Moving with kids- During school year or summer? Which is better?

[mamacatnv]

Originally Posted by marie5v

There is a reason families move in summer and not mid-year. There are no benefits to a mid-year move, and a lot of negatives. First, if the child shows up on the first day of school, the teacher has prepared for him, has a desk and materials for him, is ready to help him and his classmates adjust with all kinds of ice breakers and beginning of year activities. Classroom policies and norms are explained and taught, and the focus is on making everyone comfortable. Many students will be new, so that won't be so much a problem. Academically, of course, the child gets the full curriculum from the beginning, all the appropriate assessments, and so on. This is the time of year designed for children to begin.

Mid-year, here is what happens when a child shows up: the teacher finds out a day or two before hand that they are getting a new student. Sometimes they find out when the child actually shows up. They don't have a desk or any materials for the child. They scramble to get things in order, while dealing with 25 other kids and trying to maintain a lesson at the same time, all the while under pressure not to miss a minute of the planned curriculum because of course, there will be a test. Most teachers let out a huge groan when a student shows up after the start of the year - once I actually brought a new student to a teacher's room and right in front of the student she looked at me and said "you have got to be kidding. Can't you put him somewhere else?" Teachers HATE when a kid shows up mid-year, even if they manage to smile and seem welcoming.

Then, naturally, the teacher has no time to help the student adjust. She can't be bothered with worrying about him making friends or not - really there is no time. A good teacher has procedures in place, but a new teacher or less organized teacher will not. It's a crap shoot if he will get any kind of assistance fitting in or not. Frankly, in some schools you'll be lucky if he even gets his own desk and chair before the end of the day. And of course, he has no materials, so the he might need to look on with someone else.

Academically, he has no idea what's going on, the teacher has no idea what he can or can't do (he missed the beginning assessments), no idea of his level. Academically, a school switch mid year can be like losing a half or even whole year. It's disastrous for a weak student, inconvenient for the strongest.

A mid-year move is a very very bad idea. If you can possibly avoid it, then do.

I completely and totally disagree with you and feel sorry for any kid that had to deal with the teachers you describe above.

We moved 2000 miles with our then 7th grader. We chose to leave late March. We knew no matter what we did, this was going to be difficult so we did everything we could to ease the transition. I was in contact with the school where she was heading well ahead of time. She was able to choose her classes and knew what she was walking into. The school assigned her a buddy for the first several days and since she was new, she did stand out and that was a good thing. The kids went out of their way to say hi, to make her feel welcome as did the staff. We were very impressed with the whole transition

The benefit of the move with only 6 weeks left was that 6 weeks gave her some time to make a few friends prior to going into the summer and we made a lot of effort to get to know those kids/parents so that the kids could do things together during the summer. It worked out really well.

Unfortunately we hated the area we ended up in and exactly one year later we moved again, this time it was only 60 miles but it meant a whole new school etc. Again. we did everything I described above and the transition went ok. This one was a little tougher at the start but all in all it worked out.

DD is now a Freshman in high school, just came home with straight A's, really likes school and has friends! Mission accomplished

[stradivarius]

Speaking from personal experience, having moved right after the school year had ended was a very good thing that my parents did for me, when I was nine at the time. I had that entire summer to just be a kid, and to make friends with the neighborhood kids. That naturally translated into already having had friends when I went into the new school as a fourth grader.

When we moved last year, we made sure to do similar. We actually moved in May, but fortunately, since our older child was just in pre-K, we were able to slowly adjust her to the new environment; i.e. bringing her part-time, then eventually full-time. It also helped that her younger brother went (and still goes) to that preschool/daycare. And our daughter stayed in the program all the way through August, before she started Kindergarten. We also lucked out that the daycare was a good fit for our daughter in so many ways, namely, having an awesome teacher who really care about her. Throughout the summer while she attended that preschool, she was also able to make friends with our new neighbors and other kids at the community pool, etc. She had a breeze adjusting to Kindergarten this past September as a result.

What I'm about to say is purely anecdotal, but I do think that younger kids are much more resilient to these kinds of transitions, and their new friends are more accepting at those younger ages as well. My brother, who is 4 years older, had a heck of a time adjusting to the new environment when we initially moved (when he was 13).

Best of luck and let us know what you decide to do!

[ChasRaven]

Thank you! I will keep you all posted. It's such a hard decision that I'm really hoping something in our situation will make the decision for us ;-) From all the different views and experiences on here, I really don't think there is a "wrong" time to move as long as we do our due-diligence and make sure we create the right environment for them. Of course, I'd rather move sooner than later... I think we are all anxious to get moving on this transition in our lives. Thanks again!!

[lovesthebass]

Originally Posted by Hopes

It's best to move right at the end of summer. That way they don't have too much down time in the summer with difficult access to making new friends, but they are able to start the new school on the first day like everyone else.

^

This, pretty much.

I moved a few times, in all three situations, actually. If I were to have to go through it again, I would also choose to do it not long before school starts. My least favorite was the move during the school year. I would never recommend this.

I recently got married and also gained a stepdaughter. I thought it would be a good idea for her and my wife to move in a few weeks before school started and it worked out pretty well.

[ajzjmsmom]

We have moved a lot over the last 14 years due to the job, our kids never wanted to live apart from their father until school was out, so we always just moved when he moved. We never had any issues and now it seems like my kids have friends from numerous states that they keep in touch with. We are moving the end of Feb and actually thought about holding off moving until school was out but both boys wanted to move, they hate where we live now. The 10th grader is worried that he is going to be behind so wants to opportunity to take summer school if necessary and not be behind going into his junior year. I think what is making this move so exciting for all of us is the knowledge that this will be our last move and we are finally settling down and buying a house. So in our experience moving in the middle or last 3 months of the school year has never been an issue.