Pre-K....should I hold her back?

[Guest guest]

Just wanted to get a few thoughts on what to do with my daughter Halley:

She is currently in pre-k, she is still severely behind on her speech, and am

considering holding her back next year instead of sending her to kindegarten.

There are a couple of reasons: First, I feel that by holding her back I am

giving her an edge on when she does start kindegarten, she is very smart, but

I am already seeing her apraxia fall over into her reading skills, she has

some difficulty with her ABC's & 123's, with apraxia, sometimes it is hard to

know what they know, and I feel she is not on the same level as other

children her age. Granted she amazes me with other skills, like puzzles and

matching, but want to give her a fair shot at learning. We played a matching

game the other day, she kicked my butt, and I was not letting her win, she

has an amazing memory, and can do puzzles way older than her age group, but

am concerned in the academic areas. Another reason is that kindegarten is the

age where children start to get ugly, and tease. She is very strong willed

and has great self esteem, and do not want to diminish that now.

I do not want to put her into special ed classes, and am concerned if the

teachers and her ST would agree with me on this. If they do not agree, do I

still have the right to hold her back. I feel pretty strongly about holding

her back...Any thoughts?

Liz

http://kidstalkback.tripod.com/kidstalkback/