Nov. '07 babies

jsugrin

So who is doing transitional Kinder?  I was finally able to get some info from my district, after many phone calls and a couple emails.  I swear they are hoping no-one knows it's an option so they don't end up with many kids.  When I asked if they were planning on putting any info on the website ect the response I got was" well things are changing a lot and we don't want to confuse people".  Now on the surface that sounds reasonable but the reality is the basic info I needed was that to enroll Andrew in transitional kinder I have to enroll him at the regular Kinder enrollment, which is Dec. 5th!

I get it that they don' know where the transitional kinders will be (not every local school ect because of a small enrollment) but seriously if you checked out their site to figure out if your kid was eligible for the 2012-2013 school year you would look at it and think, damn my kid can't go to school until 2013-2014.

Anyone else feel like their district did a better job of getting info out there?  Are you planning on sending your kiddo or keeping them in private pre-school an additional year?

One thing that I found interesting is they are expecting that some kids will end up either being promoted to kinder if there is room or being promoted on to 1st grade the following year if there is not room in a kinder class for them.  I really expected there to be a hard line that there would be no mid year promotions.

futrkingsley

This doesn't apply to me but it does apply to my niece.  I checked her district's website and there is no mention that for next school year the birthday deadline has changed at all and no mention of the transitional kinder.  I think my SIL plans to enroll her since they want to save money whenever possible. 

jsugrin

futrkingsley:

This doesn't apply to me but it does apply to my niece.  I checked her district's website and there is no mention that for next school year the birthday deadline has changed at all and no mention of the transitional kinder.  I think my SIL plans to enroll her since they want to save money whenever possible. 

I wonder if they figured it would be less confusing, that the Nov. parents would come in to register for kinder and then they are going to explain to them about transitional kinder?  I almost feel like that would be better, well as long as a district is either large enough or small enough that people don't have to deal with not being placed in their neighborhood school.

I'm honestly hoping they don't have a transitional kinder class at our neighborhood school because it sucks.  My only concern with doing it is we had planned on either trying to lottery into a Charter school or waive into a different school and I worry about having to change him again the following year.  When it comes down to though I don't see us deciding to pay for an additional year of pre-school since Cooper will be in pre-school then too.

futrkingsley

I have no idea how the school district plans to handle it.  It's a complicated mess, or seems so from slightly afar.  Their own town has 5 elementary schools, all but 4 are so bad parents can transfer out to a better performing school under NCLB.  The one school that isn't "underperforming" is their own neighborhood school.  Class sizes there run 35 kid, even in kinder.  So my two nephews go to a country school (k-8), first using an interdistrict transfer, and now using the address of my other brother.  Ha.  Confused yet?  So this country school is likely were my neice will go since both brother's already attend.  But the school is still pretty small and the number of kids with Nov. 2007 birthdays might be all of 3 kids. 

I'm surprised your school district would consider mid-year changes or pushing the kids to 1st grade the following year.  I thought the whole idea of the change was to get closer and closer to having just 5 year olds in kinder and thus only 6 year olds in 1st grade.  Or are they assuming the 4+ year olds who do transitional kinder will be caught up in one year and ready and prepared to join the kids who did do kinder?

soon2Bkranz

I have a question. I might consider this for JLK but she is Oct 28th. So that means technically she could go to Kinder next year. So could I enroll her or is it not am option. 

futrkingsley

soon2Bkranz:

I have a question. I might consider this for JLK but she is Oct 28th. So that means technically she could go to Kinder next year. So could I enroll her or is it not am option. 

Libs, I think it only applies to children born after Nov. 1st, 2007 for the 2012-2013 school year.  The following year it would apply to kids born after Oct. 1st 2008 for the 2013-2014 school year.

soon2Bkranz

Yea thats what it looked like to me too.

jsugrin

futrkingsley:

soon2Bkranz:

I have a question. I might consider this for JLK but she is Oct 28th. So that means technically she could go to Kinder next year. So could I enroll her or is it not am option. 

Libs, I think it only applies to children born after Nov. 1st, 2007 for the 2012-2013 school year.  The following year it would apply to kids born after Oct. 1st 2008 for the 2013-2014 school year.

Yeah the technical dates are Nov. 2- Dec. 2 so you'll be stuck with either sending her or paying for another year of preschool.  Based on how my district seems to be avoiding having any more kids than absolutely necessary I'm guessing they're not thrilled at having to foot the bill for a new program.

jsugrin

futrkingsley:

I have no idea how the school district plans to handle it.  It's a complicated mess, or seems so from slightly afar.  Their own town has 5 elementary schools, all but 4 are so bad parents can transfer out to a better performing school under NCLB.  The one school that isn't "underperforming" is their own neighborhood school.  Class sizes there run 35 kid, even in kinder.  So my two nephews go to a country school (k-8), first using an interdistrict transfer, and now using the address of my other brother.  Ha.  Confused yet?  So this country school is likely were my neice will go since both brother's already attend.  But the school is still pretty small and the number of kids with Nov. 2007 birthdays might be all of 3 kids. 

I'm surprised your school district would consider mid-year changes or pushing the kids to 1st grade the following year.  I thought the whole idea of the change was to get closer and closer to having just 5 year olds in kinder and thus only 6 year olds in 1st grade.  Or are they assuming the 4+ year olds who do transitional kinder will be caught up in one year and ready and prepared to join the kids who did do kinder?

I was surprised too, and she was the one that brought it up!  I think the main point is that with NCLB and the pressure of test scores that if you get young kids in kinder that have a hard time focusing, sitting still, have no prior school exposure so they have to learn all about sitting still for circle time, ect that those kids aren't really "learning".  

She said that transitional kinder was going to be focused on teaching them colors, letter recognition, circle time and social skills so that kids with 1-2 years of preschool who had those skills or more will be considered for advancement.

 

futrkingsley

jsugrin:

futrkingsley:

I have no idea how the school district plans to handle it.  It's a complicated mess, or seems so from slightly afar.  Their own town has 5 elementary schools, all but 4 are so bad parents can transfer out to a better performing school under NCLB.  The one school that isn't "underperforming" is their own neighborhood school.  Class sizes there run 35 kid, even in kinder.  So my two nephews go to a country school (k-8), first using an interdistrict transfer, and now using the address of my other brother.  Ha.  Confused yet?  So this country school is likely were my neice will go since both brother's already attend.  But the school is still pretty small and the number of kids with Nov. 2007 birthdays might be all of 3 kids. 

I'm surprised your school district would consider mid-year changes or pushing the kids to 1st grade the following year.  I thought the whole idea of the change was to get closer and closer to having just 5 year olds in kinder and thus only 6 year olds in 1st grade.  Or are they assuming the 4+ year olds who do transitional kinder will be caught up in one year and ready and prepared to join the kids who did do kinder?

I was surprised too, and she was the one that brought it up!  I think the main point is that with NCLB and the pressure of test scores that if you get young kids in kinder that have a hard time focusing, sitting still, have no prior school exposure so they have to learn all about sitting still for circle time, ect that those kids aren't really "learning".  

She said that transitional kinder was going to be focused on teaching them colors, letter recognition, circle time and social skills so that kids with 1-2 years of preschool who had those skills or more will be considered for advancement.

That seems like such a low bar but what do I know, my kid is only three and I don't teach.  

jsugrin

futrkingsley:

jsugrin:

futrkingsley:

I have no idea how the school district plans to handle it.  It's a complicated mess, or seems so from slightly afar.  Their own town has 5 elementary schools, all but 4 are so bad parents can transfer out to a better performing school under NCLB.  The one school that isn't "underperforming" is their own neighborhood school.  Class sizes there run 35 kid, even in kinder.  So my two nephews go to a country school (k-8), first using an interdistrict transfer, and now using the address of my other brother.  Ha.  Confused yet?  So this country school is likely were my neice will go since both brother's already attend.  But the school is still pretty small and the number of kids with Nov. 2007 birthdays might be all of 3 kids. 

I'm surprised your school district would consider mid-year changes or pushing the kids to 1st grade the following year.  I thought the whole idea of the change was to get closer and closer to having just 5 year olds in kinder and thus only 6 year olds in 1st grade.  Or are they assuming the 4+ year olds who do transitional kinder will be caught up in one year and ready and prepared to join the kids who did do kinder?

I was surprised too, and she was the one that brought it up!  I think the main point is that with NCLB and the pressure of test scores that if you get young kids in kinder that have a hard time focusing, sitting still, have no prior school exposure so they have to learn all about sitting still for circle time, ect that those kids aren't really "learning".  

She said that transitional kinder was going to be focused on teaching them colors, letter recognition, circle time and social skills so that kids with 1-2 years of preschool who had those skills or more will be considered for advancement.

That seems like such a low bar but what do I know, my kid is only three and I don't teach. ;) 

That's what I thought too.  My kid has already learned stuff like making sedimentary rock, how to build and explode a volcano, what a lever and fulcrum are.  I'll admit he doesn't know all his letters but it's more because stand alone they have no value to him and he is only now expressing interest in learning them as they build words (so more learning words and then how the letters build them, backwards I guess).

It really sounded to me like they were doing what I would expect a 3 year old preschool class to look like.  It really made me wonder what our district does for kinder.  I keep hearing all this "kinder is so academic now, not like when we were kids", but she made it sound like they are prepping for very at risk kids.