Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Delaying Kindergarten

Looking for thoughts/research re: delaying admission to Kindergarten for DS3. His older brother, DS7, is HG. All signs point to DS3 being gifted although possibly 2E (anxiety). DS3 has a late June birthday and Dad wants to hold him back a year from beginning Kindergarten in Fall 2016 as he will have just turned 5. I'm not convinced this is the right path as we may then just be facing the school wanting to accelerate him. The research I have found supports holding back kids with a summer birthday and indicates test scores, math achievement and reading outcomes are significantly better for summer birthday kids that did not start kindergarten until age 6. I also found 1 article that indicated that gifted kids with a summer birthday often go unidentified due to being overlooked by teachers because they are young. All signs are pointing to my husband being right on this one, which is okay with me, but my gut thinks it's a mistake. Thoughts?

I could be wrong (in which case someone will correct me!), but the research I've seen recently points to good early/worse late (i.e., high school) results for kids who are held back. I'll see if I can find the link.

If you suspect giftedness, I'm not sure that you would see better test scores, reading outcomes, etc. -- he may already be ahead of age peers by K.

FWIW, we did not even consider holding back ODS (PG, though we didn't "know" it then) despite a very late summer birthday. It made absolutely no sense to us to consider it given his intellectual development. Nor will we hold back his May birthday sibling, who isn't yet at that level of academic progress (that ODS was at by this age) but whose preschool teachers say is more than ready.

You'll have a better idea where your child is at by this time next year. Is there a reason to worry now?

Here's the most recent link I've seen on this topic.
https://today.duke.edu/2015/03/birthdaysandcrime

Now, this does specifically address drop-out rates, which may not be as much of a concern... or then again, they may be given that boredom can create all sorts of issues.

Another one:
http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/news/coverStories/pros_cons_holding_out.php

Worried now because we're trying to make decisions about preschool. Want to send him 3 days a week, Dad wants to wait until Fall 2016. I've registered him, but we haven't paid yet. As an MSW in the behavioral health field, my clinical judgment indicates a year at preschool could help with the budding social anxiety/performance anxiety he's been displaying. Of course, Dad doesn't want to hear any of that mumbo jumbo

Actually, the newest research seems to show the opposite of what your husband believes.

http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/youngest-kid-smartest-kid

There's also a school of thought that suggests children who are unchallenged in elementary school lose important opportunities to develop executive function skills.

http://nurturingwisdom.com/is-executive-functioning-the-missing-link-for-many-gifted-students/

Anecdotally, my twins are June birthday boys with a September cutoff. They were not redshirted and there was only one other boy younger than them in their elementary school--the rest were redshirted, so it's very common in our area.

My observation of the redshirted boys in their grade were that they were uncomfortable because they were much bigger than other kids, they weren't any more advanced, and I know from one family who red shirted their kids-- the children felt dumb because they had been held back.

In one case, the kids were going to be tall anyway, but when they were redshirted, they were literally more than a foot taller than their classmates by 3rd grade and were at least a year older. They might have been awkward no matter their grade, but they had a hard time fitting in with grade peers who were younger and much smaller. But the additional issue was that they weren't doing any better academically, so it wasn't as if redshirting gave them an academic edge.

Ah, that makes sense. Given what you say about him, it seems that preschool now would be beneficial! We did send both our children at that age -- they enjoyed it and it did seem to help their development. Doesn't seem it would hurt anything (other than the cost, of course!).

BTW, your question got me thinking about this again and I did some searching. This article has some good links.

http://parentsware.com/delaying-kindergarten-facts-academic-redshirting

Thank you so much for the helpful articles. This is just what I needed to support my gut!!

I used to think red-shirting was a good idea until I had an actual living breathing kid who was going nuts spending a whole week on the letter "A" in preschool.

We started school early and so far so good.

Again, I think you have to be careful applying research based on average kids to an outlier kid. While that "gift" of an extra year might help kids of an average or lower ability, high ability kids don't need that advantage since they will likely already be at the top.

I would also consider where you live. A kid who will turn 7 at the end of K (in June) would still be an anomaly in many many places with strong school systems. I don't believe that hitting 19 by the time you graduate is consider "normal" in Pennsylvania. Your DS would encounter many kids who are around one full year younger, which can be detrimental to his self-concept. Letting your DS start school at the proper year will result in him being among the youngest quarter of kids but holding him back may result in embarrassing questions about grade retention by the time he hit upper elementary.

I would NOT hold back, especially with the strong possibility he might be gifted (or even HG+). I have two who are relatively young for grade, who both started on time. Best decision we ever made. Both are currently underchallenged in school, so we are struggling to keep them learning.