What Your Child Should Know

Having taught kindergarten and second grade, I've had a few friends ask me if I thought their child was "on track" to be ready for preschool and kindergarten. Since nobody hands you a curriculum when you become a Mommy, I thought it would be helpful to know some of the skills and concepts that you can be working on with your child at home. A lot of these are skills that your child would still be learning/practicing even in kindergarten, so don't freak out if there are things on here that your four year old doesn't know! However, if you are wondering what else you can be doing with your kiddos, hopefully this will give you a little direction.

Math:

·   * Shape Identification

·      *Color Identification

·      *Counting to 20

·      *Number Identification

·      *1:1 Correspondence (one ball represents the number one, two bears represents the number two, etc.)

·      *Classification/Sorting (by shape, color, size, etc.)

·      *Creating and Continuing a Pattern

·      *Comparing objects (bigger/smaller, shorter/taller, etc.)

Language Arts

·     *Identifying letter names and sounds

·      *Identifying capital and lowercase letters-which ones are the same letter

·      *Tracing/Writing letters and numbers

·      *Identifying rhyming words

·      *Drawing pictures to tell a story

Reading

·      *“Reading the pictures” (have your child “read” you a story by telling you what’s happening in the pictures)

·      *Retelling the story (you read a story and have your child retell what happened)

·      *Story elements (characters, setting, problem, solution)

·     * Making predictions (“What do you think is going to happen next?”)

·      *Sequencing (Putting the events of a story in order-what happened first, next, last)

·      *Discussing lessons/morals in a story

·      *Making connections (to yourself, another story, etc.-“Alexander is having a really bad day! Can you think of a time when you’ve had a bad day?”

·      *Identifying new vocabulary words and discussing meaning

·      *Modeling fluent reading, using expression and phrasing

Science/Social Studies/Other

·    *Weather

·      *Seasons

·      *Holidays

·      *Months and Days of the Week

·      *Family

·      *Animals

·      *Fine Motor and Gross Motor Skills