Starting Kindergarten: Getting Your Child Ready

My youngest child will be starting kindergarten in a few weeks and for our family it is the last child entering into the cycle of education.I know that he will do well as he is well prepared.

He will be attending for three hours a day and I will be “parked” right outside his classroom in the parent’s waiting area. In the Philippines, many private schools allow parents to accompany their children each day during the early years. It makes the separation a little easier and allows the social independence to develop at the child’s pace.

For all parents, it’s hard to predict how a child will handle separation on the first day of kindergarten. Some kids will cling to their mom in terror, while others will skip happily off without even a parting glance in mom’s direction. If your child leans toward the former behavior, don’t be alarmed. Starting kindergarten is big step for children, and the anxiety they experience is a perfectly normal part of the developmental process. Nevertheless, there are ways you can make this transition easier for your child.

A child’s education, like everything else, begins at home. Getting involved with your little one’s learning can mean the difference between your child struggling or succeeding in kindergarten and early grades. Preparation can be as simple as reading to your toddler or teaching your child responsibility by assigning him chores. Nowadays, schooling is a joint pact between educators and parents. Teachers will carry the mantle, but they expect children to enter the classroom armed with the skills needed to learn.

Today’s research suggests that babies are learning inside their mother’s womb and parents should recognize the value of a good education and should be actively involved in the learning process at this stage when the basic nature of a child is to please his parents.

Along with preparing children for the classroom, experts say parents must teach children social skills that will help them connect with other pupils. According to The Informed Parent, a web site designed to help parents with educational issues, by age 5 children are expected to get along with other children and should have mastered a range of emotional and academic skills.

The Informed Parent and other experts say a child who is kindergarten ready should be able to count, demonstrate small motor skills like running, walking or holding a pencil properly, follow simple sequential directions, talk clearly, recognize numbers, understand basic comparisons and tell a chronological story. On an emotional level, children should be able to relate to peers and authority figures (teacher, play leader, etc.), have a sense of humor and understand the concept of other people’s property.

Experts say there are four critical stages that indicate if a child is ready for school:

Cognitive: Children should be able to identify the different letters of the alphabet (not just sing the ABC song), print their first name, and know their address and telephone number.

Social: Children should be able to get along with peers, express their needs, share with others and play well in a group or alone.

Emotional: Children should feel comfortable in their new classroom environment. They should not display separation anxiety (when the child refuses to separate from the parent) for longer than eight weeks.

Physical: Children should be able to perform simple motor skills like buttoning and unbuttoning their clothes and tying their shoes.

While many parents know how to prepare their child for the educational aspects of kindergarten, they have trouble when it comes to teaching social skills that are just as important.

Interactions with other children is the most common problem in kindergarten because they’ve all pretty much had the opportunity to be selfish until now. Experts say one of the biggest challenges for parents of kindergartners is balancing a hands-on approach with encouraging their child’s independence.

Children would have a more rewarding kindergarten experience, experts say, if parents would view it as the building block to future educational success. In kindergarten, pupils learn the foundations of reading, writing and arithmetic. Everything begins with this grade.

TIPS FOR A SUCCESSFUL KINDERGARTEN YEAR

Parents can improve their child’s kindergarten performance by creating an atmosphere of learning at home. Here are a few tips recommended by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Research and Improvement to help you boost your little one’s success:

* Read together. Children who read at home with their parents perform better in school. Keep magazines and good books in the home and take children on trips to the library. Discuss reading material with your child. Ask what the book was about or why a character acted that way.

* Stimulate your child’s vocabulary. Tell stories to your children about their family and point out words to children wherever you go.

* Establish a daily homework routine. Set a regular time for homework each day and set aside a quiet, well-lit place and encourage your child to study.

* Keep in touch with the school. Parents cannot afford to wait for schools to tell them how their child is doing. Ask what you can do to help your child.

* Promote family involvement in your child’s education. Participate in everything from reading a bedtime story at night to getting involved with the various  local parent-teacher groups.

* Encourage your child’s independence. Ask him to help with simple chores, such as choosing school clothes or cereal for breakfast.

* Teach your child responsibility. Teach your child to complete an assignment immediately and to delay his/her gratification.

So, in a few weeks, my youngest – the baby- will enter a new stage of his life. Yes, I will have my regrets that he is growing up and leaving the house for the first time but I am proud of his development and know that there are no limits to what he will achieve in life.

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