When Kindergarten is Around the Corner
As a parent, how do you feel when you send your child off to Kindergarten? Excited? Terrified? Heartbroken? One way to sum it up is by saying emotional. We are scared one minute and ecstatic the next.
Scared for so many reasons.
Will they make friends? Will they fit in? Will kids be nice to them? Will they feel scared, alone, or isolated on that first day? Will they not need me as much anymore?
Ecstatic for so many reasons.
They will make so many new friends. They will have so much fun. They will grow and develop emotionally and educationally. They will start flexing their independence.
Our kids mean so much to us, and all we want to do is protect them, especially when we envision them as those little babies and toddlers they were in what seems like 5 minutes ago. As a boy mom, I’ve experienced nothing like the love I get from my little guys. I’m lucky enough to still be at the point with both where I get tons of willing affection from them.
So, as Kindergarten approaches very quickly, I can’t help but wonder if that’s going to change. Is this the start of the world hardening him? And I don’t mean that negatively because life’s curveballs are what shape us, define us, and help us grow and learn. But I still feel the need to shield him from any and all of the hurt.
As parents, we know deeply how we’re feeling as our little ones head off to grade school, but what about our kids? How are they feeling?
Every kid is different, and every experience will be different based on our children.
Have they been in a structured school experience prior?
Are they naturally outgoing or introverted?
Are they comfortable around other adults and children?
The questions are endless when determining how your child will adjust to kindergarten. And the child you put on the bus that first day isn’t necessarily going to be the same kid on the last day of school.
In some cases, moms and dads aren’t going to react the same way when the bus takes off that first day. So, there are a lot of emotions wrapped up in one experience. Again, we’re back to that word, emotional.
So, how can we ease the transition for parents and kids alike?
Enjoy every moment left before the big day. As the summer closes, spend some one-on-one time with your soon-to-be kindergarteners. We’ll never get this time back. I understand that life gets crazy sometimes, but one-on-one time is a great way to bond with your child and gauge their feelings as they embark on the big milestone.
Learn your child’s love language. Reading The 5 Love Languages of Children by Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell was a huge eye-opener for me. Going in, I knew my love language and my husband’s but never thought about how that same concept could be so valuable in parenting. Once you figure this out, it helps to mold your approach as a parent in a way that’s best for helping them handle emotions and grow accordingly. Now, this doesn’t mean your kids will consistently start saying “please” and “thank you” while simultaneously sitting calmly throughout an entire dinner. There’s no book known to provide that. But this does mean your relationship will be different in a really great way.
It’s okay to be excited, terrified, and emotional from one soon-to-be Kindergarten parent to another. Embrace the change and build your child up to deal with life as it hits them because it will, as it did all of us. It’s part of growing up, maturing, and developing into a kind, amazing human, even if we don’t feel 100% ready for it as parents.
Tell me what you think as your little one heads off to kindergarten by commenting below.