7 Ways to Prepare Your Toddler for Preschool

Getting them ready to tackle learning

Preschool is an exciting time of learning and socializing for your toddler. For some children it is the most fun they’ve ever had For others, the time away from their parents is a bit unnerving or even frightening. Some excel and absorb new learning, skilled at recollection and others may not seem to be keeping up. There are things you can do as a parent to better prepare your toddler for these experiences to make preschool a more fun and successful time.

As a parent, you want to see your toddler succeed, but also wrestle with the emotions of time away from them. Here are a few tips to help prepare your toddler, and how to make sure all involved are growing and thriving through the experience.

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1.  Help your child learn resilience by playing games with them

Resilient children are able to handle the ups and downs, the frustrations, the challenges, as well as the joys of life with a better-centered emotional strength.

One very important way to do this is to not let your child win all of the time. Playing games with your child is important to teach them cooperation, competition with integrity, learning to play by rules and take turns, as well as learning all kinds of great preschool prep things like letters, numbers, and colors.

Vicki Palmer, a Huffpost contributor and early childhood educator, discusses her perspectives on teaching toddlers resilience to prepare them for preschool in her article 12 Things You Can Do to Prepare Your Child for Preschool (That You Probably Haven’t Thought Of). “In my 35 years as a preschool teacher and as a parent of two children, I have learned that the single best thing we as parents can do to prepare children for preschool is to help them to develop their independence and resilience. The rest will follow in time.”

Palmer also advises that it is important for children to not “win” all the time ( as in, letting them win the games you play with them), “Children learn so much from playing. In preparation for preschool, and life in general, it is so helpful if you can take the time to play games regularly with your children. This could mean board games, card games or ball games. It doesn’t matter what the game is, as long as your child is playing with other people.

When you are playing these games regularly, please, please make sure that you don’t let your child win all the time. It is a subtle way of teaching resilience.”

Games for the toddler age:

• 14 preschool activities to get your child ready for the classroom
• 9 Classic Preschool Games That Secretly Teach Life Skills
• Fun Learning Games for Toddlers and Preschoolers

2.  Help your child prepare for preschool by encouraging independence

For some parents, encouraging independence is difficult, emotionally, but rest assured you are holding them back if you do not begin developing your toddler’s independence and encouraging them to cling to you. This is a time you will have to practice some “letting go.”

Michelle LaRowe gives us 5 great tips in her Momtastic article 5 Tips for Encouraging Independence in Toddlers:

• Never do for your toddler what they can do for themselves
• Toddler-proof your home
• Give your toddler choices
• Assign age-appropriate tasks
• Encourage safe risk taking

A few things we would add to this list:

• Begin having sleepovers with trusted family members–the night away is good for developing independence
• Do not have “clingy good-byes” or loiter and press your child for “extra” good-bye efforts from your toddler–sometimes they are totally ok with parting with you for a little bit. It’s ok for YOU to be ok with that as well.
• Encourage your child to tell you all about the fun they had in your absence–and celebrate this with them.

3.  Work on hygiene, eating habits and potty habits

Most preschools require that your child is potty trained in advance but these rules are a little different for each facility. Some require full potty training, some allow pull-ups, and some will help to continue potty training with your child while they are at preschool. It’s important to communicate well with the preschool and know what is expected and what supplies you will need to provide for the preschool.

It’s also important to review hand washing routines with your toddler and go over eating habits as well. A lot of toddlers don’t necessarily sit down at a table to eat their meals at home and it’s a good thing to start practicing doing this before your toddler starts preschool. At the toddler preschool age it is difficult to sit still but at preschool they likely will be expected to sit and eat their meals together as a group rather than run around in circles and come back to eat a little bit when they are ready. It’s probably also good to help your toddler understand not to take food off of other people’s plates.

4.  Practice hand activities and skills they will need 

Preschool is a whirlwind of learning, both socially, and with regards to language, letters and numbers, and crafting. Suddenly, there are a host of fun and new learning activities! Introducing them to a few of the hand skills they will need to master these activities will help them feel more secure in their new preschool setting.

Ashley Thurn, MS, OTR/L on Motherly website has provided an excellent list of these skills and how to introduce them to your toddler/preschool age child in 25 simple activities to help prepare your child for preschool. You can refer to the article for a full discussion of each, but here are a few from her list that we find to be particularly important:

• Practice holding and working with a pair of age-appropriate scissors
• Practice drawing straight lines and cutting on a straight line
• Have your child thoroughly familiar with letters, shapes, and numbers
• Practice writing their name
• Writing / drawing / coloring both on a flat surface and on a raised surface such as a board or easel
• Teach about taking turns and sharing
• Help your child learn how to ask for help when they need it
• Clean up and put away
• Sitting for a lesson or story

5.  Talk about what to expect

One great way to prepare your toddler for preschool is to read books to them about preschool. It opens up the conversation and gives you an opportunity to get them excited about school but also to answer any questions that they may have or to pick up on any underlying anxiety that they may have about preschool.

Here is a list of great related books to read with your toddler:

• Spot Goes to School by Eric Hill
• Preschool, Here I Come! by David J Steinberg, illustrated by John Joven
• Rosie Goes to Preschool by Karen Katz
• The Name Jar by Yangsook Choi
• What to Expect at Preschool by Heidi Murkoff
• The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn, Ruth E. Harper (Illustrator), Nancy M. Leak (Illustrator)–This is a great one if you or your child may experience separation anxiety

6.  Pick out items together 

Contact where your child will be attending to see what supplies they will need. A backpack is often a requirement. Make the list together with your child and explain why they will need each item on the list–then take them on a special “preschool shopping” trip.