Start schooling later than age five, say experts

[SheilaT]

15. I know that Finland doesn't start school

until age 7. And the Finns seem to be doing just okay.

While there are clear-cut differences in readiness, I've gotten more and more bothered over the years by the way Kindergarten has become the new first grade. Why?

Kindergarten, at least when I attended 60 years ago, was the place where you learned how to get along with others, to name your colors, to count to ten, and maybe a few other things. Now, kids are expected to be reading by the end of kindergarten. Why?

Again, kids are vastly different, even coming from the same families. My sister's oldest was one of those who somehow magically learned to read on her own.(Her other two learned to read in first grade.) My oldest still couldn't read at the start of second grade. (My younger one learned to read in pre-school in a Montessori program.) What I think are the reasons aren't important, but fortunately the school put him in what they called Special Reading, meaning with a tutor, and after a while he caught on and could read quite well, thank you very much. Sister's oldest never went beyond high school. My son is currently working on a physics degree. So how soon a kid learns to read isn't the only thing that determines academic success.

I also think that a huge problem is that we have one and only one age cut-off. You turn five by a particular date and you start kindergarten. Okay, so parents can and do sometimes hold their kids back, which in a way makes things worse. If everyone adheres to the cutoff date it means that the oldest kid in the class will be 364 days older than the youngest, which is a HUGE difference at that age. Holding back actually makes things worse. My oldest was born on December 22. He wound up in school with kids more than a full year older than he was. Invariably the kids held back were always large for their age. Weird.

Anyway, my solution would be to have two starting dates for school, one in the fall and one in January. Allow some slack, of course, but a kid who perhaps was old enough to have started in the fall, but the parents felt wasn't quite ready, would then start in January. Then you'd reduce the age differential between oldest and youngest by quite a bit. Of course, unless you figure out a way to get all kids on the same path by perhaps 4th grade -- which is probably doable -- you'll then have to deal with two graduation dates, one in December the other in May/June. Heck, colleges do it.