While there is no perfect formula that determines if a child is ready for kindergarten, parents can help their children acquire some basic skills that will prepare them for success in school. On the first day of school, teachers look forward to seeing children who are healthy, mature, capable and eager to learn.

It is useful for parents to have a clear understanding of what a child should know before starting kindergarten. The website familyeducation.com has compiled an extensive checklist to assist parents in preparing their children for school.

Kindergarten Readiness Checklist

• Listen to stories without interrupting
• Recognize rhyming sounds
• Pay attention for short periods of time to adult-directed tasks
• Understand that actions have both causes and effects
• Show understanding of general times of day
• Cut with scissors
• Trace basic shapes
• Begin to share with others
• Start to follow rules
• Be able to recognize authority
• Manage bathroom needs
• Button shirts, pants, coats, and zip up zippers
• Begin to control oneself
• Separate from parents without being upset
• Speak understandably
• Talk in complete sentences of five to six words
• Look at pictures and then tell stories
• Identify rhyming words
• Identify the beginning sound of some words
• Recognize some common sight words like ?stop?
• Sort similar objects by color, size, and shape
• Recognize groups of one, two, three, four, and five objects
• Count to ten
• Bounce a ball.
  
  

(Reprinted from Kindergarten Readiness Checklist on the Family Education Website)