![]() Research finds that students who are relatively older than other children in their grade score higher on math and science tests and, although these differences decrease over the years, they are still present to some extent in eighth grade. Some research studies eliminate the problem of parent choice by looking at the impact of age for children within the same grade, such as comparing students with summer birthdays to students in the same grade with fall birthdays. The parents that choose to redshirt their children are often different from the parents who do not - most notably they are often the families that can afford to make this choice. This research is all correlational, meaning we do not know whether it is redshirting that causes these advantages or if it is simply associated with advantages. However, this effect may begin to fade as early as the end of first grade. Research on redshirting suggests that it is associated with a small academic advantage (that is, higher academic test scores), and test scores seem to increase at a greater rate in first and second grade. So does research actually find that redshirting will provide an academic and/or social advantage for children? The answer may be more complicated than you think. It seemed that everyone I talked to had wholeheartedly accepted that delaying kindergarten was the best choice for all children. Yet in talking to school administrators and teachers and other parents about this decision, the message I heard over and over again was that the choice was obvious. Granted, she would have entered kindergarten in 2020, and the possibility of remote learning caused many parents to delay school entry that year. However, it seemed like all of the children with summer birthdays (and even April/May birthdays) were waiting an additional year to start kindergarten. My oldest child has a late August birthday, which is right around the cutoff date for her school. For parents of children born near the kindergarten cutoff date, the pressure to redshirt feels intense. In the book, Gladwell points to data on the birthdays of Canadian Hockey League players to argue that being relatively older than peers provides an advantage, and he extends this argument to children’s success in school.Īt the same time that ideas from Outliers have circulated, kindergarten has become increasingly academic and rigorous. Increased awareness of redshirting may have roots in Malcolm Gladwell’s bestselling book Outliers, published in 2008. “Redshirting” or choosing to delay kindergarten for a year is a popular topic for parents of young children at this time of year. A version of this post was originally published by Parenting Translator. Sign up for the newsletter and follow Parenting Translator on Instagram.
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