full day vs half day K

Does the school system your child will attend in a year or so do half day or full day K? I am just curious. When we moved here, the school did only half day K which I preferred. But the private schools in town all do full day K and the public schools got pressured so last year they went to one full day K per school but parents had to pay the price difference. Stipends for low income. Anyway, now they've done a levy and part of that is going to fund full day K for everyone. They started it March 1st of this year. Mid-year! So, now all kinders will go to school 8:30-3, five days a week. I am bummed. I did not want Eliza to go to K that much. I liked it when Paulina was in half day K. She went afternoons and it was perfect for us.

So, what are your systems going to be doing when your kid is in kinder? Do you get a choice?

In our private school system, K is 9-2. So a shortened full day. I have no clue what the public school system does.

That is a good time span. Here, the privates are 8:30-2:30. We only have a few private schools. I am almost considering keeping Eliza in the school she is at now. They do a half day, five day a week K program. Not sure. Depends on her. She is so reluctant to be away from me now I am just not sure what full day K will do to her. I hate that we have no choice.

Back when I was in school, I did my student teaching in Kinder and it was half-day. My last year of teaching though our school made the transition to full-day kinder. It is my understanding that all the schools in LAUSD were to be making the transition to full-day kindergarten so I'm pretty sure that kindergarten will be full-day for Brandon.

I think, with the amount of material they have to get through, that it's a good choice, and I think it's the overall trend. My kindergarten was full-day. That's partly why I really wanted to get Brandon into preschool this year. He's never been away from me so I didn't want him to just get thrust into being gone from me for the whole day. I'm hoping after one year of half-day preschool he'll be ok to make the transition into full-day. At least, I'm hoping...

*Lurker*

Our province has brought in full day K starting this September. The school that DD attends however brought it in a year early, so it's full day right now. It isn't that way across the country though. I'm not sure what private schools are doing.

They attend the same hours as the rest of the school, 8:45-2:30.

When DS eventually gets to K, he will go all day. I always thought of K, and it being a half day, as a way to acclimate kids to being away from their home, and being in school. My DD also went to pre-school as a transition, and I plan on putting DS into pre-school for the same reason.

I do not like this trend of taking academics down a grade as a means of improving test scores. Since when does that ever work? I was a teacher and I think this is a big mistake. I went to half day K and so did my brother and all the stuff they do in K today is more like what I did in first grade. I wish they would just do what they do better instead of sending it down a grade. I don't want my kids to grow up too fast. There is no hurry! They can take their time to learn!


I do know that some kids really do still come to kinder never having seen a book and that is why they want to go to full day, because there is too much still not learned before kinder. That is kinda sad.

I went to private school and it was full-day kinder so that has always been an option, but I definitely think it's becoming more and more common to have full-day kinder.

Unfortunately, with No Child Left Behind, it is ALL about the testing. When the schools don't meet the requirements it's no good for the school. For the teachers and staff there is immense pressure to achieve at a certain level. That definitely affects the quality of education (teach to the test). That's one reason why I'm not sure I want to go back into teaching. The amount they want these kids to know at such a young age is ridiculous and with the amount of material teachers are expected to teach in one day, it's just not possible to get it done in the half-day setting. I blame it all on NCLB. It's sad for the kids...a lot of the fun just isn't there anymore.

We have full day here in my area in PA, but with pending budget cuts to state and federal, it is looking to be dropped to half-day. I don't mind full-day...she will be in preschool next year 5 days a week 1/2 days, so she will be used to being at school.

We have full day K, but we have a part day 4K. So they go from 830-1130 M-Thur for 4K (which is an optional program), and then their full day is 845-320 M-F for regular K. For DD1 it hasn't been an issue to go full days, she loves school.

Taylor will be going to Montessori school next year and in Kinder. Next year, I have her going 3-half days/week. I haven't decided yet if we will keep it at that for K or go 5-half days/week. They offer 5-full days/week also but I feel that is too much and we can't afford that. I don't know exactly what the local public schools do. I do know the next school district over where my niece goes has K 3-half days/week.

I'm sorry to hear you have no choice in the matter Kathy. I'd be really bummed too. And I agree about the No Child Left Behind and test scores and all that. It always upsets me everytime I read or talk about it.