So. It's back to school time for all the public schools (it seems like preschools are still on the old school schedule though as we don't go back until next week), and all I can think about is that this time next year the kids will (are supposed to) be in kindergarten. Kindergarten. All day, all week, kindergarten. Every time I do anything now I think 'We won't be able to do this next year because the kids will be in kindergarten.' And I can't handle it.
I think about kindergarten more than a kindergarten teacher thinks about kindergarten. I lose sleep five nights out of seven thinking about kindergarten. I bring kindergarten up into conversation with everyone I know, including complete strangers and childless friends who haven't thought about kindergarten since THEY have been in kindergarten. Thinking about kindergarten is pretty much consuming me.
The thing is, I do not want to send the kids to kindergarten next year. They will be five next May, which is the age that kids typically start kindergarten, but if I'm being completely honest right now, there is about a 99% chance that I will be waiting another year. Redshirting them if you will.
Obviously I'm not redshirting them for any sports or athletic related reasons, as we are not sports or athletic related people. I have a myriad of reasons that I play through my head all day, every day, including:
- Them being the youngest in the class. Their birthday is May 27th, which let's just call June, and the cutoff in St. Louis is July 31st, so they will only be five by two months when they start kindergarten. They will be in class with kids who have their birthday in August-April, who will potentially have been five for a year plus (I guess that would make them six), eleven months, ten months, etc., etc. And that just doesn't seem right to me. I know there has to be a line drawn in the sand somewhere, and I wonder if I would be having the same anxiety if their birthday was in April or even early May (probably), but I know it wouldn't even cross my mind if their birthday was in the fall or the winter. Let's say their birthday was this September and they were turning four with two more full years of preschool ahead of them- that I could get with. I would feel that they had had the proper preparation and were ready for the demands of kindergarten. Which leads me to...
- The demands of kindergarten. And I'm not talking the academic demands which have GREATLY changed since I was in kindergarten and I'm pretty positive all I learned was my address and my phone number, but the physical/emotional/mental demands. My kids are smart- they might not be geniuses, they might not test into any gifted program- but I know they are as smart as, or a little smarter than, your average kid their age. They know their letters, numbers, sounds, can spell a couple words, and P can write her letters (H has no interest and I don't push it). They have both very recently started coloring in the lines which I find completely amazing as it seemed to happen overnight. So as far as the curriculum of kindergarten, I think they could handle it (they could probably do some of it this year if I'm being honest.) What keeps me up at night, is thinking of them being in a classroom environment, sitting at a desk or at a table for probably five of the seven hour school day, walking through the halls in silence, eating lunch in twenty minutes with little supervision, and doing this every day, all day for nine months. AND if I had to go back to work for some unforeseen reason, they would have to take the bus. I look at them now, playing what they want when they want with who they want, enjoying days of limited structure (we have to have some structure for my own sanity), but when we are home they are pretty free as to whatever they want to do, taking trips to different places with me throughout the week....and I just can't wrap my head around them maturing enough physically, emotionally and mentally in a year to be able to give all that up without there being some problems.
- Penny's size. She's short. She's under three feet tall. She still wears 2t clothes. Her butt is literally the length of my hand. And I'm supposed to put her on a bus with sixth graders? Uh uh.
- Our friends. Now this is where I go off the rails a little, but I'm being as honest as possible here and I would be lying if I said our friends aren't something I take into consideration when I'm going back and forth in my head about what to do. We have been fortunate enough to have had two active playgroups in our lives since the kids were infants. One started when they were about six months old, and one when they were about a year. And in both of them, my kids are the oldest. Not the oldest by a lot, but the oldest by two or three months or so, and as school cutoff goes, that's a whole year. Now I don't have any delusions that my kids are going to be in the same school or even the same district as any of these friends, as we all live in different parts of the city or county. And even if I do decide to send them to kindergarten next year, I have a good feeling that we will stay in touch with these friends throughout the kids childhood and hopefully beyond. So it's not that I'm keeping them back a year so I can still go to playgroup every week; it's that I look at my kids, and then look at the other kids, and the thought that mine would be a whole year ahead of them in school just boggles the mind because they seem exactly the same. The two or three months that they have on their friends does not make them a year more mature, or give them a year's better attention span, or makes them need a year less of preschool.... it's a mental block for me that I can't get over. And since I'm already off the rails a bit, I think I'll just jump track completely for the next reason...
-Me. Now if you ask my mom, this is what it all boils down to, my uncertainty about sending them to kindergarten 'on time' has to do with me not wanting to give up being a stay-at-home-mom. And there is truth to that. I am blessed beyond measure to have had the last four years with my kids, I bow down to moms who work outside the the home (I read somewhere that we're not supposed to call them working moms), I am sure I could manage it if I had to, but I'm glad I don't have to. I LOVE staying at home, I really, really do. And I do not miss working one. tiny. bit. And I know that when the kids start kindergarten, I will go stir-crazy after day three (okay maybe week three) of being home by myself all day everyday and will need to do something to fill the time, and that something will most likely be substitute teaching. So yeah. Do I want to give up the lifestyle I've (mostly) enjoyed for the past four year's? No. No, I do not. But, I think all the time I spend with my kids makes me the foremost expert on my kids, and this foremost expert just doesn't feel like they are ready to start kindergarten next year. Which leads me to...
-The gift of time. As a former teacher, I am lucky to have lots and lots of friends in education. And I've talked to a handful of them about this already (remember, I'm obsessed), and one of my dearest friends said something that has stuck with me, that the best gift I can give Harry and Penny is the gift of time. I know that if I do send them to kindergarten next year I will forever wonder if I did the right thing and second guess my decision. I also know that if I don't send them to kindergarten next year I won't. I'm sure there are people out there that started late and it sent them on a downward spiral of sex, drugs and rock n' roll, but personally I can think of a number of reasons not to send them on time (see above), but can't think of any downsides of waiting a year. Except that we'll be paying for their schooling for another year which will suck. And I want to move in the next year, so I wouldn't want to start them in school only to pull them out a few months later to start them in a whole new school. Which is a whole other blog post.
If I do decide to wait a year, I've already decided to send them to Ritenour's Early Childhood Center, which is much more like real school than the preschool they're attending. This is probably a parenting fail on my part, I should have looked for a more rigorous place to send them, but their current school is very inexpensive, has super loving teachers, lots of playtime and some teaching, and of course, Jesus. I could send them to Ritenour ECC for five half days which I think would be a good blend of school life and the life they are used to living. You know, the good life were they have access to a personal servant 24 hours a day, and can for the most part do whatever the hell they want. ;)
So that's that. In case you were wondering 'What is Rachel thinking about right this very moment?' at any time over the last three months, this is it. And I would like to add that anytime I have said 'I' in regards to making this decision, I am also speaking on behalf of Jamie who has no strong feeling either way and is leaving it up to me. Which is why I love him.
Any thoughts? Have I enraged anyone besides my mother? Please help me, I obviously need advice! Or better yet, who can I pay to make this decision for me?
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