Prepping for Primary School at Home

[Marahute]

My summer born is due to start Reception in September. While he was attending his amazing preschool, I wasn't feeling too worried about it, as he settled in well and they are very experienced in helping prepare the children for starting school. His teacher wasn't concerned and felt he would be ready.

Now I have accepted it's unlikely he will go back before September (really hope I end up being wrong about this but assuming the worst) and will be missing out on all the vital preparation time at preschool. I was just planning to arrange to send him in for an extra day a week when all this kicked off.

Question is, what can we do at home to help prepare him? First child so no experience with this. He doesn't like change very much and I'm worrying about the shock to the system of going from being at home with me all the time, to then going to a brand new school. He is struggling with the transition to being at home full time, TBH. He has been in some from of childcare 3x per week since around 14 months.

I'm sure I am not alone in feeling this way and having these worries. Would definitely appreciate some guidance.

I am obviously going to be chatting with the preschool about this too, but currently they are dealing with all the upheaval of the closure so giving them time for the dust to settle.

I wouldn't worry too much tbh. Reception is for settling into school life, they don't expect them to hit the ground running. All children will be in the same boat i.e. their nursery/pre-school/childcare will have been closed for months. Even the teachers will be in the same boat! It's going to be weird for everyone.

In terms of what you can do to be ready for reception:

Read with him. If he's interested in phonics you can introduce those, but it's not necessary.

Work on holding a pencil correctly. Draw. Write (start with his name). Do playdoh or clay or baking, anything that strengthens those finger muscles.

Teach him to share and take turns and be patient (even if he is an only child and doesn't actually need to do any of those things).

Teach him to feed himself (with a knife and fork), dress himself and toilet independently.

Encourage him to listen and follow basic instructions.

Encourage his curiosity in things, try and find answers when you can, talk to him and explain things.

Basically all the things you were probably doing anyway!

Thank you, that's really helpful. I am probably overthinking it, it just feels like school is such a big change, it's hard to get my head around it. He is a curious little thing, so hopefully that is will stand him in good stead.

Good point that all children will have been in the same boat too, I need to remember that.

Encourage him to listen made me laugh out loud, he definitely needs some work where listening is concerned, and is currently driving me crackers.

We are doing most, if not all, of these things, so will continue and try not to worry about it all.

I'd actually worry less about this now. By Sept a lot of reception children are going to need a very slow start as all children are likely to have been in lockdown or similar for weeks

Every reception teacher I’ve ever spoken to had said the same, don’t worry about the academic stuff, the best thing you can do is send them to school being able to recognise their name, feed themselves and use the toilets by themselves, so being able to wipe and wash hands etc. They can teach 30 children phonics at once but 30 coats that needs fastening is time consuming, so being able to dress themselves to a certain extent too.