Ready or Not?

Ready? Or not?

Gina is all ready for school. She has her “Frozen” book bag and her “Spiderman” sneakers. She’s picked out her first-day-of-school outfit and decided which friend she will sit next to on the bus. She can recite her ABCs and write her name. Her parents have the camera ready and they are all set for the big day.

Gina may not be as ready as she and her parents think. There’s more to school than lunch boxes and ABCs. Children need adequate preparation for the high-stakes world education has become. Concerned parents are the first and best asset a child can have. Teach your child about the world of school. Add some fun to your lessons; make getting ready for school a pleasure for you and your child. Here are some suggestions for making school an exciting adventure for you both.

·       Don’t just sing the alphabet song:

     We all know it; “A,B,C,D … next time won’t you sing with me.” Children need letter awareness but this traditional little ditty teaches children a string of sounds they may not comprehend. How many of us thought “LMONP” was the name of one letter? Language begins with thoughts, concepts, words, sentences, and lastly, letters. Help your child feel language.

     “RRRRufffff,” says the dog.

     “MMMMMoooooooo!” says the cow.

     Make connections between sounds and letters:

“Top starts with the same sound as Tommy.”

“Marshmallows make Molly mumble.”

“Milk and moo both come from cows.

     So when singing the song, help your child learn the language of the letters.

·       Sing, sing, sing!

Music involves rhythm, rhyme, melody, timing, and more. Teach your child many types of songs. Dance with the rhythm. Bang wooden spoons in time to the beat. Play games with songs. Leave out the last word to practice rhyming: “This Old Man he plays two, he plays knick, knack on his shoe” or glue, or gnu, or stew!

     What funny images will your child envision by changing just one word?  Illustrate your silly song.  Pass out rhythm instruments and play along. “What rhythm instruments?” you ask? Plastic jars filled with beans make great maracas. Pot-lid cymbals and stew-pot drums sound lovely in a pots and pans symphony.

Listen to many versions of the same song. What’s different? What’s the same? Listen carefully; try something new. Music hath charms to teach the savvy child.

·       Jump up! Jump down! Turn all around!

Help your child follow two- and three-step directions. Often a teacher will say something like, “Find your orange crayon and color the pumpkin.” This may not seem complicated but many children have trouble going more than one step.

     Make it a game. Add one more step each time. “Pick up your sweater, carry it to the hook, and hang it up.” “Wash your face first, your belly next, then your elbow.”  Let your child give you directions. Make mistakes.  Laugh a lot.

·       Math is life!

Math is not some subject in school that we all dread. Math is everywhere. Math is the great puzzle of life. If Aunt Joan comes over with your three cousins, how many plates will we need on the table?” Even if your child can’t count, he can lay out one plate for Aunt Joan, one for Erica, one for Joanna, and one for Caleb. One-to-one correspondence is a basic concept of math.

Make up riddles: If there are 12 legs at a party, how many children are there? How many horses? Draw pictures and figure it out. Make a giant paper doll by tracing your child and then compare it to toys, furniture, and appliances.

Play math games in the car, in the store, at the zoo – everywhere you go. If it takes three “Wiggles” CDs to get to Granny’s, is the two CD trip to Uncle Jim’s closer or farther? How can we split six cookies among three children?  Make math fun and it will be E-Z for your child in school.

·       Practice focusing.

This is a tough one. Sitting still is boring. Yet lots of time in school is spent using this skill. It must be learned like any other. Sit together and share a book.  Assemble a puzzle. Build a tower of blocks or draw a picture. Do not sit in front of the TV. Television is a passive medium. School is a participatory event. Children must be focused and actively engaged in learning.  Keep the body still, but your mind moving. 

·       Learn to listen.

Listening skills are paramount in most learning situations. Your child needs to be an active listener, sorting, categorizing, rearranging, and digesting a huge amount of verbal material each day. Listening to children’s radio or recordings helps your child to develop this skill. Listen with your child and then discuss what you have heard. Again, turn off the television. The scattered visual images television offers impair the concentration skills necessary for active learning.  Sit still and let music wash over you like waves from the ocean.  Listen to the still small voice of your child as he learns to listen to the world.

·       Write Your Child’s Name in Many Different Ways.

It’s great when a child can recognize and write his/her name. Every school today seems to have its own system of handwriting. If you know which school your child will be attending, take the time to check this out. Make sure that your child sees his name written in many different styles, upper and lower case. Use that font feature of your computer: Writing my name can be lots of fun!

·       Use proper English at home.

Now is the time for all good parents to come to the aid of their children. Baby babble sounds sweet coming from a toddler but sour coming from a big school boy. Be a good model. Use good grammar. Make this a habit for your child.

It is much harder to give up “brang” than to grow up saying brought. Reading and writing will be much less of a chore for a child who naturally uses correct grammar. Enunciate distinctly. Clear pronunciation helps tremendously with spelling. Sure English is a crazy language with more exceptions than rules, but don’t make it a “second language” for your child by allowing lazy grammar and pronunciation to trip them up.

·       Practice small motor skills.

Use those little fingers and toes. Spread cereal “O’s on the table and let little Robby pick them up with a lollipop stick. Roll small pieces of clay into balls and make a pile of peas. Grab the washcloth with your toes in the tub. Put olives on all of your fingertips and eat them one at a time. Jiggle them around to make an olive puppet theater. Wink, blink, and wiggle your nose. Primary students are expected to use pencils, crayons, and scissors. Exercising the small muscles in hands with fun activities like these develops the dexterity needed to write, color, and cut.

·       Build BK.

Background knowledge that is. Give your child a multitude of experiences from which to draw in order to make those all-important learning connections. Get out and explore the world. Start in your own back yard and enter the world of science.  Follow bees and butterflies. Study the geography of the park. Explore the wonders of the forest. Learn about other cultures in specialty stores or ethnic restaurants or just by visiting your neighbors. Visit a farm, a fire station, or a police barracks. Open up your child’s eyes and ears to the great big world.

·       Curiouser and Curiouser.

Why, why, why? It’s a three-year-old’s favorite question. But in today’s hurry-up world, we don’t often enough take the time to encourage a child’s natural curiosity. A good student needs to ask why – and what, when, where, and how.

Encourage questions. You don’t have to know the answers.  Let your child experiment. What happens if we don’t put the gelatin in the refrigerator? Will it gel on the counter? How long will it take a little piece of soap to dissolve in the tub? Guide your child in using the many resources available today in the library and on the Web. Let them ask! Then, let them seek and find – or wonder some more.

·       Read! Read! Read!

     Never were three more important words written about preparing a child for school. Reading to your child creates an explosion of learning. Reading involves all the skills listed above: listen to the letters, feel the rhythm, hear the rhyme, follow the direction of the story, sequence the events, sit still and concentrate, build background knowledge, ask questions, comprehend and evaluate, hear the flow of the language, note the different print in each book, and follow the left-to-right progression of the sentences with your fingers and eyes.  

Make reading with your child a priority.  Do it first, not after all else is done. Studies show that reading to a child just twenty minutes a day from the age of six months can raise a student’s high school achievement scores up to 150 points.

Enjoy yourself! Do the funny voices. Daddy does a great Big Bad Wolf, but listen to the scary one little Jimmy can do. Stop and ask questions. Wonder why aloud. Record yourself reading your child’s favorites and make wonderful keepsakes. Keep the computer in the kitchen to look things up. Treat books like treasures and your child’s life will be full of golden memories and silver dreams.

Now your child is ready for the exciting adventure awaiting her in school. Propel your child into the world of learning by preparing him/her at home with the necessary skills. No teaching degree is necessary, just a sense of fun and a joy in learning. Watch out world, ready or not, here they come!