Dtr May Have to Redo kindergarten.......confused........

Hi,
I am the Director at Reading Friends. We are an academic preschool for children ages 2-Kindergarten.

First, a big part of my job is counseling parents about this very topic....whether or not to give their child the gift of an extra year. I have some information in print that I would be happy to share with you that you could share with your husband.

Let me just say this, and I don't mean to be gender-biased, but the dads almost always have a hard time with the thought of their child being different/associating their differences with failure of some sort....I don't know why, but I see it time and time again. Just because your child is different does not mean you have failed as a parent.

At any rate, if I can help you with anything, please let me know. We do have Kindergarten and tutoring help if you think that is the best route to go....almost everything we do at Reading Friends is rooted from a therapy perspective...this perspective works for all children in my point of view :-)

Please contact me directly if I can help....I wish you the best!

Regards,
M.

M. Senick
Reading Friends
www.readingfriends.org
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whatever happened with your little girl?

Hi Stephanie,
I feel for you , especially for being alone in this decision.
But here's the thing and you know it already. if you know she isnt; ready then do what's in her best interest. Evrything and everyone else is secondary.

I have a very bright 4 year old who is academically at 1st grade level already but is emotionally immature and physically small. He also has a short attention span when it's something that doesn't interest him or someone gives him multi-step directions.I'm holding him back in preschool another year. He will be 7 when he enters 1st grade. I'd rather watch him make friends, be confident and belong rather than be the youngest and overwhelmed.

My best wishes. Do get several opinions before you decide on treatment. Good luck!

I used to teach 3rd graders. I had a few situations where an immature child was passed along, eventhough not succeeding in class, until he/she hit 3rd grade. I've held several children back and of course the parents want to know why know one said anything sooner. I understand how you husband ffels, but would let the school do the testing and would tell them that I wanted her held back. Give her a chance to mature before she is passed through the system and can't catch up. Let us know how it all goes....lots of luck with your situation!

As a kindergarten teacher, I would tell you if the teachers/administrators feel that she should repeat kindergarten I would go with it. It is an agonizing decision that teachers make. I had to recommend that one of my students repeat kindergarten next year. It was not a decision that I came to lightly. He simply was not ready to move on. He showed improvement throughout the year, but he is not emotionally ready to move on. As I explained to the mom, it is better that he is held back now than later on when it will affect him more. If your daughter is not ready she will just be frustrated in first grade and it may turn her off to school. Just as you may feel that you are a failure as a parent (which you are NOT), I felt like I was a failure as a teacher. The reality is that there is a spectrum of learning and some kids don't move as quickly as others. If a child is not ready to learn something no matter how much you try to teach them they will not grasp it.
As for the ADHD, I would get an outside opinion. The school where I work will not even recommend testing for ADHD for kindergarten unless it seems severe.
Good Luck....try to look at it from the perspective of your daughter's future. It may not seem like the best option now, but it could be the best option for her future.

Stephanie,
I know from first hand experience that if your daughter isn't ready then don't push or let her continue on. My daughter is in second grade and has struggled so much this year. at the end of last year we debated on letting her move on or holding her back, I wanted to hold her back and her dad didn't. He won and we let her move up. Big mistake. Her birthday is late July and her maturity level has never been up with the rest of her class. So we are looking at her redoing the second grade over because we didn't do it last year.

Good luck

Hi Stephanie:

I'm sorry I don't have time to read the other responses but I wanted to weigh in on the sunject quickly. My step-son repeated Kindergarten (my husband was for it, mom was not). He is now 17 (will be 18 in August) and a Jr. We are all VERY happy that he repeated Kindergarten as even to this day, he still lacks the maturity and attention span of his peers. We have had his tested for everything with our own private Dr's and he has nothing other than a lack of maturity or willingness to apply himself more. We have done tutoring, Kumon, after school one on one with teachers - As hard as it has been on his thus far, I can't imagine the difficulties he would have had if he had not been held back.

Follow your heart - you know you'll do what's best for your daughter. Best of luck to you!

I feel for you! It sounds like those teachers want what is best for your daughter and want to make sure she is ready for first grade. You sound like a caring and wonderful mother.

I have some knowledge in this matter and want to tell you what I have learned. My son will be starting K this year as a 6 year old because we held him back. My husband and I argued back and forth about it. He is like your husband and thought more about the age and not about the child. My son has a speech impairment too and some other stuff that I was concerned about.

That extra year was the best thing I could have ever done for him. It really is a gift of time and if your daughter has developmental delays and the testing suggests suggests she stay in K then I hope you do look at that extra year as a gift of time. It is much easier now to catch up rather than struggle and stay back a year later. All we want as parents is for our children to be happy and succeed and not struggle.

To make a long story short, my son has articulation delay(and very recently they notice a pragmatic delay), sensory issues, and we also had a full testing done on him because I was concerned about him not verbalizing things and breaking down when he was upset. So they did a whole bunch of testing. Since your child is already in K, I am sure the testing will be different than what they gave my son. A psychologist came to see my son and she observed his him in pre K class. Later they did one on one work. The test was called the Bracken Basic Concept Scale and what it did was test concepts children need to know in early childhood education. It determines a child's school readiness and knowledge of English language verbal concepts.

Do not second guess yourself or feel that you failed in any way. I have been down that road also. Look at the idea that the issue was caught early enough and your daughter does not have to struggle down the road later. When I went to my son's ARD meeting for his K year, I was not quite sure what to expect. We went over his IEP and I feel that we are working as a team to make his school year the best they can be.

My only comment is that 7 years old is not so late to start first grade. My son was born ON September 1st and we had to decide for him to be one of the youngest in his class or one of the oldest. We decided that oldest had so many more advantages!
There are a ton of children that are already 7 or turning 7 at the beginning of the school year.

Don't feel bad for doing what is best for your child. I didn't start my son in kindergarten til he was almost 6 & I am so glad!

my oldest has repeated 2 times and i'm okay with it. it's been the best choice for him. what i would advise you is to get 3 opinions for a diagnosis: the school eval for starters, then the pediatrician, then an outside couselor/therapist type. then if they all agree, i'd do some major reading and internet research before you make any decisions about treatment. this was my approach and all i can say is that it worked for us.