Are You Ready for School?

Pearson’s Kindergarten Readiness Checklist
Our partners at Pearson have created a Kindergarten Readiness Checklist that will give you a glimpse of what skills most teachers expect when a child enters school. Print it out, and use it as a reference throughout your child’s preschool journey. We will also be giving you ideas on how to help your child develop these skills in our monthly e-mails, so save the link!

Key Kindergarten Readiness Skills include being able to...

Listen to stories without interrupting
Recognize rhyming sounds
Pay attention for short periods of time to adult-directed tasks
Understand actions have both causes and effects
Show understanding of general times of day
Cut with scissors
Trace basic shapes
Begin to share with others
Start to follow rules
Be able to recognize authority
Manage bathroom needs
Button shirts, pants, coats, and zip up zippers
Begin to control oneself
Separate from parents without being upset
Speak understandably
Talk in complete sentences of five to six words
Look at pictures and then tell stories
Identify rhyming words
Identify the beginning sound of some words
Identify some alphabet letters
Recognize some common sight words like "stop"
Sort similar objects by color, size, and shape
Recognize groups of one, two, three, four, and five objects
Count to ten
Bounce a ball
A second reminder: all children are unique! These are general guidelines for skills that most Kindergarten teachers would like to see children have when they start school. Keep in mind that your child will learn a lot in his first year of school, but if you are still concerned about whether or not your child is ready, talk to your child's pediatrician.