Kindergarten: What to Expect from April to June

As April showers bring May flowers around the country,  a lot of kindergarten classrooms are blooming too.  Those little kids who trembled at the threshold?  Most of them now saunter into the classroom each morning, only too happy to offer guided tours. And once you’re gone, the children are better than ever at settling into the work and play of their day.

While teachers celebrate these gains, they’re also still working hard.  As June approaches, they have their eye on a list that can seem pretty daunting: End of Year Standards.  Teachers will, of course, consider every child case by case, but with No Child Left Behind and a general climate of “accountability,” you’ll probably want to pay close attention to what’s coming up.   Individual state standards vary, so plan to consult the website for your state’s department of education, as well as your district curriculum, for exact specifics.  Across the nation, however, here are common June goals:

Literacy

Using grade-level materials, your child can:

• Handle a book, using “concepts of print” such as going through from left to right, front to back.
• Hold a pencil properly and use scissors to cut along a simple line
• Write his own name
• Say and write all or most of the letters of the alphabet (some letters may be scraggly), and most of their sounds
• Name and label objects
• Recognize at least 10-15 common “sight” words, such as “is” or “the”
• Draw a picture and write simple “sound-spelled” words that tell about it

Math

• Using grade-level materials, your child can:
• Tell you how numbers represent “how many”
• Count from 1-20 on a number line by ones and by 2s
• Sort out sets of objects, separate and categorize them.
• Compare more, less, and same
• Add simple numbers between 1-10, showing, for example, how 2+2 equals 4 things
• Recognize and create patterns, such as AABBCCAABBCC
• Explain the concept of one-half
• Know about sequence: yesterday, today, tomorrow, and time to the nearest  hour

Science and Social Studies

• These topics have been introduced through literacy and math activities all year.  Specific topics vary widely by school and state, but baseline skills are:
• Observe, describe, sort, compare and classify objects in simple sets
• Make simple predictions and evaluate what really happens
• Tell whether something is living or nonliving
• Identifying helpers in the community, such as firefighters
• Use a simple map, such as for a child’s neighborhood
• Identify different holidays
• Understand the reason for school and community rules

Social-Emotional Milestones

Your child has been able to maintain the skills that solidified in the “sweet spot”:

• Handle home-school transitions without serious anxiety
• Maintain on-task focus on developmentally appropriate challenges, such as readalouds and activity centers, for 15-20 minutes at a time.
• Behave in ways that are friendly and safe in the classroom and playground
• Follow the teacher’s classroom rules and directions consistently

If your child can already do all of this consistently by April, that’s great!  But it’s also pretty rare. Just about all kindergarten children can benefit from a few more solid months of classroom work and play, with practice in every area of the curriculum.