Kindergarten or Preschool ?

Sorry this is a long post- but a few friends and of course Sam's grandparents have been asking about this so here it is in the shortest summary I can give (sorry I am a babbler!)




Last week Sam met one on one with his teacher for her to assess him, and then last night Kevin and I had parent teacher conferences with her. I was a little nervous/curious just because you wonder how well the teacher knows your child when she sees him only 6 hours a week AND with 18 other kids. However, I was very impressed, she definitely knew our Sam! When we arrived she gave us his report card (!!) and we went over it. Here is the basics and most important/interesting points:

1. Cognitive/Creative Development: He did very well in this area- patterns, colors, shapes, recognizing name, and of course numbers. In fact, she had him count (she stopped him at 55), she had him repeat numbers out of sequence, and had him count objects. She said he is at a 6 year old level with numbers. Kind of funny since if she HADN'T stopped him, he probably would have counted to 1000 AND she didn't ask him to do any addition or subtraction which he is quite good at. So...I bet he is actually higher than a 6 year old level! Our Sam loves numbers!!

2. Listening and Language: Followed four directions in a row, which was good. But he has a short attention span and often loses his train of thought or starts playing during circle time. He loves stories and can repeat most sentences, however, he cannot repeat sentences with a lot of description (the bright red ball bounced high in the big blue sky...). He also has trouble with several letter sounds which makes him hard to understand and problems with word association. She said that he is more at a 3 year old level for this area.

3. Social and emotional: She says he plays well, especially with his friend Jaden. He usually will not talk in group or volunteer an answer. He also does not participate with motions in songs or when they move around he just stands there. Needs encouragement for trying new things and needs reminding at clean up time.

We talked about a lot more- cutting with scissors, how he holds his crayon, what he can draw, crossing a t, and other social things that were important for kindergarten. In the end, she said he tested at a 4 year old level, and at this point they are really looking for kids to be testing at a 5 year old level. She also reminded us that today kindergarten is what first grade was like when we went to school, AND as an August baby, most kid would be a year older then Sam. In the end, she felt strongly that another year before Kindergarten would definitely give Sam a chance to grow in a lot of these areas.

It was really good for Kevin and me, and nice to see that she saw the same things in Sam as we did. She right away pointed out that he has a strength in numbers but that short term memory, social things, and some fine motor skills were not at a kindergarten level yet. It was great having her opinion and now we feel very confident in a final decision. Sam will go to transitions preschool next year. A few good things are: it will be a change (change is hard for him!), he will see that he goes to a different classroom different teacher etc. Also, the transitions room has older kids (no 3 year olds) and really focuses on preparing him for Kindergarten. It will be everyday, and he is even considered old enough to ride the bus if we decide to do that. Sam will start kindergarten when he is 6. Since Josh is a late September, he will most likely start kindergarten at 5 and turn 6 within a month- this way the boys will still be two years apart in school.