive in kindergarten. What research tells us about the “average” child or “most” children may not apply to a particular son’s or daughter’s unique abilities and delays. Families might want to speak with parents of older children about their own kindergarten-enrollment decisions and how they view them in retrospect. And then, parents should follow their own best judgment.”h
Side 2: The Benefits of Redshirting Your Child
Scarymommy.org wrote an article about the benefits of redshirting your child and delaying the start of kindergarten. The article is Delaying Kindergarten May Reap Benefits Through Adulthood by Melissa L. Fenton. I’ll briefly give the key points of this article and attache the link at the end.
“A Stanford study agrees, and found that “kids who delayed attending kindergarten to the later year were far more likely to be able to pay attention in school and had ‘dramatically higher levels of self-control’ than their peers. And that advantage was sustained for years afterward.” “
Studies show that older children are more teachable, compared to the younger students in class. ” A recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Affairsis one of the first to follow redshirted kindergartners into adulthood, and their findings are worth noting. Writing about the study results, NPR notes that “children who start school at an older age do better than their younger classmates and have better odds of attending college and graduating from an elite institution.” “
“The study specifically focused on children who turned 5 in August and then immediately started kindergarten and compared them to children who turned 5 the previous September and were in the same class. Researchers found the older children scored higher on college entrance exams, with an achievement gap of almost 40 points on the SAT. Also worth noting is the fact that the socioeconomic level of the children had little to do with any age achievement gaps — meaning even the children of higher-income families with more resources saw the same disadvantages when starting school at age 4.”
“Perhaps this new problem of overwhelming concern of what age we should send our children to kindergarten has nothing to do with their age at all, but with what the average modern kindergarten looks like. It has seemingly morphed into the new first grade, with children expected to be independently reading before they even step into a classroom.”
Side 3: The Teacher’s Point of View
As a Kindergarten teacher for 8 years, I agree with the article posted from scarymommy.org. In my district, students must turn 5 by December 31. I have had many students in my class that do not turn 5 until the end of November to beginning of December. Many of these students are almost a full year younger than their peers that turn 6 in January and February. The difference between the students that have birthdays between January and June, and those that have birthdays between September and December are huge.
The students with the later birthdays have more difficulties socially. They have a harder time problem solving, not only with daily issues but also in resolving problems with peers. They often need more adult intervention and support in learning how to handle various social situations. In my experience, many of these students are on the immature side. They are more apt to copy negative behavior. The younger students also do not understand the implications of consequences and some require behavior plans to help improve behavior. They also have more difficulty adjusting to full day Kindergarten.
Students on the older side have a better adjustment to full day Kindergarten. The children are socially mature. They are better able to express their thoughts and feelings to peers and adults. These children have an easier time playing and sharing with peers. They are often the role models in class. They understand the importance of following class rules and have a better understanding of the meaning of consequences if class rules are broken.
Now let’s look at academics. The students I have had with birthdays at the beginning to middle of the year enter Kindergarten knowing the majority of letters, sounds, and numbers. They have academic skills such as writing their names, counting with one-to-one correspondence, and are usually ready to learn sight words at the beginning of the year and start reading. If you have read my other blog posts, you know that in Kindergarten we hit the ground running. We start reading sight words and doing academic work right at the start of the school year.
Many of my younger students do not have the same academic skills as my older students. We work very hard with these students to give them the academic support they need. However, it often takes the majority of the year to get them onto Kindergarten level for academics. Unfortunately some of the younger students that were behind in Kindergarten, tend to be behind as they move through the grades. As they mature, they eventually catch up. But it is often a struggle for them and they end up having more behavioral issues and a dislike for school.
I understand that many articles state that younger children entering Kindergarten will not struggle, it’s the older children that will struggle in the long run. However, this has not been my personal experience as an educator. Everyone will take away what they want from this post and form their own personal opinions. I wish I could say that delaying the start of Kindergarten is a black and white issue. Unfortunately it has many gray areas. If you are a parent of a child with a later birthday, you need to look closely at your child, think about what your child can do socially and academically, as well as look at their maturity. Please read my other blog posts about what is expected in Kindergarten. Kindergarten is not like how it once was. Please be aware of what is expected in Kindergarten from your child’s school before making any decisions.
Side 4: My Personal Experience as a Mom
My daughter’s birthday is at the end of October. She turned 5 this year. I needed to decide whether to send my daughter to Kindergarten this year or wait one more year. As a mom, I wanted to send my daughter to Kindergarten with her friends and have her start on time. I didn’t want her to feel as if she was left behind. I also knew that being one of the youngest in the class, she was still on the immature side.
As a teacher, I knew what Kindergarten was going entail – long school days filled with nothing other than academics as the district she will attend does not have playtime. Academically, she was ready to enter Kindergarten, she knew all uppercase and lowercase letters, including sounds. She knew how to count to 20. She could identify numbers and shapes. I knew, however, that as the year progressed, she would struggle to keep up with fast academic pace, and would grow frustrated with both herself and with school. I decided to keep my daughter back in Pre-K one more year. It was a financial burden, but I knew in the long run it would be best for my daughter.