I'm just curious. At my school the cutoff date is October 1st, but I think we need to push it up to sometime in the summer. When is your school's cutoff date for entering K?
Where my children go it's 5 by September 1st. If they have a September birthday I THINK they can meet with the counselor, be tested, and possibly start even though they're a few weeks from the cut off. I think it's rare that that's granted though.
in Connecticut they have to be 5 by Dec. 31! I have lots of little ones in my class! I think the cut off should be July 31!
In California it is 5 by Dec. 2nd. With more and more people holding kids out a year it means 4 1/2 year olds mixed with 6 year olds! Some of my ex-students did k here in Calif. and moved to other states and weren't allowed in 1st grade because they are too young and had to repeat k. Why don't we have a national cut-off age?
I think that we need to determine readiness first based on not only age, but also social skills, ability to modify behavior, etc. We definitely have some students that are still just too "young" (not just age) to be in school. In Georgia where I teacher, Kindergarten isn't even required!
5 on or before September 1st. We do begin school in mid-August, so often begin with 4 year olds. We also used to have early entrance testing, but wisely our district did away with that.
Our cutoff is 5 by September 1st. I had one last year whose birthday was September 1st. Her mom knew that she would be at a disadvantage because of her age and she never stopped working with her. She's now in first and reading almost at a 2nd grade level. We have been lobbying our state senate to change the cutoff date to summer sometime. If we were to pull records, I guarantee over 60% have a birthday near the cutoff date and were retained.
In our state the kids have to be 5 before September 1st. The school year also begins on the 1st of September (unless it's Labor Day or a weekend, of course). In my daughter's kindergarten class there was a girl who celebrated her 5th birthday today. My daughter said the teachers were surprised because they thought she was going to turn 6. My daughter said the girl's mother told the teachers that the girl was only 5. This is all coming from my 5 y.o. daughter, so who knows what the whole story is. I wonder what will happen though. Will the school tell the mom and the girl that she isn't allowed to be there? This particular school district does have 4 y.o. public preschool. I'm pretty sure the district has a special provision about 4 y.o. who can pass a certain test for early entrance into kindergarten early. I'm guessing that's fairly rare though.
5 by September 15. Some of the young 5s are put in pre-k if they are not socially ready for kindergarten.
Indiana has one of the earliest cut off dates - until about two years ago it was June 1st. I believe the date is now July 1st. All I can say is be careful what you wish for - with the early June 1st birthday, we have sophomores that can drive to school on the first day. They turn sixteen in the summer. This also means we have students that turn 18 before they start their senior year.
Michigan's cut off is DEC 1 which I think is terrible - especially when you think about how kids are tested and compaired to children in other states - lots of our children are MUCH younger. Then you have tons of parents that choose to keep their kids home an extra year. It create big discrepencies in the classroom. So I've been informed that on Monday - a 4 YEAR OLD (birthday is sometime in Oct) is coming for the day in my FIRST GRADE ROOM! She may become one of our new first graders! Our kindergarten is full (private school) and her parents say she is gifted anyway. . .
Our kids start August 1st and the cut-off date is September 30th. I think that the cut-off date should be the first day of school! Just my two cents
In NY the cut-off date is Dec. 1st. I wish it was Sept. 1st. I have quite a few 4 year olds this year. I feel bad for them... they seem so young.
As I am sure many of the posters are Kindergarten teachers....what are your thoughts on holding kids back a year. My son has a June 18th birthday.....he is VERY bright, but in a social setting likes to be the "funny" kid and goofs off a lot. We have decided to hold him back from formal K class a year (he is also a little guy....15th percentile in height!) Get mixed responses about my decision and would like some imput from K teachers! Thanks!
I do believe in holding back and recommend it to parents. It is not just IQ but also EQ (emotional quotient), whether they are ready socially and you have already figured out your little guy is does not have the EQ - yet. As one Kindergarten teacher said, you never hear of parents regretting repeating a year for their child but you do of parents who did send their child (when they weren't ready). I am speaking from expierence here. We sent our daughter and she did not have the EQ. Consequently she did not want to learn and struggled all the way through school. Academically she received learning support all the way through primary school and was at the top of the bottome third of her class. She is also small (on the 25th percentile for growth). It is only when she went to high school that she has repeated a year. She is now an average student but if we had had hindsight, I would have kept her back a year. I relay my experience to parents and place the guilt trip on them. My priority is their child and what is best for the child. Most parents listen and take the advice and those children have flourished. Some do not. There is one little girl who went into grade 1 and is totally lost, she is the bottom of the class. Another boy came back to repeat the year and half way through the year the parent wanted him in Grade 1 so he went. Again, the boy had no idea, the other children have had 6 months of grade 1 work and this boy is so far behind, another bottom of the class (in fact, the Grade 1 teacher's recommendation is that he repeats which means it was a waste of time the father trying to push him forward). He was top of his class before he went to Grade 1 and has now missed 6 months of foundation learning, perhaps he will struggle still with Grade 1 next year. You would have to make sure that the Kindergarten teacher caters to his individual needs if he is so bright. You don't want him becoming bored and disruptive if the work is too easy.
One of my girls turned 5 today which is our cut off date. I would have guessed she was turning 6. I had her mom in 8th grade. I feel old! I did hold my DS with the Aug. birthday back until he was 6. He did 2yrs of PreK. He was also tiny.
I wish I had held my DS back. His birthday is 10/16. We lived in CA where the cut of date was Dec. 1. I had planned on keeping him in K for two years. I taught at the pre-school/K he attended and he was bored and got in trouble. His K teacher told me not to hold him back. He struggled for a few years. The hardest part for him was when all his friends drove and he didn't. Most of his friends had been held back and were a year older. I am proud to say that he just graduated college with honors;-) If I had to do it again, I would have held him back.
I think the kids should be five by the time they start Kindergarten, but that would be different for everyone as well. We start school the first week of August, but our cut-off date is September 1st. Therefore, we have students who don't turn 5 until after school starts. CRAZY!!
