Kindergartners head to school for the first time

Staff

Published Wednesday, August 29, 2007

By Sarah Kirchner, staff writer

A kindergartner’s first day of school is an eventful time for parents, teachers and students alike. However, what used to be a tough situation when 5-year-olds left their parents that first day now has become an easier experience, said St. Theodore Catholic School kindergarten teacher Mary Tuohy.

“Kids have been places,” she said. “It isn’t nearly as big of a problem.”

Tuohy said that in recent years her kindergartners haven’t had as much separation anxiety because more kids are going to either preschool or day care before they get to kindergarten.

“Most of the kids are very excited,” said Hawthorne Elementary School kindergarten teacher Stacie Stensrud. “The biggest thing is there are so many new things for them to experience and learn in the first few weeks. It’s a lot of change for them.”

Even though first days of school are getting easier for new students, teachers and parents can still take steps to help their kindergartners.

Before the first day

Tuohy suggested parents prepare students with different skills before they get to kindergarten. Self-help skills are particularly useful, such as putting on and zipping their own jackets, pulling open a door and learning how to tie shoes.

Teaching your student to follow more than one direction at once is a plus, Tuohy said.

At home, parents should talk with soon-to-be kindergartners about their plans for the first day, such as who will drop them off at school and who will pick them up, what their lunch numbers are and who the students might know in their class, Stensrud said.

“It’s important to discuss it, not just tell them about it,” she said.

Academic skills are also useful, but definitely not required because that’s what teachers are there for, Tuohy said. It does help if kids know their alphabet, numbers and how to spell their names, she said.

One thing parents can do to make the transition go well for students is to say goodbye on the playground, Tuohy said, and make it a quick goodbye. Don’t tell your student you’ll miss them because that could make it harder for the student.

“It’s a ‘see you later,’ not a ‘goodbye,’” she said.

Once the kindergartners have said goodbye to parents, teachers step in to introduce the school and classroom to the kids.

The first day

Stensrud and Tuohy said on the first day they take their students on a tour of the classroom and the school, making sure kids know where the gym and lunchroom are located, along with other areas of the school. Tuohy said she also stops by each of the other grade level classrooms and points out where big brothers and sisters are during the day.

Tuohy also makes sure to have the students’ names on their spaces and items, she said, to help create ownership with the classroom and area.

On the first day of school, expectations of common tasks, such as washing hands, are modeled. Stensrud said she tries to get students talking about what they notice in the everyday task, what they know and help them learn the basics.

“In kindergarten you don’t know what their experiences are, and that way we teach them our expectations,” she said.

For curriculum, Tuohy said she works on how to hold a pencil, sees which students can write their names, reads stories and does a color sheet.

Reading “The Kissing Hand,” by Audrey Penn, is also common the first day of kindergarten for Tuohy and Stensrud. Stensrud said in the book the raccoon mother of a raccoon kindergartner kisses the child’s hand when sending him off to class the first day, and that kiss stays with him when he feels lonely or sad throughout the day.

One difficult thing Tuohy said she runs into with kindergartners is the difference between preschool and school. A lot of students are used to having a choice with their activities, she said, and when they get to school all activities are planned so they can’t choose whether or not they want to participate.

Occasionally there is a student that has a harder time separating from his parents, both teachers said, but the problem is often over within a few minutes.

To help the transition go better, kindergarten teachers in the Albert Lea School District and at St. Theodore Catholic School have interviews with parents in the coming days.

However, Stensrud said teachers are ready and waiting for their next batch of kindergartners.

“Teachers are very excited and put a lot of time and energy into what we do to get prepared,” she said.

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