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Home › Articles › Back to Preschool Headquarters › Toddling Off to School

Toddling Off to School

Is Your Toddler Ready for Preschool?

By Keath Castelloe Low

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How Will I Know If My Child Is Ready?

Children develop at different rates, but there are some general guidelines your family may use to assess readiness.

Dr. Ari Brown, pediatrician and co-author of Toddler 411 (Windsor Peak Press, 2006), suggests parents look for the following:

Is your child able to

  • play willingly with other children in a playgroup or playground setting?
  • separate from parents and cooperate with another adult?
  • perform self-help skills (such as drinking from a cup, feeding self, toilet training depending on the program's requirements)?
How Can I Prepare My Child?

Dr. Brown suggests parents take their children on a tour of the classroom before school begins. Set up a "meet the teacher" time and invite a future classmate for a play date before the first day of school.

Low recalls when his daughter was getting ready for preschool – they attended play dates the summer before school began. "The school arranged these play dates," she says. "It was great because the children and parents met together on the school playground. Several of the days the teachers would pop out to say hello and interact with the kids and parents. We even took a picture of Ashley with her teachers and put the photo up on our refrigerator at home. By the time school began in the fall, both Ashley and I felt right at home with the whole environment."

The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), the leading organization of early childhood educators, recommends parents talk openly with their children about starting preschool and the upcoming changes in their daily routine. They suggest helping your child ease into her new routine by having her start her school-year bedtime, wakeup time and morning routine a few days before school starts.

Dr. Brown notes that parents may also want to "practice having a schedule and transitions between activities at home" in preparation for the transitions and structure they will have in a preschool setting.

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