CINCINNATI -- Get those black ink pens ready, moms and dads.
Thousands of parents in the Tri-State are registering their child for kindergarten over the next few months in preparation for next school year. Caregivers should expect to fill out lots of school forms and paperwork. And some will also need to set up wellness exams with their child’s pediatrician, optometrist and dentist.
Once all of that is complete, there’s likely to be a bit of residual anxiety over whether their little one will be fully ready for the "big leagues" this August.
Can their child handle the academic and social demands of a kindergarten classroom? What will their teachers expect them to know?
Those questions, and more, linger in the back of many parents’ minds well before their child is even old enough for school. Most of that anxiety relates to kindergarten readiness. We’re hearing the term more and more as educators at every level push for better early childhood education programs and opportunities for children.
Children at Rainbow Child Care Center in Alexandria. (Photo provided)
The reason: The years before children reach kindergarten are among the most critical in their life to influence learning, according to the U.S. Department of Education. There’s also a link between kindergarten readiness and future academic success, experts agree.
But what exactly does "kindergarten-ready" mean, and how can we help our children get there?
In Greater Cincinnati, Stephanie Byrd knows the lasting difference being ready for school can mean for a child. She’s the executive director of United Way of Greater Cincinnati’s Success by 6.
The initiative is a driving force behind kindergarten readiness and aims to increase access to high-quality early childhood programs and services. It ties in with a network of programs that are working to provide a better early foundation locally for school success.
“When we think about kindergarten readiness, we need to look at the broad definition,” Byrd said. “Every child is different, and there is a lot of variation in child development.”
Just as the rate of development varies from child to child, the definition of kindergarten readiness varies slightly from state to state and even among school districts. Overall, kindergarten readiness refers to having the skills and knowledge, in a variety of areas, necessary to succeed in kindergarten. States assess those skills each year with kindergarten-readiness screenings.
Locally, educators look at a variety of factors, Byrd said.
The most obvious things are a child’s cognitive or academic skills, things like recognizing a fair amount of letters and numbers, rhyming words, and knowing how to write his or her name. But social and emotional skills are just as important, she said. Those include being able to interact with classmates, follow simple rules and instructions, express needs and wants, and listen and focus during instruction.
There are also physical indicators of kindergarten readiness beyond overall health and up-to-date vaccinations, including fine motor development. Examples include being able to hold a pencil properly and use scissors.
Byrd advises parents not to get hung up on any of those particular skills and warns that not every child will master all of them by their first day of kindergarten. And she says that’s OK.
When it comes to kindergarten readiness, the important thing is that children are exposed to a wide range of high-quality early learning experiences from birth.
About 85 percent of the brain’s development happens before kindergarten, Byrd said.
“We know so much more now about brain development. We’ve learned a lot over the last 20 years,” she said. “Children are born learning, and quality early-education opportunities are critical to their development.”
In fact, early learning affects not just how children will perform in kindergarten, but also whether they’ll read well by third grade, succeed in eighth grade and even whether they will graduate high school, according to United Way.
Byrd offered these tips to expand a child’s early-learning opportunities and help build kindergarten-readiness skills:
- Start early. Since parents are children’s first teachers, Byrd suggests they learn to transform everyday moments into teachable moments. Even newborns benefit from such moments, she said.
- Just singing or talking to babies helps create connections in their brain that leads to further learning,” she said.
- When you make a habit of narrating your shared activities or engaging your child in conversation, you help them develop early language skills. Reading to them, taking them for a walk around the block or even on a trip to the grocery store does the same and broadens their knowledge of the world. Sorting laundry can introduce them to colors, and helping with a family recipe in the kitchen can help older children learn early math skills.
- For help, look online, or take group courses through a United Way Born Learning Academy (or similar early-education program designed for parents). Some local outreach programs offer home visits. A good first step is reaching out to your home school district, where staff can connect you with resources.
- Track your child’s developmental milestones. To ensure children are on the right track, parents should be aware of their developmental milestones (things most children can do by a certain age) from infancy, Byrd said. And if their child’s development doesn’t match up with most others in their age group, early intervention is the key to getting them back on track.
- “It’s important to check in often and to ask questions about your child’s development,” Byrd said. “Ask your pediatrician ... and talk with your child care provider. If there is a problem, there are early-intervention services available.”
- Find a high-quality preschool. Both national and local research shows attending a quality preschool program makes a big difference in regard to kindergarten readiness, Byrd said. The good news is that access to quality preschool programs is getting better here in the region.
Districts in Northern Kentucky, including Erlanger-Elsmere Schools, are offering expanded preschool programs. Cincinnati Public Schools teamed up with Cincinnati Preschool Promise on a $48 million a year school levy that passed in November.
The funds will ensure all 3- and 4-year-old children from families that make twice the federal poverty wage or less, who live in the school district, will get to attend private or public preschool tuition-free, WCPO previously reported. Quality improvement grants will also help private, community-based preschool programs achieve and maintain quality, which will expand the number of quality preschools in Cincinnati, according to United Way.
“It’s exciting, because more local children will have access to quality preschool programs,” said Byrd, who has helped lead the Cincinnati Preschool Promise steering committee. It’s a piece of the puzzle in improving kindergarten readiness across the region, she said.
Currently, more than 40 percent of Cincinnati’s children enter kindergarten unprepared. United Way of Greater Cincinnati has a goal to reduce that percentage significantly by 2020.
