The decision for a child to enter school early can have a profound effect on the child�s academic and social performance for the remainder of his school career. It is a decision that needs to be taken seriously. Early school experiences shape self-confidence and influence children for the rest of their lives. Children who enter first grade early may demonstrate social or emotional difficulties due to their relative immaturity, have difficulty fitting in with their peers in social situations as they progress through school, and be less likely to excel in sports because of their age and/or smaller size. We ask parents to carefully consider whether enrolling a child early in first grade will be of long-term benefit for their child.
Yes, but the profound effect can be positive as well and I wish that your district would acknowledge that. For those of us with kids whose bds are right on the cusp, we're in a tough spot. Both of my girls could easily have waited to start b/c they squeaked in by mere days and w/ dd10 she moved to the district with the later cut-off after K so she'd be an early admit there if they allowed such a thing, which they do not. They're both much younger than their age peers as a result, but I don't believe that having them be the oldest would have been a good thing either.
My kids are not socially immature as a result of being younger. If anything, they are, and have always been, more socially mature than their age peers which, at times, made making friends harder in the younger years b/c the social interests didn't mesh. I imagine that might have been worse had they been the oldest rather than the youngest in grade.
Smaller size is only an issue up to a point. At some point, they all reach their size potential (middle school or high school). Dd12 was one of the smaller kids in 6th b/c she skipped the prior year and being that much younger made her smaller. She is now of perfectly average size for an 8th grade girl b/c she hit her big growth spurt. You'd never know that she was younger just looking at her. Dd10 is a very small person. She has 1st and 2nd graders who are taller than her. My dh is a little Italian guy and we don't have many tall genes in the family on my side either. Dd12 got the few "average" sized genetics that dh and I had to contribute. Dd10 would be the shortest in grade no matter how long we had waited to start the kid. I can't imagine using my child's height as a determinate of her grade placement. Come high school, when the girls are done growing, she'd be the shortest again even if she was a 20 year old high school student.
