DD (4yo) currently attends preschool at a private school where she'll continue onto grade school. There are still 3 months left in the school year and they are concerned that she doesn't know all of her letters, her class hasn't gone over them all yet. What did you child need to know, such as letters numbers colors etc, before starting kindergarten?
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@purrpletulips: considering what they teach in Pre-school and Pre-K.... very little - this was all they required for our district
Say first and last name and phone number
Print name
count to 10
recognize and name colorsthat's it!
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@mamaof2: is that pre-k or k?the writing part seems advanced compared to the other items on the list (and has me nervous even though DD isn't at that age yet - she does the other things but can't even copy a straight line let alone letters)
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@PinkElephant: Kindergarten
Is your DD starting K this fall?
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@Mamaof2: were they required to recognize all letters (both upper and lower case)?
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I guess I'm confused. If the school she's at is the school she is going to be going to, wouldn't they be teaching them the things they'll need to know to be ready?
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@purrpletulips: according to the list we were given, no.
I was at the Orientation with DS and the teacher asked each child to walk to the board and write their name - all 18 of them could do it but some were messy and hard to read and others were perfect.
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@Mrs. Jacks: the problem we've run into is the school is evaluating her now for Kindergarten readiness (about 2 months earlier than public school does their evaluations). They did an evaluation back at the end of October and she's improved since then but still doesn't know all they are asking. DH and I are all confused because it seems strange they would evaluate when they essentially haven't even covered everything in class they are evaluating them on.
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@purrpletulips: are you working with her at home? I did letter flashcards with both kids before bed each night and Kumon has some awesome tracing books for pre-writing
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@Mamaof2: She can write her name just fine (does it all the time); the concern is more recognition.
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@purrpletulips: oops that was meant for you - Is she starting K this fall or next? When is her bday?
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@purrpletulips: I would just get some flashcards!
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@Mamaof2: we are doing some at home and she does pretty good there; it may be an attention thing because they do the evaluations off to the side of the classroom but the other kids are present. DH and I are arranging an appointment with the teacher to discuss this.
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@Mamaof2: She turns 5 April 1 of this year, we plan for her to be in kindergarten this fall.
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@mamaof2: thanks!
no, she's not even 3 yet, but we are already thinking about preK since she'll need to apply this fall to attend in fall 2016, and it's fairly competitive.
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@purrpletulips: I am glad you are meeting with the teacher -I would ask them how they plan on helping her progress and what you can do at home. I doubt they would hold her back for this.
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Does the school publish the state standards on their website? My son attends a preschool program and at our last parent teacher meeting, they went over the state standards and where he fell against them in terms of kindergarten readiness.
eta: I went back and read what you wrote about the evals on things that they haven't covered yet...are they behind in their instruction as per the guidelines?
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You are paying this private school to get her ready for their own curriculum. It makes no sense to me how they could say she's not ready. Have the other children miraculously mastered concepts they haven't even presented yet?
I could understand if she was struggling with the concepts they've already taught... But new material that they haven't gotten to yet, seems nonsensical. I'm glad you have a meeting with them!
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@purrpletulips: Mrs. Cowgirl wrote a great series of blog posts on Kindergarten readiness awhile back, have you checked those out? They might help address some of your concerns.
- http://www.hellobee.com/2012/11/13/the-new-kindergarten-an-introduction/
- http://www.hellobee.com/2012/11/15/the-new-kindergarten-what-to-prepare/
- http://www.hellobee.com/2012/11/20/the-new-kindergarten-how-to-prepare/ -
I'm so thankful for this post!!! I have been stressing about kindergarten for the last few weeks. DD isn't in preschool , starts Kindergarten this fall, and all of her knowledge is coming from me. I think our school requires them to have SIGHT WORDS! SIGHT WORDS! Who requires them to walk into kindergarten reading?!?! !
These posts are making me feel better, DD can do this stuff!
I would talk to the teacher, it is unfair for them to hold it against your LO if they haven't covered the material yet.
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Thanks everyone. I just "quizzed" DD on her number and letters. She recognized 11/20 numbers, she recognized 19/26 capital letters and 16/26 lowercase letters. The missed ones correspond to what the teacher mentioned at dismissal today so we'll work with it. I also found the standards in the parent handbook, it does seem they are evaluating a few things beyond what the handbook states so we'll talk with them about it. Overall this post has given me some direction and made me feel a little less panicked. However it would have been nice of them to give us a little more heads up on her deficiencies than 5 days.
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Lo started playing letter quiz by tantrum apps and it's helped her a ton recognizing lower case. It's got a nice set up to finger trace the letters, which I wasn't sure if thatwas going to translate into writing but she's made big leaps since playing it regularly.
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@Mrs. High Heels: Thank you, I'll check this out. It appears to be during a time when I was taking a HB hiatus.
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Write first and last name, count to 20, ABC's and sounds thar letters make
Our private preschool also did 2 evaluations and they wanted the kids to know their address, birthdate and to speak clearly
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You are all scaring me. My son goes in for his prek evaluation today for the private school I work at. He is not even. 4 yet and so little (wears 2t clothes). He's slightly delayed in speech but knows numbers to 40, all of his letters, spells his first name (can write it but really bad). I don't know what the eval will entail. I know that private schools have higher standards than public school but I'm hoping not too high. They also have a play group interview thing this weekend were they watch social skills.
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@purrpletulips: I'm a former kindergarten teacher:-). I'm by no means an authority, but feel free to wall me if you want to talk through anything!! I did my Master's thesis on kindergarten readiness, too. Best of luck-try not to stress yourself out too much!!
no, she's not even 3 yet, but we are already thinking about preK since she'll need to apply this fall to attend in fall 2016, and it's fairly competitive.
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