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iQuestions Faculty, Dr. Tim & Darcy Kimmel 
 
 
Question: 
 
My daughter could start kindergarten now but she could also wait 
another year. How old should she be before she starts kindergarten?  
 
Answer: 
 
DARCY KIMMEL: I wish I had a dollar for every time I’ve had a mom 
ask me this question. 
 
TIM KIMMEL: I wish we had a hundred dollars for every time.  
 
DARCY: Well, true. 
 
TIM: That would be nice. 
 
DARCY: You know, it’s important because we want the very best for 
our children. 
 
TIM: We do. Conventional wisdom would say, “Put the child in early.” 
There are a lot of reasons why they say you need to do that: the child 
thinks he is ready; a lot of his friends are going in early; you don’t 
want to leave him behind. 
 
I’ll tell you what. The conventional wisdom says that the need to get in 
there early because they need to have exposure to the information so 
that they don’t get left behind. 
 
Now let me help you out on something here. There are so many 
advantages to let that child stay home one more year and go into 
kindergarten as the older child in the class rather than the youngest.  
 
 
When it comes to all that academic stuff, where they say they’re going 
to be “left behind,” here’s what the studies show: whether they come 
in and learn how to read when they’re four or five or six, by fourth 
grade, everybody’s even. There is no advantage beyond that. 
 
But I’ll tell you what. There is a huge disparity when they get on into 
the high school years, because it’s in those early years, those first five 
or six years, when so much of the emotional stability of the child is 
being developed, and a lot of that requires space time, lap time, mom 
time. You are much better off having that child stay at home with you. 
 
Plus, think about this: one year of a five-year-old, what does that 
represent? That’s 20% of their life. Think of how much maturity is 
going to happen in that one year before they get up there.  
 
And that really helps them out when they are teenagers and they start 
to date and everything. 
 
DARCY: Oh, boy. The maturity when they are teenagers. If you can 
have an older child in a grade when they start to drive, when they 
start to date, it’s amazing how much more balanced, how much more 
mature they are to take on a lot of those challenges. 
 
TIM: Now, listen. We did this for all four of our children, and we took 
grief for it. The school system didn’t like the fact. We even had one 
teacher tell us that she didn’t think it was fair, because our kids 
seemed to be doing so much better than the other kids. And I’m 
thinking, “Hmm. Hmm.” Well, we just ignored that. 
 
And you know what? Our kids have been able to go through school, 
have very little problems with it, and do very well—and I think it was 
because we made this singular decision.  
 
 
 
 
 
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