yeah, my sister who technically skipped a grade was above average height for her age, and born in january, so it barely counts here. she is also not socially awkward. but it sounds like your kid isn’t socially awkward either. do people even get over that social awkwardness anyway? I didn’t.
Yeah, she’s like 5%-ile height for her age. 
I agree people never get over it. She is shy, but tries anyway, which is more than I do.
I have a hard time telling if she is “social”, because all kids are stupid at that age.
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She’s a kid. Let her be a kid.
I think skipping grades is more for the parents to brag.
Is the kid gonna do better in life if they go to college at age 15 or 16?
I doubt it.
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They might get a TV show . . . especially if they become an MD.
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I mean, it’s not like I’m tiger-momming here. She watches tv and plays video games like 10 hours a day.
It would bother me less if Kindergarten was more relaxed, and just let the kids run around play all day. But instead she has to spend hours learning how to count and read.
yeah, I think this was my mother’s argument for my sister to go to kindergarten a year early. She already knew how to count and read. She didn’t skip kindergarten. She went a year early, which seems like the same idea.
I really didn’t have to read beyond your 1st point to find the real issue. Get her out of there. Find a decent private school. It’ll make all the difference. Public schools have become nothing more than government babysitting centers. Most of the school day is spent on activities other than learning and developing social skills. Run, Run as fast as you can and don’t look back.
My instincts about private school are similar to yours around private-college-- that they exist for rich snobs who want to treat their kids to a mini-resort. My first image of a private-elementary is Jass-Kent.
But yeah, just heard back from the teachers that it would be practically impossible to hold her back later (if we wanted to undo the decision), because the system is built to prevent slow kids from being held back.
I don’t want a rich kid school. I want a smart kid school. But maybe I’ll be stuck with rich kid school. Or home schooling.
Honestly completely passive babysitting would be perfectly fine. If that existed.
They’re often one and the same.
There are plenty of decent private schools near me. If I want a snobby rich kid (I don’t - I completely agree with your view) school those exist as well. There are plenty of very good private schools without the huge price tag. They might not have the name recognition of the top-tier private schools, but they’re most likely all much better than a decent public school. Just getting your kid out of public school system is often enough. Private schools have administrations and teachers who will often be much more flexible and willing to work with you. In my experience, public schools are mostly about moving a large cohort of students through the system so that the federal funds just keep on coming (i.e. very inflexible about their unexcused absence policy) some teachers might truly care, but administrations have their policies which must be followed, private schools are about educating the children.
I think it depends on what private school you’re talking about. Where I grew up there were a lot of private catholic schools. Pretty sure the teachers got paid less there than at the public schools, a lot less, and I heard stories from back then how teachers would beat up the kids, and it was perfectly legal. Wasn’t allowed to beat up kids in public schools.
That was probably very true (and with a few exaggerations tossed in). But things have really changed in the education scene. It wasn’t that long ago that only hard-core religious folks and other outlier folks were the the parents homeschooling. That’s all changed. There are now all kinds of programs available for those “normal parents” who want to choose something midway on the spectrum between hardcore homeschool, and snobby rich kid boarding school.
I can’t over-emphasize, things have really changed and the Pandemic related lockdown only put more fuel in the fire and accelerated the rate of change and the amount of options. There are now many, many different quality choices. Get out of the public schools. They’ve lost their way.
ah, possibly. i went to public school a long time ago.
My oldest kids went to public schools. My youngest kids - nope. I had an epiphany* around 8 years ago. Everything I’ve seen, read and experienced since then has only reinforced that view.
*I listened to the wise wisdom of my wife
When it comes to choices for school for their kids, my experience is that people mostly only see, hear, and repeat whatever supports the decisions they made for their kids.
The private school parents just couldn’t be happier. The charter school parents love it to no end. The traditional public school parents usually seem very happy.
Which parents seek out ways to say “yeah, I fucked up and here’s how”?
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Perhaps we should hear from the students!
But I didn’t go to school here. I did however went to a private international school for high school. It’s good education because the teachers I presume are making dough, and most students end up in prestigious colleges.
Lately, she’s been doing worksheets about forming letters. Where you write a letter like 50 times. Okay, I guess, it’s a thing she needs to learn one day, as she often writes backwards.
Yesterday, she had a parent teacher conference, in which her teachers were like, “I don’t think she’s ready for first grade, because she doesn’t finish her worksheets… In fact, she misses our important social time, because of it… And sometimes we make her repeat the worksheets the next day when she doesn’t finish.”
The ****. I feel like they are trying to be a joke Ranger would tell about public school stupidity.
My wife freaked at this, and emailed the G&T coordinator, which I guess is her first step as PTA mom type. The G&T was like, “no definitely bump her a grade, and get her tested for ADD so she can get 504 exemption to bullshit, and I’ll advocate for her, and if that doesn’t work there’s always private school or whatever.” Okay, good to hear, I guess.
Maybe it’s form of survivorship bias, of course parents who move out of public schools are happy about their choices. How many people do you hear from who have switched from private and charter schools to public schools and are happy?
Public schools are really losing touch. Alternatives are really stepping up their game. Have you seen the news articles about some of the school board meetings? The DOJ is now advising school boards. Do you really want to get mixed up in that hoopla? To quote another campaign - “It’s time to cut the cord”.
should’ve stopped there
many. my kid is in a public HS. we get kids who come to it back from the local private that wasn’t a good fit, had other issues, and other things. Same for the charters. people land in a place and stay there and are happy. People leave the public for those and land there and are happy.
why yes, I have seen articles about school board meetings. The school day is pretty insulated from the hoopla, and the people bringing that same hoopla to the school day (like yesterday’s beverly hills elementary anti-maskers) more or less sound like they get posts liked by someone with the screen name “Ranger” somewhere.
I am fine with someone thinking the public school isn’t a good match for their kid or family. i think it is laughable that someone advocates to all “run from that bc I did and the items on the news are scary.”
to Sredni’s recent point about the teacher saying stupid stuff - that can happen and working with the GT coordinator would be better. There are simple staff in a lot of places, and that frustrates me to hear. Fixable, fortunately. Parents in general need to advocate for what their kid needs, regardless of the setting. There is no perfect place for all.
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