Help your child to start school successfully

With just a few months until the start of the school year, early educators everywhere are being asked a very familiar question….

Is my child ready to start school next year?

In this series of four articles about school readiness, you’ll receive practical ideas and information to help you to decide if your child is ready to tackle the challenge of ‘big school’.

Social and Emotional Maturity

Does your child have the resilience, independence and self-reliance to be a confident school starter?

Some key things that you can do in the coming months to support your child’s social and personal skills include ensuring that your son or daughter can:

• Use a toilet independently
• Say his or her own name and address
• Separate from you
• Adapt quickly to new settings and environments
• Complete a task and tidy up afterwards
• Play cooperatively with other children, share and take turns
• Sit still to listen to a story for 3-5 minutes
• Show curiosity about the world
• Share an adult’s attention with several other children
• Participate in imaginative play

These are skills that most successful school starters have, but don’t worry if some are still a challenge for your child.

Encourage your child’s attempts to achieve these goals and talk to your child’s pre-school teachers, early educators and carers about ways in which you can help your child to overcome social and emotional obstacles.

These professionals are likely to have worked with many children just like yours and will be able to give you ideas and strategies that are simple...and more importantly...work!

There are stills several months to go until school begins…and you never know, your little one might just surprise you.

                                                                                                     
Written with reference to: Starting School – NSW Department of Education

                                                                                                             © Sonja Walker 2010