Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Red shirting

Yup. A lot of Asian kids spend 2-3 hours a day studying while little johnny is playing sports. Little johnny gets to sweep floors for a living while the other kids become doctors and nurses.

That's a great double standard to strive for.

If people logged the time their kids spend doing academics vs sports, they would be shocked.

I agree, multi-age classrooms can be great, but when they are great each child's curriculum is differentiated. They are not all required to do the same work. Unfortunately, this style of multi-age classroom just sets the younger students up for failure or at least unrealistic expectations. It's very frustrating, especially for parents of gifted children because our little ones usually ARE the youngest in the class.

I agree. This played out substantially in my DD's PS experience. She started K as a 4 year old. There were many in her class 6 turning 7 at the start of the school year.

I agree. Besides, a multi-age classroom planned as such, is self-defined, so emotional, social, academic and broader physical ability levels, are expected. I think knowing this is so important. Not only class teachers, but adults who come into contact with the kids through-out the school day, need to be aware of the wide age differences in age of many same Grade children.

The red-shirters we know are about equally split between people who's motives I agree with (neighbor with 4 year old, academically nearly ready but unable to even manage preschool emotionally/socially) and people I don't (sportsy parent of 2 year old who says mid-year birthday boy is not going til 6, irrespective of his academic and social readiness).

But perhaps single age classrooms are just a blip on the history of education anyways? Seems like prior to 70 or 80 years ago most US kids would have been small town or rural living and would have gone to small elementary schools where progression was all based on skill and content mastery, not on age. If not for sports it seems like a return to that wouldn't be all that bad. Perhaps what the US needs is a separation of sports and state.

Polly

This would be a great place to scan in the cartoon on my fridge. The one about the two kids playing baseball, one from Asia and one from Michigan. They discuss their summer break and in the end the Michigan boy asks the other what he's going to be when he grows up. The Asian boy answers, "your boss..." definately a double standard.

Polly - separation of School and State. Not as crazy as it sounds. Plenty of countries don't allow sports to dominate school life.

That's pretty much the group of older kids that wind up with that label (redshirted) here, too. However, it seems to be more for academic reasons than sports reasons where I live. The oldest kids are often the ones who are identified as gifted by teachers and tracked accordingly very early on.

We have a 5 by 9/15 or 5 by 10/1 cut-off depending on which district you are in locally. Dd#2 has a 9/27 bd & started in the 10/1 district then moved to the other. So, she is naturally the youngest in the class. She started K about a month before her 5th bd. There are kids in her current class who turned 7 by the middle of kindergarten. One of these kids who comes to mind is recognized as really bright, is being subject accelerated for math and goes to the GT reading class. Maybe she is gifted or maybe she should just be a 5th grader (and not even a younger end 5th grader) rather than a 4th grader this year.

My kids have bds right at the cusp where we could have waited a year to start them. I don't know that it would have given them an unfair advantage to do so b/c they wouldn't have been outrageously older than their grade peers had we waited. However, IMHO there should be a really, really good reason to wait to start your child in kindergarten until s/he is nearly 7 and not just he's shy or you want him to be the best athlete b/c he'll hit puberty first.

Like others have said, if it is a choice that is made by a small # of families due to personal circumstances, it really isn't an issue that tends to get the rest of us all riled up. However, when it becomes the status quo and your child is then 1-2 yrs younger than the rest of the class b/c so many kids were held out that extra year, normal developmentally appropriate behavior gets pathologized. And kids who are gifted but also a lot younger tend to get overlooked for enrichment in favor of kids who are achieving highly b/c they are a lot older.

LOL!

I had absolutely no idea that this sort of thing went on. Australia is renowned for being "sports mad" and generally or should I say just about always values its athletes over academics in adult life. Ironically this isn't the case at school, they are pretty much on a par. We don't have "red shirting" here and I really feel for you guys and the challenges it presents. As if the journey through school with GT kids isn't hard enough!