Is Your Child Ready for Kindergarten?

No list of kindergarten readiness skills can encompass the needs of all kindergarten children.  Regardless of the skill level of your child, your child's teacher will work hard to meet his/her needs.  To give you a sense of what skills are expected at the start of kindergarten, we created this list and this booklet.  Remember that if your child is not exhibiting a particular skill one week, s/he may exhibit it the very next week!  If you have questions about your child's readiness for kindergarten, you may want to talk with your child's preschool teacher, child care provider, or pediatrician, who may suggest additional assessment with an intervention specialist.  During our August screening, your school's Instructional Support Teacher (IST) will be able to answer questions you may have about your child's readiness for kindergarten. 

• Shares with others.
• Plays cooperatively with other children. 
• Separates from parents without being upset. 
• Begins to control oneself.
• Starts to follow rules.
• Takes care of self care needs - bathroom, dressing, zipping, buttoning, etc.
• Listens to stories with interest.
• Looks at pictures and then tells stories. 
• Recognizes rhyming sounds - nursery rhymes.
• Pays attention for short periods of time to adult directed tasks.
• Has a general sense of time of day.
• Cuts with scissors.
• Traces.
• Speaks understandably in complete sentences of up to five or six words.
• Identifies rhyming words orally.
• Identifies the beginning sounds of some words orally.
• Identifies some letters of the alphabet.
• Begins to identify and write the letters in their name. 
• Sorts similar objects by color, shape, and size.
• Recognizes groups of one to five objects.
• Counts to ten.
• Bounces a ball. 

(List adapted from Smart Start Centre County)