Did your child start kindergarten early?

Question

I want to start my daughter earlier than allowed by the local school system. I'm willing to have her tested to see if she is in fact ready for this leap, but want to know if it's even possible to start her if the test says she's ready. And who do I contact about getting a test? AND, my daughter tends to clam up with strangers, especially when one-on-one, so how can I make sure a test is accurate?

Answer 1

Not a good idea.  She might be mentally ready, but far from phyically or emotionally.  My guys started a tad late and it's much better.

Answer 2

U SHOULD LET HER TAKE THE TEST AND U CAN CONTACT HER SCHOOL. IT WILL BE A GREAT OPPORTUNITY

Answer 3

my oldest is 4 now and for the school year, he had to be 4 on or b4 sept. 30...He was just 2 weeks younger so he couldn't start!  What a dumb idea huh?  Well, He'll start next year...He's very advanced for his age.  He knows his letters, shapes, numbers (in English and Spanish), and colors.  Take that (gesture) National School Systems!

Answer 4

I started at 4 and it haunted me all through school. You are already giving me a red flag by totally disregarding her temperament (slow to warm up to people) and pushing her into something she isn't emotionally ready for.

Answer 5

No, my children went to the kindergarden by three years old. If you have, like me, someone in wich you have confidence to guard your child till  three years, I think this is the ideal age to start kindergarden and child socialization .

Answer 6

I started my son early and they recommended he repeat kindergarten because he was not socially ready to move on. He would'nt take up for himself and would wait and be last in line, etc. When he moved on to 1st grade, he was ready and did great from then on.

Answer 7

If she clams up with strangers, then how is she going to do when you drop her off at school for three hours a day? I thought it would be good for my daughter, and all it did was make her even more shy and she felt like she couldn't trust me. The school didn't even tell me that she didn't talk at school for nearly four months! They told me at the first parent teacher conference at the end of January.

She was very capable academically, doing 1st grade work before kindergarden even started, but emotionally was not ready for public school. Fortunately at the end of kindergarden we chose to homeschool and it's been the greatest thing for her. She can work at her level, and she's been allowed to come out of her shell naturally, and has really blossomed into a people person. Why is it so important to have her start early??

Answer 8

i started kindergarden early and i'm doing great.

i'm getting all A's in all Honors classes (i'm in High School now).

p.s. i'm very shy too.

Answer 9

In Prince William County, VA they would not let my brother enroll my neice early, and she missed the deadline by one day!  The cut off point for starting school was 5 years old  by Sept 30 and her B-day is Oct 1.  The only option was to send her to private school for a year for kindergarten then for first grade switching to public school.  They opted to wait and she started school the following year and she was almost 6 and the other kids were 5.  She's a bright girl and survived, and except for always being the tallest kid in class (which would likely be the case anyway since her mother is 5'11" and my brother is 6"4"), she's well adjusted.  And if your daughter clams up, she may not be mature enough for school, even though she's bright, so it may be in her best interest to wait, even if she could start early.

Answer 10

They grow up too quickly already...don't rush it.  Let her start at the normal age, and in the meantime you can teach her at home if you feel she is advanced.  When she does start school, they will see that she is advanced and take the appropriate actions to get her into gifted classes then.  

And a young child can be brilliant, but still lack the maturity to be in a classroom setting all day.  Give her that one more year to grow and mature.

Answer 11

It depends on your child, and where you live.

In my state, you have to be five on or before September 30 in order to make the "cut". If you take the test and pass, and do get put in kindergarten early, the system reserves the right to hold the child back if they don't think he or she is ready, and you also have to pay tuition for that year.

My birthday is October 8. I was reading up a storm by the time I was three (my preschool teacher remembers me sitting in the classroom reading a newspaper!) and I had a big vocabulary. My teachers wanted to put me in kindergarten early, but I didn't have the fine motor skills, so my preschool teacher and my mother worked on it. I had the fortune to be in a VERY small private school, so it wasn't such a big deal that I was "skipping up".

It isn't just knowledge and fine motor skills. Your daughter also needs to have the social skills to make it in kindergarten. Did she attend preschool? If not--if she hasn't had experience in a social setting with other children of her own age, in a place without you and where she has to follow potentially different rules than she follows at home--then she probably isn't ready for kindergarten. My mother teaches preschool at the same school where I attended until I was too old (at the time, the school only went up to third grade), and I have seen any number of children who have the intelligence to be kindergarteners, but not the social skills. If she's still in the "at MY house we get to do this stuff" phase, then let her go at the regular time.

Also, how far away from the cutoff date is her birthday? If it's more than three or four months, the school system probably won't let her be tested, and it's not good  for her anyway. Take it from someone who's still the youngest kid in her class thirteen years later--if your daughter starts too terribly early, she'll feel too socially awkward to make friends and might actually regress in behaviour. After I left my first school, when I switched to a "bigger" school, I couldn't make friends for almost a year and a half because I was younger than my classmates and smarter than the class below me.

There's more to going to kindergarten than being academically ready. She's got to be socially ready too.

Answer 12

Yes, I started kindergaten when I was 4 and it was the best decision my parents probably made about me. there's no reason for you're child to stay home if she can already read proficiently

Answer 13

My daughter did .Her cordination was behind the others.I would recommend waiting.She had a few problems that could have been avoided if I waited

til she was more ready.