Article: '5 is too young for school'

[73349]

I thought this article from Australia was interesting: http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/students-may-be-disadvantaged-by-starting-school-at-5-years-old-20140125-31ff2.html

 

The gist is that five- and perhaps six-year-olds would do better to have more preschool before starting "real" school--an interesting contrast to the US "kindergarten is the new first grade" trend.

[wapiti]

It depends on what is meant by "formal schooling."   That, IMO, is what may need adjustment.  The author gets to this at the end:

 

The University of Sydney's honorary professor in early childhood education, Alison Elliott, said it was not the starting age that was important but rather what children were doing at school.

 

''If children are allowed to come to school at the age of four, then we as teachers have to provide that early learning environment,'' she said. ''Teachers know, or should know, how to provide appropriate learning environments for those very young children.''

Edited January 12, 2016 by wapiti

[MistyMountain]

Signapore may start school late but they are big on early learning and it says most go to preschool. I think that we do expect too much out of 5 year olds and we go about the wrong way of teaching them. I think small kids are capable of learning but they vary widely at that age. Some kids are precocious and others take longer and hit their prime at a later age since they develop longer plus there is naturally great variability in kids. Not all 5 year olds are ready to meet the standards. I don't think 5 year olds need to spend all day playing and not be taught anything which is not what this article is saying but what some people do say. I think that if a 5 year old is learning that it needs to take their developmental stage in mind which in many classrooms does not happen. I also think 6 hours of formal schooling is too much for 5 year olds. They need more movement then that.

[regentrude]

Completely agree. I have not seen any evidence that the push for early academics in the US creates a better academic outcome when you compare these student with same age peers from other countries who did not start formal schooling at 6 or 7. By age 11, the advantage of the head start has disappeared.

 

I find that the push for formal academics for all children at such a young age (I am not talking about an advanced kid who is begging for formal seat work) ignores important aspects of their normal development. I do not think a 5 year old should be trained to sit still and be quiet for 7 hours in a class room. I do not even think a 7 year old should have to sit still for that long.

FYI, I come from a country where kids begin school at age 6 or 7. During the elementary years, their school day is 3 or 4 hours long and they are done by lunch time. I consider this plenty.

[Lori D.]

Agree. Others have posted in the past about how Finland (I believe) does not start until 7yo, shorter incorporates a LOT of outdoors / nature / discovery learning and shorter days in the early elementary years rather than focused/formal seatwork -- and Finland ranks among the highest in academics by high school...

[SKL]

I agree that it depends on the child.

 

I also feel it depends on what the alternative is.

 

In the case of a full time working mom like me (and many others), the alternative is still a structured group environment, where large motor physical and social activity is severely limited by safety laws etc.

 

If the alternative was for kids to play creatively outdoors and participate in all kinds of real-life activities, then yeah, that would be better for a lot of kids.  But that is not a real option for many.

 

My kids had no problem sitting quietly and doing seat work at 4 and 5 (or even at 3).  One of them was way ahead of the academic curve and probably needed even more academics than she got.  She loved to sit and read vs. move around.  My other might have done better in a more Montessori-type arrangement (we'll never really know for sure).  But she was going to be in some group indoor learning environment regardless.

[Korrale]

I am from QLD and I started formal schooling, year 1, when I was 5. And I had no qualms because we did seat work and floor work.

What I find is interesting is that QLD now has a PREP program, the equivalent of Kindergarten in the US. It is academic and it was implemented because QLD was lagging behind other Australian states that already had an academic year before 1st grade.

[SKL]

So what does it mean that the countries with the older average start date have more preschool under their belt?  Is it a wash?

 

I don't know how it is in Australia, but in the US there is a lot of variation in KGs.  Many if not most have a lot of play-based learning.  Some of that continues into 1st grade at least.  So I don't know how to compare apples to apples here.

[regentrude]

So what does it mean that the countries with the older average start date have more preschool under their belt?  Is it a wash?

 

No. A typical preschool in Germany (which is called "Kindergarten", but is not what goes by K in the US) does not involve academic instruction. There is a lot of free play and daily outdoor time, even in rain and snow, when kids in our US daycare would not set foot outside (rubber boots are a must-have item in a German preschool). There are activities where kids paint, color, do crafts, use scissors; they may have early music education or tumbling, daily story time. They will, however, not be drilled in the abcs or early math.

During the last year preceding mandatory schooling, at age 5, kids participate in some more structured activities to prepare them for school.

So, it is not a wash because the focus of the preschool is on skills other than academic ones.

 

Btw, some of the most highly sought after programs are the forest preschools that operate without a building and spend the entire time outside, except for when weather conditions are actually dangerous. I would have loved for my kids to attend something like this.

 

ETA:

 

 

but in the US there is a lot of variation in KGs.  Many if not most have a lot of play-based learning.  Some of that continues into 1st grade at least.

 

Our K here was academic learning and mandatory school time from 8am to 3pm. Not play based. I have not heard from anybody that their 1st grade is play based; which state does not have strict academic requirements for 1st???

 

[Ellie]

I agree that a 5yo child is to young to be sent away from home every day, five days a week.

 

I'm not big on preschool, either.

 

Children so young should be home with their parents. Parents have been teaching their children all sorts of things, long before there was such a thing as "preschool" or "kindergarten."

 

What we have is a generation of young mothers who go off to work instead of staying home with their young children, and who must put their children into daycare; there's a great deal of guilt over that, so daycare has become "preschool," and now "pre-kindergarten," to make it sound more important and less guilt-imposing than "daycare."

[regentrude]

I agree that a 5yo child is to young to be sent away from home every day, five days a week.

Children so young should be home with their parents. ...

 

What we have is a generation of young mothers who go off to work instead of staying home with their young children, and who must put their children into daycare; there's a great deal of guilt over that, so daycare has become "preschool," and now "pre-kindergarten," to make it sound more important and less guilt-imposing than "daycare."

 

Ellie, your choice of wording makes you post comes across as pretty insulting to mothers who work outside the home.

It would be nice if we could not let this devolve into mommy wars.

[ondreeuh]

This is why I love my son's kindergarten class. It is full day (6.5 hours) but the academics are appropriate for most kids and fairly short. The morning starts with coloring & breakfast, then they do a morning meeting/circle time. They do Saxon K for math and are STILL learning the numbers up to 10. They do a whole-class phonics lesson but then they split into groups and do leveled reading. They just started HWT K. Each day they have a half hour recess, 45 minute special (either library, gym, or music), 30 min. computer lab, 1 hour of structured free play (they rotate between centers - play kitchen, legos, blocks, beads, etc.) plus pull-out for individual reading. It seems very old-school in my mind. Most of the kids are ahead of the regular reading program, thanks to the teacher's extra work with leveled readers and small groups. Only my son is struggling with being bored and disengaged.

[Gil]

...

Edited July 15, 2016 by Gil

[sewingmama]

The article is pretty skewed... In Korea the kids may start mandatory school at 6 but they actually start formal school at 2. The minute they are potty trained they are sent to private kindergartens ...usually English speaking ones. They were there for half the day. ALL kids did this. They also had outside music classes, art classes etc etc. Once a child hits 2 they are shuffled from class to class all day long. It was not play based learning...a lot of it included workbooks. The parents work..they have to do something with the kids. The reason Koreans rarely have more then 2 kids is because it is expected they will send their kids to these classes and they cost money. In Korea I was told over and over that only rich people have more then 2 kids.

 

Secondly, the article can say what it likes but in Australia there is currently a push for school hours to be longer to match up with a parents working hours. The legal starting age in every State in Australia is 6 years old. This means no child has to start K until that age. It is societal norms and parents who put their kids in school so young. Most welcome it because they can stop paying expensive childcare fees. Recently my State changed the cutoffs to very early in the year ( we school Jan-dec and the cutoff was end of April..all children born after that had to wait till the following year). I welcomed it since all my kids were born after that...it meant more time before they had to formally start school...but there was a huge outcry from parents annoyed at having their kids home for an extra year or having to pay an extra year of childcare fees.

 

It really doesn't matter what the best interests of the child are....children will always be at the mercy of the convenience of the parents.

 

Just last week I read an article about how afterschool care is the new place 'to be' and if you didn't send your kids there they would be socially inept and disadvantaged because they would have no extra stimulation or friends to play with. Part of it is true... Its rare for my kids to go to a park after school and actually find kids older then toddlers playing in it but at the same time...the article disgusted me.

 

Educational experiences vary just like anywhere. My kids went to PreK at 4. It was a public kindy down the road. It was play based where they taught no academics at all. However the real reason for that was not because of 'educational enlightenment'. We lived in a poor, lower class area and the kids sent there were simply not ready to do academic work...it was common for a lot of them to have never had a book read to them ever before starting school. So the point of the kindy was to acclimatise them to things that children from middle class families are exposed to in their homes. If you send your kid to a private school then they do formal academic work because the parents are paying for it and expect it. Why spend all that money to send Susy to a private school if it doesn't make her smarter then little Johnny down the road who goes to a state run play based kindy KWIM.

 

My kids went to the free government kindy for 'fun' 2 -3 half days a week and were homeschooled by me very lightly and randomly the rest of the time when they were 4. My neice has been in daycare since she was born and was sent to a very expensive private school at 4. My brother is severely annoyed (at the school system, not at me) that my kids are very far ahead of his daughter academically. My kids could all read fluently while she was still stumbling over beginning phonics after all her exposure to expensive educational settings since birth ( my kids are average learners and my neice has no learning issues either).

[Joker]

Kindergarten can be done right. Both of my dds went to K before I started homeschooling. Oldest only went for half the year due to a family death and missed time. We thought it best to finish her year at home.

 

Youngest remembers it as an amazing time. She still talks about her K experience and we are still friends today with her K teacher. I am very glad she had that experience. Her kindergarten was five days a week. Four of those days were 8:00-2:30 and one day a week was 8:00-1:30. We live 3 miles from the school so it wasn't that much time in a car, and it wasn't that much time at school (especially since they had a good long recess every day).

[Farrar]

I think, first of all, that universal preschool is coming.  It's already a reality where I am and I think it's the future, whether we like it or not.

 

I also think, that most families need to send their kids to school of some kind by age 3 or so because they need to work.  That's just an economic reality for many families.

 

I think phrasing like this "too young for school" polarizes the issue.  The reality is school for young kids.  So then the question should not be whether young children should go to school (many of us feel differently, but they do go to school, so that's that), but how to best carry out a positive educational environment at that young age.

 

And then, I think it doubly polarizes the issue by implying that there's some dichtomy between "real" or "formal" school and what's developmentally appropriate.  I wholeheartedly agree that much of what's happening in schools now for young children is not developmentally appropriate.  But that doesn't mean they shouldn't have a well-organized program of learning.  Time for play is something that can be well-organized, after all.

[Ellie]

Ellie, your choice of wording makes you post comes across as pretty insulting to mothers who work outside the home.

It would be nice if we could not let this devolve into mommy wars.

 

It is not their fault that they have to work outside the home. It is not their fault that they have been made to think they need to work outside the home.

 

There are many things that are not their fault. I still feel the same way, that young children should be home with their mothers and not sent away to daycare every day. And I still believe that it is true that "daycare" has been changed to "preschool" because it sounds better and less guilt-inducing.

 

Doesn't this article indicate that five is too young for school? Well, there you go.

[Farrar]

It is not their fault that they have to work outside the home. It is not their fault that they have been made to think they need to work outside the home.

 

There are many things that are not their fault. I still feel the same way, that young children should be home with their mothers and not sent away to daycare every day. And I still believe that it is true that "daycare" has been changed to "preschool" because it sounds better and less guilt-inducing.

 

Doesn't this article indicate that five is too young for school? Well, there you go.

 

But there have also been many studies that have shown that children in quality care don't suffer from it in any measurable way long term.  Working parents don't need to feel guilty.  Or be made to feel guilty.

 

I feel like this article was misnamed...  it's not saying five is too young to be in a play based day care/preschool/whatever you want to call it, but rather that five is too young for a formal academic environment such as is being pushed on kids now in many places.

[SKL]

I didn't know that the term "daycare" was guilt-inducing.  I called my kids' preschool "preschool" because they sat at tables and did seatwork and learned academics.  Aside from letters and numbers, they studied authors, composers, artists, geography, French and Spanish, instrumental music, etc.  I have never felt guilty about it.  :)

[lea_lpz]

Ellie, your choice of wording makes you post comes across as pretty insulting to mothers who work outside the home.

It would be nice if we could not let this devolve into mommy wars.

Well this is a message board for homeschoolers so parents who work full time and have kids in full day school / daycare might want to keep that in mind when posting on here.

[Ellie]

Well this is a message board for homeschoolers so parents who work full time and have kids in full day school / daycare might want to keep that in mind when posting on here.

 

Huh. No kidding. A message board for homeschoolers. Who knew?

[regentrude]

Well this is a message board for homeschoolers so parents who work full time and have kids in full day school / daycare might want to keep that in mind when posting on here.

 

I was under the impression that this board also welcomes afterschoolers and people who are self-educating.

Also, people's life circumstances change, and people who at one point are homeschoolers may, at another point in their live, have their kids in school. So you welcome only people here who have been, and will be, exclusively homeschooling and staying home until their kids are adults?  That excludes quite a portion of the users on these forums; some of us homeschool only for part of the kids' school life, and some - gasp - do have their kids in some type of care situation while they work and homeschool around their jobs.

FWIW, I do not have my kids in school, and I do find the insinuation insulting that working parents should "feel guilty" and are "made to think they have to work".

 

[SKL]

Well this is a message board for homeschoolers so parents who work full time and have kids in full day school / daycare might want to keep that in mind when posting on here.

 

Well, considering that the linked article was specifically about all-day school, why is it even being discussed by homeschoolers?  Obviously there is some crossover here on this forum.

[SKL]

I'm not sure how the whole preschool/daycare thing came up.  I did bring up the question as to whether preschool in the later-start countries might be comparable to KG in the earlier-start countries.  I wasn't talking about infant or toddler daycare; I assumed that if you started school at 7, and you went to preschool, your preschool was during the 1-3? years before you turned 7.

[IsabelC]

Early institutionalization, whether it's called daycare, preschool or whatever, needs to be available and of good quality because there will always be kids who need it. But I have yet to see any evidence that it is beneficial for kids who have a stable home environment with parents (or other loving adults) who have the time, resources and determination to facilitate the child's learning. I'm not convinced that it's even possible to create a setup that is ideal for most, let alone all, 5yo children. Or any age children. Oh yeah, that must be why we are going to start home schooling again  :party:

[sewingmama]

Over here, it is true that the vast majority of children attends daycare before age seven, often for many years. I am continuously shocked by how little they learn there, however.

Very true. When my kids went to 4yo kindy they were virtually the only kids who hadn't already spent considerable time in daycare. I had taken my kids to playgroup regularly though. The kindy had a policy of not teaching any academics...just play and crafts and stories and so on. That was fine to me because I was schooling my kids loosely at home, however, at the end of the year my kids were the only kids who could read and write at any level or even knew their letter sounds. At one stage the school did a trial of reading eggs but decided not to purchase it because none of the kids could do any of the lessons (mine had been using it since they were 3). It wasn't because these kids were not smart but they had not had any exposure. The parents figured that academics was what schools were for and thus did nothing with them at home and the early education programs figured the kids were better off with a play based curriculum and did no academics with them. Thus upon entering official kindy when the kids turned 5 they were lucky if they could recognise their name let alone write it.

 

It was the main reason I decided to homeschool. I knew I couldn't send my kids, who were already reading, writing and doing basic math, to K where I knew the whole class would be focusing on just the letter sounds for the whole year.

 

So there can be disadvantages to not starting any academics till a child is 7. There will classrooms full of children with big academic differences. They will contain children who like my DS taught himself to read at 4 and begged for workbooks till he cried and is a year ahead in math. Then there will be the children who were NT but their parents exposed them to books and numbers etc so they enter knowing the basics and then there will be the children whose parents believe its the schools job to educate and don't encourage or expose their kids to academics so when they enter school at 7 they are clueless.

 

I think some academic instruction at early ages is more likely to be beneficial then hurtful.

[SKL]

Yes, I think 7 is too late if kids are doing no academics at all outside of formal "school."  I don't think that's the reality in advanced countries.  From everything I've heard, kids in advanced countries generally do not enter school at 7 not knowing any of what we call academics.

 

I keep asking myself if 7 would even be an OK age for my eldest to start.  She is pretty average and has had learning difficulties.  However, even for her, I feel 7 is too late.  She may not have been a natural reader upon turning 5, but certainly by 6 she would have been cognitively ready and eager even if she'd had no previous training.  The other thing is that if she'd had to wait until age 7 to find out that she had a vision issue (noticed only because of her learning struggles), she would have missed the opportunity to get therapy at an age when it would be most effective, and she would have started out behind her peers.  And many kids with learning differences benefit from going to school earlier so they can take advantage of school-based interventions.

[MotherOfBoys]

In my town preschool is only offered by a daycare. At a certain time during the day, three days a week, they separate the kids and do preschool, which isn't much, with the ones that have paid for the preschool part. I have heard from my neighbor that she feels less guilty about working because they pay for the preschool part. She does not need to work. Her husband makes great money but she lacks confidence and knowledge about what hs mom does. She is educated and smart. 

 

I think moms offer the best age appropriate learning for their child because they know them best and love them. I think preschools do need to be offered for moms that HAVE to work or lack the abilities. But if you can stay home why not? I don't think your child will get more from school at that age then hanging out with mom. 

[MotherOfBoys]

And if the preschool wAS smaller because only the necessary kids were in it, the teacher could offer a better age appropriate learning environment.

[hepatica]

I live in a school district where the Kindergarten cut off date is Jan.1, so my December and November  dds would have been 4 years old for close to half of their kindergarten year. That was one of the factors in our decision to homeschool. When our district moved to full day kindergarten this year they explicitly argued that they needed the full day so that they would actually have time to do the traditional kindergarten things (arts, crafts, playtime, story time). The half-day kindergarten was so filled up meeting the academic requirements (which now include reading and writing), that they couldn't fit it all in.

 

My ds (5) is in a full day (6 hour) outdoor education program one day a week and it is wonderful. I think it is modeled on those European outdoor programs. They are outside the entire time, no matter what the weather. I wish he could do it everyday! 

[lea_lpz]

I live in a school district where the Kindergarten cut off date is Jan.1, so my December and November dds would have been 4 years old for close to half of their kindergarten year. That was one of the factors in our decision to homeschool. When our district moved to full day kindergarten this year they explicitly argued that they needed the full day so that they would actually have time to do the traditional kindergarten things (arts, crafts, playtime, story time). The half-day kindergarten was so filled up meeting the academic requirements (which now include reading and writing), that they couldn't fit it all in.

 

My ds (5) is in a full day (6 hour) outdoor education program one day a week and it is wonderful. I think it is modeled on those European outdoor programs. They are outside the entire time, no matter what the weather. I wish he could do it everyday!

I ran into the same thing when my dd was in preschool and we were looking at private schools! All the private schools were full day k and it was trumpeted like a good thing. A couple had half day options but the teachers warned that only 1-2 kids did that and kids doing mornings only would only get academics and non if the "fun stuff" like art, pe, hands on projects, etc.

 

5 did turn out to be too young for my dd who was not ready for k in a traditional class setting and that's why we chose to homeschool. Our k was very gentle and old fashioned. She spent 30 min a day on "seat work." She learned to cut, color, paste, recognize and write numbers 1-10, her alphabet letter names and sounds, cvc words and some simple addition. The rest of our day was read alouds, hands on projects and getting outside to explore. K was wrapped up in about an hour a half a day. I think this type if k is appropriate for pretty much all 5 to 6 year olds. K programs were kids should already be reading and expect an hour of homework a night is not. By the way I have a stepson in ps and this was his k experience.

[SKL]

My kids' school is re-introducing half-day KG for 2014-2015, if I heard it right.  It is a high-standard private school.  I don't know what specifically motivated this decision.  The 1st grade is quite rigorous in that school.

 

ETA:  I should clarify - the half-day option is in addition to the full-day option, not instead.  They had the two options a while back also, but stopped the half-day at some point.

[SarahW]

I sort of agree with the linked article.

 

For reference, my son first started attending school in The Netherlands. There, you start preschool at 3 or so, which is just a group playtime for a few hours a day. Lots of blocks and puzzles. Storytime, snack, and then playground time. Then, the day after your 4th birthday you graduate to the elementary school. There, the classroom has more manipulatives - tanagrams, alphabet puzzles, etc. More circle time with story and discussion. Crafts and playground. As for academics, they learn the alphabet, numbers, and shapes. Schooltime is the morning and two afternoons. The next year is, I think, more of the same, except three afternoons and I think they start reading and doing simple arithmitic. Then in "1st grade" (age 6/7) they do math, reading, English language lessons, etc. And then it ramps up from there.

 

We moved back to America part way through the age 4 year, and then the next year when CP went to K they put him in an "Advanced-K" since he could already read CVC and do simple addition. This had mixed results. They expected him to write paragraphs, but without good instruction in handwriting or spelling. They expected higher math, but without any conceptual understanding. It was a rough year, and I'm still trying to fill in the gaps from it.

 

Iow - yes, "academics" is wasted on the too young, but in most of the top-performing countries the young are given a firm basis in thinking skills, conceptual understanding, and social skills so that when academics are introduced they are able to just fly with it.

 

But no, I'm pretty sure 7-yo's in Finland do not enter school lacking knowledge of letters or numbers. 

[Farrar]

State daycares lasts all day long, and there are about 35 kids for every daycare worker. Some provide educational activities, while others just leave the kids to their own devices. If a parent does not bring the child during the pre-designated hours, the child will lose its spot. If the child is ill for more than three days, the child needs a doctor's notice. If the parents go on holiday for a week together with the child, the child loses its spot. So, too many hours, often too little educational activities.

 

Are there not enough spots for every kid?  Or is it just about losing a spot in a "good" day care?

[bakpak]

Seems to me that kids are on such a broad spectrum up till age 7 or so, that the real trick is meeting them where they are. The problem comes when you try to lump them all together, set standards across the board, force kids to behave in a way that they're not capable of, or hold them back due to preconceived notions. Kids vary so much in their behavior, interests, abilities, and maturity during those early years. I personally have enjoyed reading about Finland's school system, or rather Finland's positive educational culture. Extrapolating their successes to stating that no child should be learning any academics before 7 is a false assumption in my opinion. Being able to meet your child where they are, and creating a positive culture of learning is the real take-home point, whether that happens at home or in a school.

[Luanne]

Ellie, your choice of wording makes you post comes across as pretty insulting to mothers who work outside the home.

It would be nice if we could not let this devolve into mommy wars.

 

What she states is purely fact.  I'm sorry you have a problem with that.  I'm sure Ellie is sorry as well.

 

[Luanne]

In my opinion, there shouldn't be a set starting age for school.  I think since every child is different, they should go by emotional and academic readiness.  I think it is not good that they have clumped children together with only children of the exact same age and have made them so they won't (or can't) learn to deal with people of all ages.  Why should it matter if one child starts school at age 5 and another doesn't until they are 8.  It is society that has made the 8 year old feel like there is something wrong with this.

[Tanikit]

I think children start learning as babies - they learn a lot about language - possibly more than they ever learn at school in that first year of life. So schooling is really about education and children are being educated from birth in every home where there is not huge neglect.

 

So then what is it about "schooling" - which is meant to be education - that means that small children do not do so well there. I taught my DD from less than a year of age. I taught her things that were for preschool and elementary and even some for middle school and she remembered it. Not once did I tell her we were having a lesson, not once did we sit at a table and not once was she even forced to sit - let alone sit still. There was nothing formal about it at all. I did do some preparation and made materials that could be used with children that age - she did have alphabet letters and I did show them to her and tell her the sounds just like I showed her pictures of cows in books and told her what they were. I gave her crayons and paints to use and if she happened to draw a straight line she might say it looked like a L or a 1 and then I'd agree and ask her if she wanted to draw another.

 

My second child is nearly 3 and desperately wants the formal education that my eldest would have kicked and fought against. She loves worksheets, is extremely good with her fine motor control and likes to sit at the table and paint - whereas the eldest preferred to stand and paint herself all over the youngest likes to keep very clean, have no paint even on her fingers and stay in the lines when painting a picture - that is just her.

 

So can 5 year olds learn to read and write and do math? Certainly if the method is right for them. Can they learn to sit still for hours and follow loads of directions and do things they do not see the point in - well based on what happens particularly to boys in schools I would say NO. I do not think one can expect a 5 year old to keep their attention on something they are not interested in for long periods of time - it is up to someone to give that info very briefly and by the way and informally or to make it a LOT of fun for the child so that they want to do it - and formally, while it works for my youngest would NEVER have worked for my eldest and at 6 it is getting better, but she is still not where any school would want her to be with concentration and ability to sit still, though academically she is ahead in every area.

 

[MissKNG]

New York has a late cut off so almost 5 year olds are also being shipped off to school. I started school at almost 5 as well and turned out fine. (imo!)

 

As for the "mom going off to work" thing going on in this thread, I was still sent to school even though my parents were (are) self employed and the office was (is) at home. My mom stayed at home since she managed the office. She had no intention to home school so I went to school. So it's not always a "parent wants to go off to work" situation.

 

The bottom line: each family runs the way it sees as best for THEM.

[regentrude]

What she states is purely fact.  I'm sorry you have a problem with that.  I'm sure Ellie is sorry as well.

 

I beg to differ. What she stated was her personal opinion. That she believes some other person "should" be doing something and has been "made" to think something does not make it a fact.

 

[Farrar]

Neither. It's an arbitrary, post-communist thing. "Because the rules say so."

 

So there's enough spots but kids are basically expelled if they miss school?  That's a bit harsh.  But I suppose if it's a rule...  Sigh.

[PeachyDoodle]

I live in a school district where the Kindergarten cut off date is Jan.1, so my December and November  dds would have been 4 years old for close to half of their kindergarten year. That was one of the factors in our decision to homeschool. When our district moved to full day kindergarten this year they explicitly argued that they needed the full day so that they would actually have time to do the traditional kindergarten things (arts, crafts, playtime, story time). The half-day kindergarten was so filled up meeting the academic requirements (which now include reading and writing), that they couldn't fit it all in.

 

My ds (5) is in a full day (6 hour) outdoor education program one day a week and it is wonderful. I think it is modeled on those European outdoor programs. They are outside the entire time, no matter what the weather. I wish he could do it everyday! 

 

This sounds fantastic! I am sure it's something my ds would LOVE in a year or two. Not being "outdoors-y" myself, we don't spend enough time outside. How did you find something like this? Are you in the US?

 

ETA: Feel free to pm me, didn't mean to derail the thread...

[stripe]

What she states is purely fact.  I'm sorry you have a problem with that.  I'm sure Ellie is sorry as well.

 

You are sure that Ellie is sorry that Regentrude has a problem with Ellie's post? Or sorry that anyone does not agree with the "fact" that "Children so young should be home with their parents" or what? And how can you be sure?

 

I have changed my mind about preschool after seeing my nieces and nephews whom I personally believe are better off in preschool than they are at home. The children themselves look positively delighted to go to their half-day of child-centered activities instead of staying home where (in some cases) their mothers/caretakers are actively working in the home doing things like cleaning and cooking, and in other cases their caretaker is just not stimulating or child-centered. Rarely are little songs sung, rarely are there toys or books, and usually the kid is just in the way. And these are homes where there is some relative who is around during the day to watch the child. A properly run preschool is a child-centered environment that many children around the world lack otherwise.

 

I saw a show about preschool or daycare or some such program for young children in Sweden, and I have to say, it was quite nice. A small number of children went to what looked to me like a home, with a very low student/teacher ratio, where they did lots of hands-on, rarely academic things all day long, including things like eating and cooking together. It seemed pleasant to me and not at all institutional in flavor.

 

Sure, one can say, if only all parents were independently wealthy and had tons of free time, then they would spend tons of their time with their kids, etc. Except there are plenty of examples of rich, idle parents throughout history who definitely prefer(ed) to outsource child-rearing. The whole concept of a nanny is just this: a trained (or not!) person whose (paid) job it is to look after someone else's kids while the parents do something else; and after reading way too much Charlotte Mason in a short period of time, I came to conclude that she was advocating that mothers almost model themselves after nannies! 

[Stellalarella]

I'm with Ellie and Isabel on this one.  I know some folks need to work and thus need preschool.  I know some folks greatly enjoy the opportunity to work and appreciate preschool for their kids.  I know some folks put their kiddos in preschool whether they work or not, just because their kiddos enjoy it.  But I don't mind saying that it is a wonderful thing for a mother to desire to stay at home with her small children and give them an enriching experience full of seed planting, book reading, simple chore doing :), nature walking and the like.  

 

I tried preschool with one kid.  Man, it was just miserable trying to load everybody up to take him to pre-K.  Maybe pre-K was enjoyable for him, but the heck you have to go through to get there and back is just so not worth it.  The commute is the killer for me, anyway.  And I had the first three kids in a public magnet school where Kindergarten was First Grade.  Mrs. B sent kiddo home with 30 minutes of mandatory homework 4 days a week.  And then there were those blasted sight word boxes that HAD to be  memorized.  And then there was the fact that PS kids in our state only are allowed one recess per day.  And then they started foisting end of year fill in the bubble tests on the kindies.

 

I caught so much flack over the years for not putting my kids in preschool, but I can't see as how any of them suffered later on.  They've done great.    My kids felt like they "survived" kindergarten at public school.  

 

When people start talking about how desperately we need universal pre-k, my heart just sinks.  I would like for pre-k to be available for folks that want it, but I also wish that we could simultaneously encourage parents so that  they had (or could get) the skill sets keep kids at home for pre-K.  One concern that I have is that once we go the route of universal pre-k that parents will start to think that they simply aren't able to give a child what he needs in those early years because it "has" to be provided by an institution.

[stripe]

I just think it's really, really complicated, and those people who believe that the parents know what's best for their kids, need to realize that for some parents, that means outsourcing. 

 

I also think that it's important that young children's activities not all become academics-centered. 

 

But these are not contradictory! I once read about French parents liking preschool/daycare because it allows their kid to have time with all sorts of toys that they don't normally have at home, and also about some Scandinavian country where there is a supervised, organized approach to playground play. 

 

Here is an interesting take, although I tend to hate articles like this!

Why French Parents Are Superior by PAMELA DRUCKERMAN

I first realized I was on to something when I discovered a 2009 study, led by economists at Princeton, comparing the child-care experiences of similarly situated mothers in Columbus, Ohio, and Rennes, France. The researchers found that American moms considered it more than twice as unpleasant to deal with their kids. In a different study by the same economists, working mothers in Texas said that even housework was more pleasant than child care.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052970204740904577196931457473816

 

 

[SKL]

Personally I think that it has done my kids a lot of good to have been supervised / taught by many different adults since they were tots.  Everybody has a different style and a different vibe, and the variety of connections is great for both social and intellectual development.

 

But I wouldn't presume to tell other caring moms that what they are doing is inferior.

[Tanikit]

I don't think that for anything there should be a set standard for everyone - not for diet, not for medication, not for education, not for institutionalisation, not for exercise - really everyone is an individual and while there are things that you could expect to suit everyone, you will also always find an exception. This even applies to groups and families and even institutions - there is no best way to run every institution - each institution is individual....

 

So that means that some 5 years old may do well in pre school. It may also not suit some 6 year olds. And who cares whether this applies to 90% or even 95% of all children of that age - I want to know how it applies to mine and to my family. If it happens to be best for my family and my child to put her in school then that is what I will do. Right now it is best for her to be at home and it is also best for me to be homeschooling her. It is not for me to judge other people who are making other decisions - I do not know all the facts they have taken into consideration.

 

However I hope that if anyone makes a decision that they later feel was wrong that they will be big enough to change it for the benefit of their child or family. If homeschooling is no longer benefitting my children then I hope I will not stick to it just to save face with people who have said it will not work. If it is benefitting them then I hope I can keep my priorities straight so that I can keep them home. And I hope in all of this to remain grateful for the opportunities I and my children have had and will have - regardless where they come from and where they are educated or brought up. 

 

All I know is that things change - nothing is definite in life. Money is not guaranteed, heck being alive tomorrow is not guaranteed either. For today this is what works for me. If things change I will make another plan. I could not care whether most 5 year olds should be at school or not. I do however care that I maintain the right to choose where my child can be at that age and at other ages. 

[Acorn]

I agree that a 5yo child is to young to be sent away from home every day, five days a week.

 

I'm not big on preschool, either.

 

Children so young should be home with their parents. Parents have been teaching their children all sorts of things, long before there was such a thing as "preschool" or "kindergarten."

 

What we have is a generation of young mothers who go off to work instead of staying home with their young children, and who must put their children into daycare; there's a great deal of guilt over that, so daycare has become "preschool," and now "pre-kindergarten," to make it sound more important and less guilt-imposing than "daycare."

 

I was surprised to see you write this.  You tend to always argue against red-shirting.  In my district, my son could (or in your mind-should) have started school at age FOUR.  Even though, he would have been five a month after school started, we made a choice to delay entry.  I have seen it argued that we will have stolen a year of his adult life.  I think he will be a better adult though because of having an enriching home environment during preschool years.