by S D Rios

Created on: August 18, 2008

The leap to kindergarten is a monumental one, whether your child has been to preschool for years or has never been involved in formal education. Given the choice to hold your child back or not, you must take into consideration not only the educational strengths and weaknesses of your child, but, perhaps more importantly, the emotional strengths and weaknesses of your child. Consider this: In Scandanavia, many children do not begin any formal education until age 7 and, yet, their students are considered some of the best-prepared in the world. Thus, timing is not as important as the learning that takes place.

Academically, the expectation is that children enter kindergarten with a very basic knowledge of the alphabet, numbers, and shapes. Socially, they are expected to be able to use the bathroom without assistance, take turns, and exhibit self-control in an age-appropriate way. Your local school district most likely has the recommendations posted on their district website and available in the public library and the school administration office. Become familiar with the expectations so that your child enters school with a solid foundation, which will boost their self-confidence in this new and challenging environment.

The academic expections are actually quite basic and kindergarten teachers are extremely skillful at moving the entire class to where they need to be to begin learning to read, despite the great variations that exist in any given class. The preparedness does not necessarily have to do with having attended preschool. It simply has to do with the amount of exposure a child has had at home and elsewhere to experiences that have allowed them to develop to their maximum potential. The children most at risk of failure are those who have not been read to regularly, have not had a close relationship with an attentive caregiver, and who have not had the life experiences that teach them about the world.

If your child did not attend preschool, don't count him/her out as unprepared, assuming they would do better to be held back. As a teacher, I kept my son home until kindergarten, giving him experiences that I found both fun and educational and, in the end, he was one of the top in his class. I didn't do any special teaching with my son. I was there, we read, we visited places, and played, and yet there was never any indication to teachers that he hadn't been to preschool. In fact, he was too far ahead. Go figure!

Here are some other questions to consider:

1. Does

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