Preparing Your Child For Kindergarten

As your child approaches school age, you may be wondering if he has the necessary skills to pass his kindergarten screening. There are several things that you can do to prepare your child to enter the school environment.

To interest your child in reading, you should read aloud to them often. This activity will help your child to understand that the printed words represent the spoken words. By asking the child questions about the story, you can help to build up his comprehension skills. You can also teach him words that rhyme and show him how many of these word’s spellings are similar. As you are reading to him, you should point out unknown words and explain their meanings to build up his vocabulary.

You can take your child to the library to read. Many of these institutions have programs especially designed for preschoolers. They often have story times, puppet shows, and other activities geared to encourage a love for reading in these youngsters. These excursions are also the perfect opportunity for your child to become familiar with the layout of the building itself so that as he gets older, he will feel comfortable going there to check out books and do research for school on his own.

You should also print your child’s name often so that he can begin learning how it looks in print and how to spell it. You can also use the letters in your child’s name to help him to associate certain letters with certain sounds. You can take the individual letters of your child’s names and help him finds words that have the same letters in them. This is also a good time for your child to start to practice writing his name.

To help your child prepare for kindergarten math, you should make sure that he is familiar with shapes and colors. He should also have the ability to at least count to ten (preferably twenty). You can practice his shapes with him by drawing or finding objects for each shape and have your child identify them. You can help your child with his counting skills by using various items, placing them in a group, and have him count the total number. You can also practice his problem-solving skills by adding and taking shapes away from the group and having him recount the new total. This will establish a foundation for addition and subtraction. You can play board games with him that requires your child to roll a pair of dice and move a certain amount of spaces. This is good counting practice and a chance to spend some quality time with him as well.

Many children need to develop their fine motor skills when preparing to enter school. You can build these skills by having your child practice cutting straight and wavy lines with child scissors. You can also encourage him to draw pictures with little details in them. Stringing beads on a piece of thread is another way to build up your child’s coordination.

If you practice all the skills that he will need to start kindergarten, your child should pass his kindergarten tests with flying colors.