The first day of kindergarten is a monumental event in the lives of moms and little ones alike. Big Kid school at last! Whether you’re the mom who lingers outside the classroom door, “Just to make sure,” or the one who skips to the parking lot to enjoy their adulting time, you want to know the same thing. Are they ready?
Screening versus Entrance Exams
If you are planning to enroll your child in public kindergarten, the only real requirement is their age. Different states draw the age line in slightly different places, but it's usually somewhere around 5 years old by a specific date. Sometimes that’s August 31st or September 1st. Sometimes it’s January 1st of the following year. You get the idea.
Public schools must accept children who live in the district and meet the district’s age requirements. They usually still check your child’s readiness. These are called screenings or screening exams. There are many kindergarten screeners out there, but the good news is that they’re all fundamentally the same. They rarely take longer than 30 minutes and your child will get quizzed on categories like:
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Motor Skills
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Language Skills
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Literacy Skills
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Math Skills
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Cognitive Skills
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Social Skills
Now, don’t stress! Your child is not expected to know everything during the screening. It is used to get a baseline on where your child is at and identify any areas where the teacher may need to give extra help.
If you are choosing a private kindergarten, however, the process is, by definition, selective. Private kindergartens use entrance exams that may be covertly called “visiting day,” “play dates,” or some other sugary name designed to take the pressure off nervous parents and tots. Here, instead of a quick quiz, you’re more likely to encounter a mini-version of a typical school day. This gives teachers and administrators time to get to know potential candidates and see how they interact in a group.
The subjects tested will be comprehensive and very similar to those in a screening. But it doesn't mean that a little Einstein who can read at age 4 will beat out another child who knows five letters but has exceptional playground savvy. Different private schools place value on different skill sets. And those “soft” skills are increasingly recognized as just as important (perhaps more important) than academic ones.
Must-Have Skills for Your Kindergartener
You’ve got a little time left before your child starts kindergarten. Shapes? Letters? Counting? There are so many skills that seem critical! Which ones do you really need to focus on? Well, we’ve got you covered.
Many parents focus on academics when prepping their child for kindergarten. Now, reviewing those letter and shape flashcards doesn’t hurt! It will boost your child's confidence to begin kindergarten already knowing some of the material. But when teachers weigh in, two areas make a huge difference when it comes down to being ready for that big first day or not: language and social skills.
It makes sense when you think about it. If your child doesn’t know their letters and numbers, these things will be taught during school time. That’s what kindergarten is for, after all. But to navigate their school day successfully, kiddos need to be able to:
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Communicate their needs,
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Understand and respond to instructions,
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Work and play cooperatively,
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Navigate social interactions with peers, including conflicts,
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Ask for assistance when needed, and
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Answer the teacher’s questions.
Now, nobody (even us adults) is perfect at all of these things all the time. But if your child struggles with many of these, and similar tasks much of the time, it could be a setup for a frustrating school day—one in which not a lot of other learning gets done.
Pro Tip: Evaluate your child’s kindergarten readiness with the handy checklist (below). Prioritize any language or social objectives over more academic ones in your countdown to that first big day at school!
Your Kindergarten Readiness Checklist
Because who doesn’t love checklists, right? This list will let you gauge your child’s comfort with the top skills kindergarten teachers look for when assessing “readiness.” Don’t forget, your child is not expected to master all of these before beginning school!
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Motor Skills
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Use a pencil or crayon
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Use scissors
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Copy basic shapes
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Trace or draw a line
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Use the bathroom and wash up on their own
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Get dressed on their own (may still need assistance with buttons, zippers, and shoelaces)
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Use a fork and a spoon
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Language Skills
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Know and can say their first and last name and age
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Speak in complete sentences
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Be understood by a stranger most of the time
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Use words to express needs and wants
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Understand and follow two-step directions
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Literacy Skills
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Enjoy listening to stories
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Know how to find the first page of a book and which way to flip the pages
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Recognize familiar logos and signs, like stop signs
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Recite the alphabet and identify most of the letters
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Recognize their own name
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Recognize when two words rhyme (like “fan” and “ran”)
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Start to connect letter sounds to letters (like the sound of the first letter in their name)
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Math Skills
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Count by rote from 1 to 20
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Count small numbers of objects with good one-to-one correspondence
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Recognize written numbers from 1 to 10
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Recognize and name basic shapes (square, circle, triangle, rectangle)
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Understand more than and less than
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Say which number comes after any number under 10
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Understand the concepts of addition and subtraction
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Add together two numbers with the help of coins or sticks
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Recognize and follow a simple ABAB pattern
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Cognitive Skills
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Distinguish common colors
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Make comparisons and describe relationships between objects like big/little, under/over, and first/last
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Organize shapes from biggest to smallest
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Put together a simple puzzle
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Focus on a task patiently
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Social Skills
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Separate from a parent without getting overly upset
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Interact with other kids
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Recognize and express emotions
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Understand rules and behavior
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Share and take turns
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Request and accept guidance from adults
Not Quite Ready? Try This . . .
Once you’ve made your checkmarks you are empowered to decide what to do next! Depending on how much time you have left before the school year starts and how many items are unchecked, you need to pick which items or subject areas you will focus on. As we saw earlier, some objectives (language and social skills) are more important than others. Don’t feel pressured to do all the things! Start with 10 things max.
You can begin by giving each objective you would like to work on a number from 1 to 10. 1 is the most important. 10 means, “Eh, if we don’t get to this, it won’t be a big deal.” Next, make a (realistic) plan to incorporate working on these objectives every week. The key here is small frequent practice sessions. Objectives that get a Number 1, 2, or 3 might be worked on four or five times a week. Then, mix in some Number 4, 5, and 6 objectives a couple of times a week. Once you’ve reached some level of comfort with the more important objectives, switch them out for others.
How do you work on these? Google and Pinterest have a ton of free and low-cost activities, materials, and ideas for individual objectives. If you have several weeks or months before the start of kindergarten, you might consider a comprehensive preschool curriculum. A curriculum that will cover many objectives for you in a logical and pre-planned way.
To Redshirt or not to Redshirt?
Because the age of compulsory school attendance in most states is 6 or above, and because of the wonky age cutoff dates for kindergarten, parents are often left with a difficult choice. Do I hold my child out of kindergarten for an additional year or not?
Studies show that slightly older children do tend to perform better in kindergarten. But those gains are often temporary, and there is a lot more to consider. What will the immediate effects on your family be of having another year of preschool? What will the long-term effects on your child be of starting school a year later?
At the end of the day, experts agree that you, mom (and dad), should trust your gut on which option is best for your child right now. Do you feel like they have the language and social skills to thrive in school? (despite those tough days we all have) If so, buckle down on your checklist and look forward to that first day of drop-off! If not, an additional year of building foundational skills in preschool might be just what is needed to ensure your child starts kindergarten truly ready.
