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My son will be 5....Even if he was within the cut-off date, I would not let him go to school, exactly for this reason - not being ready for school.
While it might be a good idea to pursue having her tested for Sp Ed, she also sounds chronologically young. So many kids are nearly six when they enter kindergarten....and those extra months make an enormous difference in their social, emotional and motor skills (never mind academic). My daughter turned five the week school started and she was far too young emotionally, even though she kept up academically. In the spring, her teacher recommended that she be retained, and she repeated kdgn....mixed feelings abput that. Barely five-year-olds are really going to be struggling to keep up with their classmates.
While I realize this is a public school, and the teacher has 19 other kids to deal with, I am completely convinced the right approach is being taken in dealing with my child. I have requested a parent-teacher conference. My question is - how should I go about dealing with this? What should be my approach? I am aware, depending on how things go, we should probably have her repeat a year in KG. This will help her. But I also want the teacher/school to be open to dealing with a child who is developmentally behind, but who is catching up quickly. Any suggestions, anyone? What would you do if you were in my place?
Thanks,
Beth.
If I knew that my child was that far behind, I wouldn't have entered her in school yet.
Honestly, you knew that your child was behind before you put her in kindergarten. You should have waited, but you didn't and now it is causing a problem not only for your child, but for the other children in her class and for the teacher. It's difficult enough for a teacher to wrangle 20 5-yr-olds without having to deal with special needs kids. If she spends extra time on your kid, she's cheating the other kids out of what they are there for. It's unfair to all parties concerned to leave her where she is.
Get your kid into a school that can provide her what she needs, or pull her out of school and wait another year.
So, I would bypass the teacher (I think that ship has sailed) and discuss the situation with the principal - come to a consensus about her needs and placement.
I would say that ship had sailed only if the parent had already had conferences with the teacher post-behavior/cognitive issues. From what I gather from the OP, the only meeting was before school started - a really good thing to do, but still, hearing about it and experiencing what it's like in the classroom are two different things. I think the parent-teacher conference is definitely in order. Bypassing that step to speak with the principal only might indicate to the teacher that the parent was not willing to participate in open communication - not exactly the message you want to send. If you really felt uncomfortable, maybe ask for a meeting with the teacher, principal, and whatever special ed staff they have, all together.
Speaking as a kindergarten teacher, I'm wondering if she doesn't really know what you're looking for. She may have interpreted your pre-kindergarten meetings as "Please tell me everything that goes on at school since I'm really worried". And so she may be doing her best to keep you informed. It's too bad she's not picking up anything positive at all that your daughter is doing, but give her a chance - she might feel like she's doing a good job communicating with you (jeez, if I had time to write that many notes, I'd say I was doing a lot of parent-teacher communication! I also wouldn't get to eat lunch during the day).
So in your meeting, let her know what you want to know about (positive and negative) and also get from her what she is hoping her notes home to you will accomplish. I mean, is she wanting you to punish your daughter for infractions at school? Or is she just trying to keep you aprised of areas in which your daughter is struggling? Is she trying to create a paper-trail that can be used for evidence of a need for special ed services? Find out!
Don't forget, she deals with all kinds of parents. I've dealt with parents who were miffed to find out I HADN'T sent notes about minor name-calling, playground roughness, etc - stuff I don't consider out of the ordinary for kindergarten. Like "Why did you send that positive note home about him on Friday when he told me on Thursday that he pushed Brian when they played Duck Duck Goose?" Sometimes you can't win. Last year I had a student with emotional and maturity problems who cried and tantrummed multiple times daily. Rather than continuing to having the office continue to call Mom every time I had to send him there so that the rest of the class could hear anything, I assumed she might like me to rely on the preschool teacher next door who had a good rapport with him and had offered to take him into her class at these times to calm down. Turns out, Mom didn't want that - she wanted us to call every time. It was good to know that, but my assumption that she wouldn't want to be interuptted at work for this was not made out of any negative intentions whatsoever.
Anyway, not sure why any poster would suggest to you that your goal should be to "shut this teacher down". I think if you're wanting open communication and problem-solving, you need to meet with and include the teacher in your thoughts. It may or may not work but it has to be attempted for the sake of everyone involved, especially your daughter. While I'm all for emotional readiness in kindergarten, I also think it's rarely good for a kid to try, "fail", and be yanked to "try again next year".
The incident with the TA was inappropriate for sure, but I'd be interested in hearing how it was communicated. I can imagine TA's or even teachers at my school, who know the older siblings very well, jokingly saying something to the effect of "You're the big brother, you gotta tell your sis not to do this, help her out a little!".
First things first, does your kid have an IEP? If not than you have no right to ask the teacher to do anything special for her. And if she does not have one, I am appalled to be quite frank. (And I understand the frustration as I have a kid with aspergers.) If she does have one, maybe it needs to be revised now that she has had a few weeks in school and you can see more clearly how things are actually going. It's hard to know what to expect at first, give them a chance.
You should ask for a meeting with the teacher first. Discuss the notes being sent. Why is she sending them? What outcome does she expect? Discuss what she does when these behaviors occur, and help her figure out a better way to handle them if you think there is a better way. Ask her how you can help at home.
If that doesn't help, then go to the principle.
If you have an IEP, and they are doing everything they can, then your child is not ready. Even if she did really good in preschool, doesn't mean it will continue. She may have had a "developmental advancing explosion" and is now going to slow down to a normal pace. Normal is good, but not if you are expecting a normal that is out of her personal range.
From all your responses, I am getting the main point which I was planning to follow -
* Speak to the teacher. Talk about the notes, about her expectations, our expectations, my daughter's behavior and what we can do towards helping things. She does not have IEP. Since she was an early premie, she has been monitored very closely over the years, and has not diagnosed with anything. She was taken to speech therapy, and the treatment was completed - the final decision WAS that she is a little developmentally delayed but will catch up based on the way she has been at the preschool.
* I do want to stress that I do not expect the teacher to show my child special attention over the other kids. While not being a teacher myself, I am aware of her limitations based on what she can do and cannot do. But I also want her to be aware ( even though we had this conversation before she started) of where my child is, so that she can come up with constructive methods as opposed to sending in notes everytime she refuses to leave the water play after being told once, or taking the ball away from another child at the playground.
* I hope that once I meet her and get her expectations and reasoning, I will then decide if she needs another evaluation OR the next step, which would be another meeting with the principal, if necessary, to talk about other options.
Bigcats, thank you for the post from the perspective of a teacher. I really needed that.
Again, thank you, everyone. I want to do the right things for my child, but ALSO, I don't want to go into this with unrealistic expectations which would be unfair on the teacher.
I guess that knowing your child was developmentally delayed that you would have to expect this going into kindergarten. Personally I would have held her back another year so she could have been on par with the kids in her class. I agree, it is time to request special ed intervention and for you to be prepared to keep her back another year. There is a big difference between the expectations in preschool and kindergarten and even more in 1st grade. I think it is asking a lot of your daughter to act like a 5-6 year old when she is not capable of that yet.
I would meet with the teacher and see exactly what is going on-it is hard to convey this in notes. See if there is some way you can observe the classroom (from outside the room so your DD doesn't know you are there) to see your DD in action, so to speak. I think by personal observation you will get a better perspective on how your DD is really handling kindergarten.
She's obviously not mature enough to start kindergarten. Just take her out for one year, then have her start. Come on, you knew this before she started, why are you forcing the issue. SHE'S NOT READY.
It sounds like your daughter is not quite ready for kindergarten. There is nothing wrong with that. We kept my son in preschool an extra year, and it sounds like he has fewer challenges than your daughter does. Your child may, at the very least, need an EAP. I don't know anything about them, but I know they are specialized programs for a child who needs it. I think you should meet w/ the principal and ask about an EAP, or any other specialized program the school district may have. If needed, take her out of kinder and try again next year.
edit: IEP - maybe that's what I meant.
As someone else suggested, I think it would be a good idea to observe the class. You might get a whole new perspective if you watch the teacher interact with the whole group. It is possible that the attention the teacher is having to pay to your daughter is hindering the rest of the class. Also ask about discipline procedures. My sons' K teacher has a red-yellow-green system so I know that if I get a call from her, my son already had 3 warnings, and his behavior really is a problem, not that I'm getting a call or note for each and every little thing.
To the posters saying she is not ready for Kindergarten ( one liners with nothing else) - without knowing the actual facts, I would not strongly put it that way. I think she is ready, the experts who evaluated her thought the same. The point is here, as the majority have pointed out, is utilizing the resources to have her put towards the right track. I again want to stress that I appreciate all the other constructive posters with their suggestions on how to go about working on this, I really appreciate it.
While it might be a good idea to pursue having her tested for Sp Ed, she also sounds chronologically young. So many kids are nearly six when they enter kindergarten....and those extra months make an enormous difference in their social, emotional and motor skills (never mind academic). My daughter turned five the week school started and she was far too young emotionally, even though she kept up academically. In the spring, her teacher recommended that she be retained, and she repeated kdgn....mixed feelings abput that. Barely five-year-olds are really going to be struggling to keep up with their classmates.
My son turned 6 in July and started year-around K 2 weeks later. He is the oldest in the class but not by much, and he isn't having any problems that I'm aware of. In my PP it probably sounds like I'm getting calls from the teacher, but that was hypothetical. He hasn't had any behavior issues yet.
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