Starting school

[Antheia]

I was having a discussion with family and they seem to think i should send Lily to school next year. I'm not sure what to think. She is 4 this December. DH started school when he was 4 and i started when i was 5 so really she could go either way. How do you tell?

[Muppity]

So she will be 4 and 2 months when she starts? To me that sounds a bit young.

This is from the NSW Dept fo Education web site - by my reading of it Lily would be too young to start next year.

What is the right age?
Children may enter Kindergarten at the beginning of the school year in NSW government schools if they turn five on or before 31 July in that year.

Some gifted or talented children may be ready to start school at an earlier age while others may benefit from being a little older. By law, all children must start school by their sixth birthday.

[BeautifulMadness]

i personally wouldnt be sending her not @ 4, id wait till she is 5

[Kitt3n]

Antheia I think it really depends on the child.

Most parents these days are actually holding the kids back till they are 5 turning 6.

I put DD in when she was 4 turning 5, but she was turning 5 that March, so it was only a few months.

Personally i think having just turned 5 is a little early - how strong is she socially? If she is a fairly bright and adaptable kid it might be the best thing for her - however if she isnt wuite ready it could inhibit her progress.

I think its really up to you to decide if she is ready or not - 4 turning 5 or 5 turning 6 doesnt matter, its really how she will cope. Most schools also offer an interview with the child if they are a little young.

Hope you find the best solution for your little one hun!

[Phteven]

If she has got most of these skills down pat then she might be ready but there's no rush - once she starts she can't unstart.

Preparing for Kindergarten

Parents/caregivers can do a lot to help prepare their child for Kindergarten before the big 'first day'. Below is a list of skills that will be useful for children starting Kindergarten. We recognise that not all children will have these skills as everyone develops at a different pace, so this is intended only as a guide so that starting school may be just a little easier.

Encourage your child to attempt the things mentioned below, but don't worry if your child can't do all of them. Talk to the Kindergarten teacher, and together you can support and assist your child's learning.
Language

* talks to other people about familiar objects and events
* answers and asks simple questions
* makes needs known
* follows simple instructions
* uses books for enjoyment or for looking at pictures
* identifies pictures in books, magazines, on television or video
* uses a variety of things (pens, pencils, textas, paintbrushes, sticks in the dirt) to draw, to scribble or to write
* joins in singing familiar songs


Mathematics

* recognises that numbers can be used to count
* uses words such as many, a lot, more, less
* identifies things in a group that are different
* sees differences in shapes
* differentiates between opposites - up and down, under and over, in front and behind, day and night


Personal/Social Skills

* uses the toilet independently
* can say own name and address
* adapts to unfamiliar settings and new experiences
* can finish a task, and tidies up afterwards
* plays cooperatively with other children - shares and takes turns
* can sit still to listen to a story for a few minutes
* is curious about the world
* can share an adult's attention with several other children
* participates in imaginative play


Physical Skills

* uses scissors to cut along a straight line
* enjoys a variety of indoor and outdoor play
* can put on and take off jumpers, shoes, socks independently
* makes and designs things using a variety of materials

[Antheia]

Yeah see that is what confuses me because i went to school with people who were still 4 after July and they weren;t gifted or talented. I thought it was young too but they have all got me thinking.

[~clover~]

If she was 5 before July you could think about it, but since she won't be 5 til the end of the year wait.
The guide lines are if they turn 5 before July 31, or 6 after.
DD was 4 til April last year in Kinder.
DD2 will be 5 in June, so I'll have to wait & see how she is before I send her. See if she's ready.
Its up to the child, but I think she's too young yet.

[ll80]

I held my DD back a year from starting Kindergarten.
She could have started this year being 3 turning 4 in March.
I decided to hold her back so she would be 4 turning 5 and then 5 turning 6 for prep.

I've found with my DD in the last 6 months since she turned 4 that she has developed so much more socially, emotionally and has a lot more of the skills fine tuned that dachlostar posted.

I also took into consideration that if I had have started her at 3 turning 4 by the time she got to yr 12 all the kids would be 17 turning 18 and she would be 16 turning 17. She'd want to be going out etc with her friends but still be underage when some of her friends might not be.

[{sarah}]

They're changing it pretty soon to turning five by the end of May the year they start.

[Phteven]

ll80, I think that here in NSW kindergarten is the equivilant of prep.


It would be so much easier if it was standarised between the states wouldn't it.

[christy]

Yeah in QLD the deal is that you are supposed to start prep next year if they turn 5 before June 31st. The thing is if they prove to be too young, they can repeat prep, but if you don't do prep (which is an option) you MUST start grade 1 the next year. If the prep teacher thinks they are too immature socially, they will be able to recommend that the child repeats prep & its heaps easier to do for the "younger" children.

Matilda turns 5 13 days before the cut off date so she will be the youngest. BUT I have found an amazing school in Sydney where we will be moving & she is enrolled for the pre-grade 1 (whatever its called ). They are letting her do 3 days a week for the first 6 months and then evaluating how she is going, whether or not she goes to 4 days or 5 and then how she handles that, she can go to 5 days the next year & take it as an official start then.

The school only has 18 students enrolled for next year K-6. So they are able to treat each child as an individual much easier....

[ll80]

ll80, I think that here in NSW kindergarten is the equivilant of prep.


It would be so much easier if it was standarised between the states wouldn't it.

sure is dachlostar, I was referring to VIC system as thats where I was living when I decided to hold her back,

So now that I am in QLD she starts Prep next year which I gather is the same as Kindergarten roughly except they can go everyday. It's not compulsory here as I think they only introduced Prep last year, I had NFI about it all when I moved, council thought I was nuts when I rang them up to enquire about Kindergarten.

I wish they would standardise it all!!

[Antheia]

Ok i am still having trouble deciding this. She can do everything on that list that Dach gave above except she cant say her address. She asks me every day if she can go to school yet. She pretends to do 'homework' all the time (which i think is so cute!) For their guidelines she is ready socially and academically. It's just her age! And i feel she is missing out. Do you think if i went to the local school and asked about it they might interview her and see? Or even if she did start next year and wasnt ready for year 1 she could repeat kinder, do they do that?

[smiles4u]

To give you an idea, (though we are in regional Victoria)...

My daughter turns 3 on the 6th of May 2009, ... she will be doing two years of 3year old Kinder and then one year of 4year old Kinder.

So she will start 3year old Kinder the term after she turns 3 next year.

The Kindergarten Director said that they 'can' repeat 4year old Kinder if they feel the child is not ready for Prep !!

We decided it would be an advantage for her to start primary school older rather than 'too' young BUT then that's just our opinion.

I turned in 5 in Jan ... and DP 5 in March & our parents started us that year ... through our experience we felt it was a disadvantage for us even though we are Uni educated & had successful careers we felt that the 'older' pupils had an advantage over us when at school, especially in secondary school.

[Antheia]

I wish we had something similar. All we have is Kinder (which is equivallent to prep) but its compulsory and they have to go for 5 days.

[Trillian]

T, I would be holding her back another year and start her in 2010 - that's when Paige will be starting and she is older than Lily. Especially with her speech issues, you really want her to be on top of that as much as she can be when she starts or she may struggle with school and the learning side of it. Plus you've said she is quite shy and I just don't think she is ready for school because of her other behaviour issues you've been having with her and it is not worth repeating them when they will benefit more from having another year at home rather than another year of kindergarten/prep/year 1 (whatever the equivalent is)

[briggsy's girl]

i'm a bit the same - think you should hold her back - though if you can find a child care in the area that runs a kindergarten type program, it might be helpful to get her used to it all

early next year, you're going to have the upheaval of adding another bub to the family - if she's a bit on the shy side, if you then ship her off to school early, she might feel resentment towards the baby as she is being pushed out - esp if you have to send her five days a week

i was only 4 when i started school (may bub) and 17.5 when i finished - i cruised through academically, but socially it was damn hard as so many people were 18 by the time they finished high school. thankfully my parents were ok with me goin out (small town, and really responsible me!) but it was still restrictive cos i couldn't go to the pubs with them kwim? i wouldn't have written myself off like my friends, but it did mean i was excluded a lot simply because i couldn't legally join them...

[Karina]

If it were me, I'd start her in 2010.

If she starts next year she will be way younger than the other kids and they may not even accept her anyway with the age guidelines they have. If you think she is ready though, you could always ring the school or visit and speak to the principal or whoever and get their advice. My birthday is in June and I started the year I turned 5. Even though I was able to do all the things they thought I should be able to do to be in school, they still didnt want me to start that year, purely because of my age... age and Lily would be 6 months younger than I was. In the end my mum pestered them and they took me.