Kindergarten Apprehension

Hi L.,
In my opinion wait another year. I am a first grade teacher, and I feel that it is better to wait, especially with boys, and especially if you are having some doubts. In my experience when children start later they have a better school experience all around (socially, and academically). My son is not ready to start school yet, (he is only 13 months)but I have already started to think about this, and I decided I will start him when he is six. Maybe enroll him in preschool, two to three days a week for a couple of hours in the fall.

what about homeschooling for kindergarten and putting him in first grade next year?

another idea-- can you have playdates with someone who will be in his class? if he has a buddy he will feel less alone. you could also invite his teacher-to-be over for dinner or something so he can meet her and learn to trust her in a familiar environment.

also ask about volunteering in the classroom!

Have you thought of putting him in a summer camp with kids his age? That way he will have more experience with them and you can see how he adjusts. He may surprise you and after a few days, do really well. If it is not time for him, hold him back a year. He will not be the oldest in his class even if you do.

I also have a (once) very timid child who just completed 1st grade. I didn't want to send him off to school, either, fearing that he wasn't ready socially. As parents, we tend to coddle our children long after they require it, often hurting their chances at ever breaking out of that shell. My advice is that you send him, the teacher will let you know within the first few weeks if maybe perhaps you should withdraw him and wait another year or so. When my son was in Kindergarten, he began biting his fingernails as a nervous habit, which stopped as soon as school was out. And though he was shy at first and sometimes when I walked him in I had to help him get set up with a partner for morning activities, once I was gone and the day started, he always settled in quite nicely and had a good time with his friends. It's important for him to have the opportunity to be around other children his own age and interact with them, learning coping skills and the right way to respond to people who (annoy) him, which he will get at school. My son cried through Kindergarten graduation because there were so many people there and he was nervous in front of them all, and the fact that everyone looked at him because it was so cute only intensified the fact! But, he made it through, and the first day of first grade, he went willingly and without a thought about how shy he could be. One thing we did for first grade though, was we went and met the teacher individually before we started school, so he felt like he knew someone before he started, which I think helped, so if you can, meet with his teacher and talk and have her talk to him. A lot of growth will happen over that Kinde-first grade summer that will help him be more comfortable. Blessings in your endeavors!

Boys tend to mature slower socially than girls. MANY moms wait to send their boys till they are almost, or already 6. They just do better. Although I am a nurse, I teach art at my daughter's school...and the "younger" boys just struggle a bit. They do so much better one year older. I do agree with a lot of the other things, get him into some other social situations, but I'd still wait a year. In Indiana, Kindergarten is still optional also.

L.,

From the perspective of an educational advocate for kids with disabilities, holding kids back is a very bad move. If your son has a learning disablity (and you cannot tell today if he does) you have cut him off from a year of effective intervention and may even gaurentee that he will never receive enoungh early intervention to be effective. Intervention is provided in public school based on grade, not age, and even if he is a year behind age when you realalize he has a problem, he will not be elegible for intervention until he is a year behind grade, two years behind age. The window of opportunity to learn reading and writing skills closes around the middle years, and lossing a whole year is devistating to some children. I have seen it again and again.

The clincial evidence on holding back is not good either. There is no evidence that children who are held back do any better than those who are not, however, there is plenty of measurable evidence that children who are held back are much more likely than their age at grade peers to engage in risky and opposistional behaviors.

In essance, both for children with unidentified disablities and for oppositional teen behaviro you run a greater risk of a poor outcome if you hold back than if you do not. These are the measurable facts, the "benefits" are anecdotal and very short term at best.

M.