Kindergarten Readiness

This is the time of year parents start to register their kids for kindergarten and they wonder if their child will be ready in September. Many schools use age as the determining factor for kindergarten readiness, but some educators believe that how much experience a child has in a school-like setting is just as important.

Some schools have testing for children before the school year starts. The kindergartners may be evaluated on their physical development, ability to recognize the alphabet of his or her knowledge of body parts, colors and shapes. These tests attempt to judge your child’s level of physical and cognitive development.

What should you do if your school doesn’t offer testing before entering Kindergarten? Below are a few guidelines to look for at home:

Language

• Does your child speak in full sentences
• Can they explain events they experienced

Motor Skills

• Can your child throw a ball, skip and climb
• Do they use scissors and hold a pencil

Social & Other Skills

• Do they understand the concept of sharing
• Can your child dress him/herself
• Do they wash their own face and hands
• Does your child play well with others
• Do they follow rules and directions

There is no way to tell if your child is truly ready for kindergarten. You, as their parent. are the best judge of kindergarten readiness.

Is Your Child Too Old for a Blankie?

Young children may have a “lovey” which may be a blanket or their favorite stuffed animal. Parents often worry if their children are too old to be carrying their “blankie” around. Find out when to consider retiring your child’s “blankie”.   Click here to read the article.

Keeping the Attention of a Preschoolers

The most difficult thing a parent will ever have to do is to try to keep a preschooler occupied. With their short attention spans, you need to have a lot of tricks up your sleeve. This can include arts and crafts, games and learning activities that you know will entertain them. Keeping your preschooler occupied allows them to maintain a healthy lifestyle and learn through activity.

Outdoors

Take advantage of the warmer days to send your children outside. During winter it’s easy to forget that the backyard exists. A healthy dose of fresh air, can help wear kids out.

Arts and Crafts

If you can’t get out of the house on a rainy spring day, try a craft activity. Craft stores have made being crafty easy, even if you’re not a crafty person. Packaged craft-in-a-box activities are very popular with kids. They include making beaded jewelry, bookmarks, birdhouses and more.

Indoor Play Centers

The Y, gymnastics centers, indoor play centers, mommy and me classes, activities of all types to fit all budgets are going on right now in your community. Look in your local paper, check online, and check with your local library or community center for more information on how you can get involved.

The Top 5 Potty Training Issues and How to Tackle Them

Let’s face it, potty training can be difficult for everyone involved. There can be many issues that parents/guardians face during potty training. This article can help guide you through the top 5 potty training issues.  Click here to read more

Interaction is Important for Your Baby’s Development

The first three years of life are extremely important in the long-term development of young children. You can help jump start your babies emotional and intellectual development by providing the right kind of stimulation.

• At a basic level, facial expressions, like playing peak-a-boo or smiling can begin to stimulate your baby’s brain from a very early age.
• Reading aloud to a baby can provide stimulation and the basic building blocks of speech and language development.
• The stimulation your baby receives by touching various types of fabrics, shape blocks and even playing with water during bath time can help develop a baby’s motor skills as well as stimulate their brains.
• Hugs, kisses and other positive interactions can help stimulate your baby’s brain and provide emotional development and support to make your baby feel secure.
• There is a fine line between providing enough stimulation to your baby and too much. Soothing music and baby massages are a great way to stimulate your baby’s brain why at the same time calming them.

The best way to make sure your baby is getting enough stimulation is to fill their environment with books, colorful objects and pay toys of all different sizes and shapes.

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Helping Preschoolers to Celebrate Siblings’ Birthdays

It can be hard for toddler’s/preschoolers to celebrate their siblings birthday.  They watch their brother or sister receive all the attention, opening present after present.  Here is a great article on how to deal with this issue and how to keep everyone happy during a fun birthday celebration.  Click here to read the article

Teaching Healthy Eating

If getting your child to eat vegetables and fruits has become a battle, get them involved in choosing healthy food by create a collage of fruits and veggies. This will help them learn about new foods while embracing their inner artist.

What you'll need

* Cooking and food magazines

* Cardboard or poster board

* Scissors

* Glue or a glue stick

How it works

Ask your child what healthy foods they likes to eat, and look through the magazines together to find pictures of those vegetables, fruit, or grains. Ask them to pick out items that they like the least and explain why those are good to include in their diet.

Help your child to cut out the pictures and glue them on the poster board arranging items by color. Then hang their masterpiece on the fridge as an easy reminder of what foods are good to eat, or head out to your local farmers market and have your child pick out foods they want to try that are on their poster.

6 Keys to Help a Child To Become a Good Reader

 Since we celebrated Read Across America ,  I wanted to share  6 Keys to Help a Child To Become a Good Reader from the National Education Association website.  This article gives you tips on helping your child to become a good reader. Click here to read the article

Getting Toddlers to Help Around the House

One of the most common complaints from parents with toddlers is that their toddlers don’t clean up. With their curious minds and nonstop energy toddlers are into everything. By the end of the day your house looks like 50 kids had a play date instead of just one. However, there is some good news, toddlers can learn at an early age to pick up after themselves and even have a little fun while doing it. The earlier they start cleaning up and helping around the house, good cleaning habits will grow as your little one gets older.

One of the most important habits is to have a routine for cleaning up.

• Try giving them a 5 minute warning that clean up time is coming. Have a verbal cue to let your child know that it is clean up time. A favorite one used by teachers is the clean up song, you can make up one on your own or use the old time favorite. Singing will help pass the time while your child is picking everything up and putting it away.
• To make things even easier for your child, get your child’s things organized. It makes it much more fun when your little one knows where everything goes. One of the best ways to do this is to purchase some inexpensive bins and label them.Try taking a picture of the toys that belongs in the bin and place it on the outside so all your child has to do is to match the toy to the picture. If you have older children, place a card with the name of the toy written on it. This will help with their reading skills.

Remember to keep a positive attitude. Your little one may not get all the toys back where they should go, but they did clean up, so offer them positive encouragement for even the littlest effort. Your toddler will be so pleased with their accomplishment.