Recognizing the time of the day and days of the week is important for children as it pertains to routine.  From an early age, many infants go to child care on specific days of the week and times of the day.

Awaking wtih enough time to complete all the necessary morning tasks is essential.  A child needs to:

• Dress
• Eat
• Brush hair/teeth

If you have a slow eater, allowing for time to eat a full meal before school is important for concentration.  At least an hour is necessary to ensure that your kindergartener is awake and ready for the days events.

Children associate certain activities with the time of the day.  Breakfast comes in the morning, lunch in the middle of the day and dinner in the evenings.  In our home, we have a standard bed time routine that includes cleaning up the toys, bathing, story time and sleep.  We go in that order to help assist our children from the busy day into quiet rest.

Understanding how the day works will help children establish a good routine in school.  Children are assisted from activity to activity with care and consideration of the days’ tasks.  Maintaining a structured routine throughout their day at home will help your kindergartener be prepared.

Days of the week are just as important as the times of the day.  Typically, school runs Monday – Friday and a child has the weekend off.  Weekend routines are typically different and more lax than during the week.  Having a child understand how the week progresses is important.

We use a great rhythm to teach our children about the days of the week.  The following video is of my four-year-old.

We use the song to correlate the days of the week to a calendar.  We have been known to create our own calendars for each month to elicit creativity.  We mark any appointments and activities on the calendar and always reference back to which day of the week we are on.

Knowing the importance of routine, days and times of the day is essential for any preschooler and kindergartner.  Working creatively helps your child to remember.

It’s never too early to prepare your child for Kindergarten.  The earlier you start, the more time you have to ensure that all the basic skills are underway for schooling.  No matter the choice of home school, private school or public school; preparedness is necessary.

The following guidelines can be used to determine your child’s readiness for school:

• 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

As we progress through the various objectives through this list, suggested activities and tips will be provided for use with your child.