First up was the tour of our future home. I am still head over heels in love, but now that the initial passion has faded (and/or the beer goggles are off- whichever analogy you prefer), and I wasn't trying to keep Claire from jumping in the pool, I could see... flaws. Little lines and wrinkles that need some fixing up. So we had a contractor spend an hour with us, pouring every room, including two I never even walked in on our first viewing. By the end, we had a rather extensive list of projects:
Project 1: updating the horrifyingly hideous yellow and brown floor-to-ceiling tiled guest bathroom.
(it's lurking through that open doorway)
Not only is it yellow and brown tile, it is four shades of non-matching yellow and brown tile because they ran out halfway through, and rather than scrap the god awful color combo, they persevered with different yellow and brown tiles to complete the job. The shower is also a dark cave-like structure with a shower head 4 feet off the ground. We're starting over from scratch with this one, so that one day soon it will be a lovely en suite bathroom for our beloved guests (and one of the kids, if we let them go back to separate rooms one day).
Project 2: updating the pink and blue floor-to-ceiling tiled kid/hall bathroom with peeling bathtub, 4 ft. shower head, and moldy grout. And by "updating," we mean changing out everything to be light, bright, and something you'd willingly bathe in.
Project 3: updating the master bath. The master wing of the house was added in the mid-90's, but we think they must have run out of money about halfway through. The design and basic structure are great- both our inspector and contractor complimented the architecture and core building. But the superficial stuff is cheap, ugly, and/or just odd. They used a salvaged 1960's bathtub, old fixtures, super ugly 1" beige tiles with thick grout, non-matching dark brown 1" shower tiles, and again, 4 ft. shower head height. (We met the owners, they are average height- I do not understand their showering techniques.) There is also carpet in the sink area (yuck), and despite installing a surprisingly beautiful taupe, white, and green marble counter top, they painted the walls a completely non-matching (though admittedly fetching) blue. So we're replacing the tile with new, larger tiles and thinner grout and extending it through the sink area, getting a new bathtub (I take a bath every night, the tub is a priority), painting the walls, and re-tiling the shower with lighter tiles, higher fixtures, a higher ceiling, and a glass door instead of droopy sad curtain.
Project 4: master bedroom aesthetics, including re-securing the recessed lights (they're all falling out) and removing the cheap-looking built-ins beside and behind the master bed. We have nice bedroom furniture (thank you Costco) and I want to use it. I'd also love to rip out that carpet, but that project will probably have to wait.
Project 5: removing the dated wet bar and replacing it with a nice shelved game closet.
Project 6: replacing the faux kitchen tiles with real kitchen tile and relocating the oddly placed microwave.
(can you imagine the things Clairebear would try to nuke at this height?)
The microwave is moving to a spot above the stove (there will be a vent in the bottom of the microwave- very nifty) and we're replacing the pin-point lights with wider recessed lights. The current lights are nicely placed, but they're so pin-prick concentrated that they literally blind you when you look up.
All-in-all, given that the house is about 70 years old and we poured over it for an hour with a contractor, it's in great shape. This is all cosmetic- the inspector said the foundation, systems, and core structure were all in amazing shape, so that's good. I don't know if we can afford all these projects, but we're getting an estimate for everything and will then prioritize from there. The bathrooms are definitely happening- I seriously don't see how we can shower in there, and those changes will add the greatest value to the house. It's a little intimidating to think of all the decisions to make for tile, cabinets, faucets, etc., but it's exciting too. Our current house was only 3 years old when we bought it, so even though some of the fixtures and colors weren't my favorite, it was all so new, I had no excuse to spend money changing them. Now we get to personalize everything- which means if I don't like something, it's 100% my own fault. Hmmm.
In other big decisions- we're trying to pick a daycare, neither of which are as awesome as our current one, and decide whether Landon will start Kindergarten in the fall or wait a year since he's a summer birthday. We've always assumed he'd start on time- he's super social, well-behaved, and very acclimated to the school setting, but he's a boy and he'd be one of the very youngest kids in his class and everyone seems to kind of freak out when we say we aren't holding him back. I've been quoted a lot of lines from Outliers. The daycare we're leaning towards is a Montessori school with a beautiful classroom that continues through Kindergarten. We could start him there and if he is doing great, transition him to public school for 1st grade in 2013, or start him in Kindergarten again in the public school as one of the older kids in the class. So he'd do Kindergarten twice, but in different schools with very different settings and methods of teaching, so it wouldn't feel like a repeat. I don't know. It's another $13,000 to keep him in daycare/private Kinder, but over his lifetime (and compared to the $60,000 we will have already spent on daycare), that is more of a temporary irritation than a factor in the decision (or so I keep reminding myself). I know that an extra year of aging would probably be good, no matter where he is on the academic/social scale- any older kid is likely to do better, but does that mean we should do it? even if by all standards, he's ready now? But if it helps- now or later- why wouldn't we give him the benefit of being the oldest rather than the youngest? Why not have him at home for one more year?
I actually wish you weren't allowed to start your kid late, so it was just a black and white cut-off. I don't like these kinds of parenting decisions- they affect things too far in the future. How can I know now if Landon would benefit from an extra year before heading off to high school, college, etc? So I'm pushing off that particular decision and looking at faucets and refrigerators online instead. And wading through 100 pages of federal benefits information and their 57 different health plan choices. And deciding what to buy at the store for dinner. Hmmm, and I wonder why my insomnia is back in full deadly force?
Back to faucets.
If you want to talk federal health care plans, let me know. We just switched to Aetna after eight years with federal BC/BS and have already saved a ton of money, but M parsed all the numbers with the major plans (and also, there's an online worksheet you can use) and we quite literally spent weeks on it. No need to reinvent the wheel!
ReplyDeleteI highly recommend pinterest if you're not already on it - as we tried to figure out paint colors, fixtures, lighting in our new house, it was super convenient to pull lots of pictures together from around the web.
ReplyDeleteAs someone with a late birthday who started kindergarten on time, I highly recommend against holding him back. Now that I'm 30, I feel like I almost have a year of extra life, since I was able to finish college, law school, etc that much earlier, then take extra time to travel, while not feeling like I was lagging behind people my age since I had that extra year. Socially and academically, it was completely fine. I would have been bored to death if my parents had held me back.
ReplyDeleteI have a summer birthday as well and started on time and I completely agree with this! I know other people who were held back because of their birthdays and they were actually kind of embarrassed because of it. I always enjoyed being the youngest!
Deletei have a sept birthday and started on time, so I was always the youngest in the class. I'm really glad my parents did that! i was good because i was quite successful in school, but i always had to work. in the long run, i thik that's the best.
DeleteI have a late September birthday and also started school when I was 4. I also always did very well in school and never had an issue with being the youngest. I agree that it's really nice to have an extra year built in thanks to starting school earlier. And I was reading and writing before I started kindergarten, so maybe holding me back would have just left me bored (I did not attend a pre-school and my mom stayed home with us).
DeleteOn the other hand, my sister's son shares a birthday with me, and she decided to hold him back a year because he wasn't as mature as I was at that age. I think boys generally don't develop as quickly as girls. Also, not sure if you care about this, but I think I read somewhere that kids don't do as well in sports if they're the youngest. That held true for me -- I was always very mediocre at sports.
I do not envy the kindergarten decision. I purposely timed my first pregnancy so that I would have a winter baby for that exact reason. Unfortunately my plan backfired when my son was born 3 days after Christmas (also something I was planning to avoid). Maybe with baby #2 we will plan better. I am partial to February birthdays.
ReplyDeleteWe discussed red-shirting my twins (July 19th bday), but ended up sending them to kindergarten on time, partially due to the day care expense. Two things we found helpful- they were in a day care at a local community college, so their curriculum was fabulous and very much aimed to preparing kids for school.
ReplyDeleteWe also let them watch the Best of the Electric Company on DVD, which really helped jump start them on reading; they are now and have been some of the best readers in their classes. They're in 3rd grade now and are both thriving at school. Take my .02$ for whatever it is worth. :)
Looks like a beautiful house!
ReplyDeleteI find the red-shirting kindergarten thing to be a bit frustrating. In NY, the cut off date is December 1st. Our son started kindergarten at 4, turned 5 on November 25, and is the youngest in his class (although there are other October/November birthdays).
Now he's in 2nd grade. I've thought a lot about whether we made the right decision. He is less mature than others in his class, but not strikingly so, but he is an above average academic student. He is also one of the tallest boys in the class. I don't think there is a right answer - he may be more socially suited to first grade, but the boredom of the first grade work might negatively affect his behavior and happiness...so who knows. If everyone simply followed the guidelines, these issues wouldn't come up, which is why I find it so frustrating.
Anyway, good luck with your own decision!
I never had to make the kindergarten decision. My daughter's birthday is June 9 (the cut off here in NJ is Oct 1). I imagine that had a lot to do with her gender though. My son's birthday is June 8. I wonder if this will be an issue when he's 5?
ReplyDeleteA word about the microwave vent hood. I saw on Holmes on Homes last night that you can only use those if you have an electric range, because code for gas says the hood must be 30" above the cooktop.
I say he's ready, so start him! September birthday. Started on time, in the gifted program. I graduated college, did Teach for America, and started law school almost the same age as many classmates, but with a better resume :) Starting a year later would have been torture, and I would have been a badly behaved, bored kid. Ditto for Dan on all of that (August birthday, except he already was a smart-aleck - he would have just been worse.)
ReplyDeleteOutliers was about accidents of timing - I dislike people using it as a playbook. There's also a weird snowball effect here - what's happening if more and more kindergarteners are 6? Kinder is already overly academic if you ask me - I feel like that just accelerates that issue.
Good luck with the house projects - I feel exhausted just thinking about it.
By the way, I totally thought NY was Dec 30 until the commenter above said it was Dec 1 and we ran to look it up. This means BOTH my kids will be some of the oldest in their class, which I didn't even want! Apparently my pregnancy planning did not account for this either.
ReplyDeleteNY lets school districts decide so there is no one answer. I live on Long Island. Most districts use 12/1 but there are some who use 12/31. If I ran the world everyone would use 9/1 but that's a whole other story.
DeleteMy brother is a July 1 birthday and did kindergarten twice.... opposite of what you might do with Landon though - first at the local public school and then again at the Catholic school I was at/we went to K-8. My parents never regretted that decision and neither did he. First of all boys are less mature. Second it was way better for sports throughout grade school/middle school/high school. Third - I was always SO jealous. I am a May birthday so I'm "young" for my age. He was the first one of his friends to get his drivers license, drink legally, etc. And I was one of the last, which sucked.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I will admit that 20 years later I still make fun of him for repeating kindergarten. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one though.
My son has an early August birthday, and he will be starting Kindergarten in the fall. He's been in a great daycare center for two years, and he started pre-K this year at the same school he'll attend for K. We used to live in SC, where the trend is to redshirt boys with summer birthdays whether they need it or not so they will be bigger for HS sports (ugh). Here in NY, though, that's not the norm. When I mentioned casually to his pre-K teacher about holding him back a year, since he'll barely be 5 when he starts K, she looked at me like I had 3 heads. He's ready socially and academically, she said, so he's going to K next year -- which is what I wanted him to do.
ReplyDeleteMy older boy went to K in SC, and I have to say that the boys who had been held back and were a year or more older & bigger than their classmates were the ones with the most behavior issues. Now, obviously, it's hard to tell which was the cause and which the effect, but I would personally be reluctant to hold my son back a year if he was obviously ready just because that's a local custom with no real reason behind it. And in most cases, there is no real reason for it. From what you've written here, Landon sounds more than ready for Kindergarten. Good luck with your decision!
I'm in the same boat as you re: kindergarten. My son turns 5 in August. We are leaning toward sending him to kindergarten, even knowing he'll be one of the youngest in his class. I was young too, but I think it's not as big of a deal for girls. It's frustrating to me how many people hold their kids (especially boys) back now... I feel like my main reasons for doing it would be because so many people do, and I think that's a bad reason. My son's preschool teachers have no reservations about his readiness, and I'm afraid he'd be bored with an extra year. I like your solution of a year of K at the preschool though - that gives you an extra year to decide if you really want to hold him back or not.
ReplyDeleteWe just went through this with JP- I have always leaned towards holding him back one year, but that is purely based upon our experience with Mark. He is a summer birthday and my parents always regretted not holding him back. Plus, since I teach high school- I've spent 4 years looking at kids birthdays and then evaluating their behavior to help with my decision :) BUT ultimately, JP breaking his leg and having to sit out for 5 weeks made the decision easy for us- we are holding him back. He will attend a bridging program this next year and then Kindergarten. I seriously agonized over this and have despised this part of parenting. JP is socially acclimated, he can already read, he's essentially ready for kindergarten, but I always wondered what if he ended up struggling in high school because I didn't hold him back?! SO MUCH RESPONSIBILITY. Where is the owners manual!?
ReplyDeleteLove the house! Was just going to mention (going off personal kitchen remodeling experience here) that while your microwave can provide a vent for your stove keep in mind it only sucks the air from the stovetop area, filters it a teeny tiny bit, then spits it out just 10'' above where the steam/smell just started. We discovered this little issue when we remodeled. We decided that (we cook A LOT) the whole reason for a ventilation system is to remove any smell/smoke from the living area right? We were not crazy to learn that the microwave vent would just pump it right back into the same room just a few inches above our heads.
ReplyDeleteInstead, there's a 2nd option on those microwaves that allows you to pipe the smell up through the cabinets/wall and out into the outside of your house, or like in our case our enclosed attic above our kitchen area.
I only mention this because I've followed your blog for years and know that you pay attention to these minor details AND cook alot!
Good luck with Landon's school decisions! I understand your dilenma in making those kind of decisions. My 3 year old is ready for pre-school this fall and in our area the choices are sparse to say the least. So hard to decide what would be best for them!
Best wishes on your move!
I'm not a summer birthday, but my parents started me as usual and I was bored stiff anyway - they should have skipped me a grade, but they didn't. I guess all I'm saying is that if Landon is struggling you can address it, but he's coming from two smart people already, so odds are he will be just fine.
ReplyDeleteWhat's better in this situation than ANECDATA????? I (a girl child) was not held back a year despite a late summer birthday and my mother still (I am now 26) tells me how much she regrets it when it comes up. I was apparently sensitive and stressed out by the whole ELEMENTARY SCHOOL thing. She held my younger brother, an early fall birthday, out a year and he ended up "making up" the extra year by squeezing high school into three years (and immediately going to a vastly more prestigious college than I did!). So who knows! It will probably work out either way, although I would imagine he would have a bigger advantage in sports, if you guys care about that, than in academics.
ReplyDeleteMy son is a February birthday child. In his class in 8th grade, the oldest child (a boy) was 14 months older than the youngest (a girl). The kindergarten cutoff date at this school was Sept 1st.
ReplyDeleteI know my child would have done better academically had we sat him out, but he was so ready for kindergarten and first grade that it would have been an odd decision at the time. Most of the people we know who kept their boys out a year did so for sports-related reasons, but not every held-back boy wound up interested in sports.
As it happened, he really did just fine, he was never bored, he scored in 98 and 99 per centile in standardized tests, and went off to college. An extra year might have improved his grades, but he also might have interacted differently being the oldest and may have been bored by certain parts of high school.
Just some thoughts. Another issue is that kindergarten tends to socialization not academics -- and it sounds as though your son would be ready for academics, not another year of kindergarten!
I agree with Andrea on the snowball effect. Honestly, I am surprised by the new trend of this being an "issue" for summer birthdays. I knew it would be something we would have to deal with for our daughter born in October, but I had no idea (until recently) that people were holding back their summer babies!
ReplyDeleteJust to clarify, the cut off in Texas is Sept 1, so Landon's birthday is within 45 days of that. I hasn't realized other states were so much later on the year- if ours was in December I wouldn't think of holding him back.
ReplyDeleteJust to throw in my 2 cents. I was always the youngest in my classes, I was born 2 weeks before the cut off of Sept 31. I LOVED it! Especially as I got older. That said I'm a girl, was always pretty much the tallest in my class until middle school and was very mature (so I've been told). I think a lot of people freak out about boys being the youngest because of sports and things once they reach high school, but being younger can also push the kids harder to keep up and make them better. I think Landon would do a great job and probably show up at least half of those older kids!
ReplyDeleteMontessori? Really? If the kids were in a really good traditional early childhood program Landon might find the rigidity of Montessori a little hard to take.
ReplyDeleteMontessori actually isn't rigid at all. Their philosophy includes not interefering with the natural learning process of the child. They basically choose their own activities, in a loosely-defined daily structure. Their day involves much unscheduled, uninterrupted blocks of working time.
DeleteIs it a qualified Montessori? Anyone can use the name. My child went to one and he had to wash rocks in some "center"; minimal art; very structured snack time; just sort of...joyless. I took him out after a week and he went to another pre school. I learned that the Montessori I had enrolled him in had no Montessori-trained teachers. So -- buyer beware. MANY of my friends LOVED the Montessori schools their kids attended.
DeleteDepends on your idea of structure. Yes, there is a lot of choice of what to do. However, many of the materials may only be used in onr way and deviation is discouraged.You have to stack the tower in only one way. I saw a child who was experimenting to see if he could balance the biggest block on a small one stopped and redirected to stacking it the "right" way. Also, most of the activities are done by one child at a time and there is almost no time spent in cooperative play, which is invaluable in helping kids learn to operate in the "real world".The materials are wonderful, the approach not so much.
DeleteThat's not the experience my friend had of Montessori - children didn't have to play in the "right" way, and definitely played and were encouraged to work together.
DeleteSounds like the name can mean all sorts of things.
I have never posted before but I've been reading since Landon was born! I'm so sorry for lurking so long.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, as the mother of 2 summer birthdays - one just 2 weeks away from the September 1st cutoff - I have never felt like I made the wrong decision by starting my boys when they were "supposed" to start. They are both the youngest in their classes but they are both smart, social and well-mannered and your Landon seems to be the same way. There have been issues at times when they were younger that teachers have forgotten that one of them was almost 2 years younger than one of his classmates but nothing major and both of them (at 15 and 11) are very comfortable and well-adjusted being the youngest. Although if you want some sort of sports super-star then you'd be better off if he were one of the oldest so that his body was more mature (not necessarily his brain - lol). We have seen that with our high schooler - he isn't physically as developed as his peers so there's a difference there although he's still very athletic and more than competitive.
Regardless, if you think Landon's ready for school, then start him :-) Otherwise, hold him back ;-) There's really no wrong answer here.
I have my little one (within 2 weeks of Claire's birthday) in Montessori and let me tell you ... it has done WONDERS. I can't recommend it more. She has excelled so much, behaves beautifully nearly 100% of the time, and I am such a fan. Definitely recommend it for at least her.
ReplyDeleteI'm not in the same boat as you with the kinder thing yet, but my thoughts: if he's ready, let him go.
I had a late birthday (November) and would have hated to be held back. I was bored as it was in school, so I actually had to be accelerated and took several classes with the grade above mine. So at least in my case, it was appropriate to not be held back. S has an August birthday and the cutoff in my state is 9/1. She is in K this year and is doing fine. She definitely had some adjustment issues at the beginning of the year (but I suspect she would have had the same issues had we held her back due to her personality - she is on the lazy side), but she has really blossomed in Kindergarten. For some kids it makes sense, certainly, but it really depends on the individual child. Honestly, if a kid is bright, there is no reason to hold back. I suppose there are sports/size reasons for boys, but I would rather have my child academically challenged at a younger age.
ReplyDeleteMany, Many people told me to hold my boys back (both have August Birthday's). We chose to start them on time, both were the youngest but were at the top of their classes, participated in sports and graduated at 17. They are both well adjusted college students who couldn't imagine having graduated a year later. We also have aquaintances that held their boys back a year so they would be great football players...both graduated at 19 with no football prospects..go figure. I think since Landon is a well adjusted bright child, he'd do fine being the youngest. Best advise: do whatever you and JP are most comfortable with.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on the job, the move, and the new home!! I went to TCU, so I have fond memories of Ft. Worth (always thought it was MUCH better than Dallas). Anyway, just wanted to throw out some thoughts about the kindergarten start date. My birthday is June 25, and I always did splendidly in public Texas school (valedictorian). My son's birthday is July 21, and he is now in First Grade. I always brushed it off when people suggested we should wait to start my son -- I would have HATED to have been held back. But the thing is, my son is not me. I really do think girls are different than boys. I taught myself to read when I was 4. When my son (despite me reading to him constantly and having a house full of books) failed to teach himself to read, I began teaching him the summer before he started kindergarten. And it was a struggle. He is clearly intelligent -- he loves listening to very, very advanced books and can remember practically everything. He did fine in kindergarten, but now that he is in First Grade, he is beginning to struggle. He tells me he hates reading, the work load has picked up quite a bit, he is exhausted when he gets home from school, and then he has homework. He is always comparing himself (negatively) to other kids in the class. The problem is that half of the boys in his class either started late, repeated kindergarten, or repeated first grade. So where he would have been naturally a little young, now he is artificially a year younger than half his class. It is ridiculous. So realize that you aren't making this decision in a vacuum -- all those people quoting Outliers to you held their kids back. Perhaps this is a regional issue. Just something to be aware of. I wish we had waited to start my son, but now it is so tricky. I do think he would be bored, and he has started extracurricular activities that I would want him to continue with in the same age group, but it would now be awkward if he is in a different school grade than they are. The whole thing is a mess. I wish you luck in your decision, just be sure you make it based on Landon and not on yourself or what others tell you. All kids are different.
ReplyDeleteHi there, just wanted to post as I had this conversation with my good friend about her nephew (and my cousin faced the same issue with her boy). There is a TON of pressure to red-shirt boys, and the societal reasons for not doing so are probably much stronger than the individual reasons for doing so (societal reason for NOT red-shirting: there is no public pre-K, so it's really the poorer children who suffer the effects of red-shirting because they either lose a year of education or end up being up to 18 months younger than some of their red-shirted peers; individual reason for red-shirting or not: the difference is likely negligible in terms of future success, etc).
ReplyDeleteInterestingly, someone just told me to read this parenting book: Nuture Shock, and he has an article about the red-shirting phenomenon and a comment on Outliers. Basically, it turns out that the data relied upon is correlated more with the socioeconomic status of the parents than the age of the child when he starts kindergarten. (http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/blogs/nurture-shock/2009/09/03/should-children-redshirt-kindergarten.html)
You guys are smart, educated, and relatively wealthy. Landon is going to be just fine no matter what. :)
It seems as if Landon has all of the social, emotional and behavioral milestones to excel in Kindergarten. I have no idea where he lands on the academic scale, but I would guess he likely is bright? If he has all of the academic pre reqs for kindergarten, I say start him on time. I think it's better for a child to have to work a little to keep up than to be bored. For what it's worth, I have a bachelor's in Early Childhood and a Masters in Counseling, so I have had some experience. In addition, my brother skipped kindergarten and went straight to first grade when he turned 5, and he has only ever excelled in all arenas. Being a year behind everyone only ever really got him upset when everyone else was turning 16 and driving, and still had to wait a year. He remedied that by dating an older girl, who could do the driving. :)
ReplyDeleteI'm with anonymous on the "every kid is different." Why force a kid on to something he/she might not be quite ready for?! I'm very glad my girl will be 5 for a few months before she starts kindergarten. I think she needs every bit of that time.
ReplyDeleteOn the house, what's some yellow and brown tile compared with a huge tree and a pool, right?! All is good! :)
starting kids late is a FAD! Don't fall for it! Unless something about your son has made you think waiting is better, the whole thing is just a by product of over-competitive suburbia. Bored child being forced to study his A-B-C's for the second year in a row and subsequently growing to see school as boring and unpleasant is just as bad, if not worse, than "small" kid or youngest in the room. 9-months age difference isn't going to matter when your child is in high school and the competitive edge counts for something. /endsoapbox
ReplyDeleteBecause you want more opinions on kinder!!! In CA the cut off is Dec 2 or 3. By son is a November birthday and could have started in Aug 2010. He had done 3 years of preschool because he started a few months before he turned 3. I could have saved some $ and waited! Anyway, he did one year in the 3 year old class and then two years in the 4 year old class. Same school, different teachers. I visited our local kindergarten. My biggest issue was class size. CA is having major budget issues. The teacher, a family friend, said to expect 30 kids per class and that they had lost their aide. I was afraid my son would get lost in the shuffle. He is quiet and doesn't ask questions. He hates to ask for help. The teacher had students from his preschool and was impressed with them academically. I was leaning toward waiting a year for kinder but had no idea where to put him. Then his preschool said to bring him back...duh. A few other kids were gonna stay an extra year. Academically they said he was solid, but socially they weren't sure. He was still quiet. He loved playing with other kids but it took him a while to warm up. And in the end, it was the best. He ended up getting into a local charter school through the lottery system. Their kinder is all day...8:15-3:30. I really think the extra year helped to prepare him. My husband is a December birthday and has always been the older kid. He tends to think older is better, especially for sports. We saw his preschool director last week when we signed up little brother (OMG) and she immediately asked how he was doing and admitted so was so torn about him. She was used to telling parents their child might not be ready academically but it was so hard for it to be the other way around. I wish the states did Pre K admission testing. I have friends that teach elementary and have heard horror stories of 4 year olds going into kinder and not even being able to take care of bathroom issues. I'm not saying preschool is a must, it can be expensive, I did NOT go...but sending a 4 yr old to kinder that has had no experience in a classroom setting can be a problem. I know most kids end up catching up...but I feel sorry for the ones who don't and end up repeating a grade down the road. Good luck.
ReplyDeleteJust an FYI, CA is "supposed" to be changing their cut off date to match more evenly with other states...the December cut off has been around forever (well my husband is 37 and it applied to him). When I read more closely I didn't realize people were holding back summer birthdays. I haven't heard of that around here..I'm still in favor of doing some pre-admission testing, but being 5 way before school starts seems more the norm. We were within a month of cut off and that was why it became an issue.
ReplyDelete