How Much Should A Child Know When They Are Going Into Kindergarten?
Alright, my girl is 5, for the last 2 years she has been at a private school. Starting the school year she will be going to a public school. She is worried that she will “FAIL”. So this is what she is able to do at this point: She knows sign language, spanish, can count up to 100+, She can do simple addition, starting to tell time, knows her shapes and not just circle or square, but the big ones. She can read the “I can read books at Level 2″ She is very bright. So with what you know, will she have any problems going into a public kindergarten school? I tell her, she is not going to have any problems, and we are working on making the switch to a big new school I a great thing. But she feels she won’t beable to do this. So what do you think, what is the norm when going into kindergarten? Any help would be great, thanks so much for your time.
Are you able to get some time for her to go see the teacher and classroom outside of class time? It sounds like maybe Kindergarten is something she does not know about, so she is just afraid of it. If you get her in the classroom and tell the teacher the problem, the teacher might be able to show her some of the activities they will be doing and your daughter may feel better and start to look forward to going.
To answer your question, your daughter is fine. She’s not behind on anything academic to enter Kindergarten.
Matt
Don’t we all worry about this kind of thing the first time we have a child going to school? Don’t worry. If you know kids who also go to the school, help her to get acquainted. If she has a couple of buddies going to the same place, they will support and protect one another from other rough kids. What she knows so far is great. She only needs the confidence to keep it up and learn to be with others.
Every child is different. You should only need to worry if your child is too shy or too rough. Most will adjust and fit in within 2 weeks. Then look out for good families where you can invite kids to come over or send your kid into their house to play. Kiny is teh best time for many kids to start long term friendships. Then year 1 is the first year you can seriously look at academic performance.
Please alway remember that intelligence and education are two different things. It is difficult to find a stronger proponent of learning than myself (a recent PhD recipient) but too often our education system is getting in the way of learning. Success in school has more to do with self-confidence (not to be confused with self-esteem) and parental support than technical knowledge (counting to 100, identifying shapes, etc.). Children develop at different times and speeds. The well known stories of people like Einstein are not the exceptions… but are more often typical of how varied the development of children is. We are far too concerned with technical development than we need to be. Disciplined study, effort, encouragement, sticking to a job, etc. are much more important indicators of final educational sucess than is any particular technical skill set.
Try and make the approachng educational experience exciting and fun for your child. Minimize his/her focus on the skills or knowing something. Learning is a lifelong adventure, we have made it into a job for children.
she needs to know:
-how to behave
-share
-her own name
-how old she is
-her ABC’s
-her numbers. required 1-20.
your daughter seems smart, so i don’t think she should have any problems in kindergarten.
Your daughter is already an over-achiever, which is great! But why is she so afraid of failing — could it be you?
All a child needs to know to go into kindergarten is how to listen to the teacher and obey the rules and get along with other children well. Why don’t you work on allowing her to have fun and be a kid?
wow YOUR DAUGHTER seems smarter then me, so no worries, i learned all of that 100 word, and speaking, and stuff in kindygardy =]
she sounds very bright and educated well she shall not have any problems at all i went to public schools it wasn’t hard i actually found it easier than going to private …you should tell her public schools are easier than private you will probably be the smartest in the class !