Why your child needs to be wired into preschool

One of the biggest roles you’ll have as a parent is grooming your child for the next step in their lives. Preschool is an important part of making sure they grow up to be well adjusted adults who are fully equipped to meet all the challenges and responsibilities they’ll face. Here’s some of the more important things you need to know about these early childhood education classes geared to three and four year olds.

The definition of what goes into a preschool program varies depending on the one you’re looking at. These schools, which will give your toddler exposure to letters, numbers and shapes among other things, may offer everything from part time schedules or even full time daycare from September to May. The time frame isn’t as important as what your son or daughter will learn at the preschool you choose for them. One of the most important lessons is the ability to socialize with other children—to share, contribute and just generally get along with playmates their own age.

Training for kindergarten

Just like the name suggests, preschool is training for kindergarten and studies have proven toddlers that get this early start come to that next step with better pre-reading, basic math skills and even fuller vocabularies than the children who don’t attend.

While the social interaction aspects are strong and important , children also learn a number of other lessons from preschool through the experimentation and exploration they experience there. Here, they begin to learn the smaller things like how to pour a glass of milk for themselves and get answers to what seems to them to be the bigger questions in life like where the clouds go when it’s sunny outside.

Fun and games

However, parents should understand preschool isn’t all about fun and games. While your little ones are playing dress up and parading around, they are also learning important lessons about how the world outside works. When your son is interacting with his peers , he’s developing language and even motor skills. When your daughter is playing with the craft supplies like crayons offered in preschool, she’s developing her creative side and that’s a big positive in our increasingly high tech society.

Those future math experts can get a good start with the right preschool too. Balancing blocks and creating make- believe fortresses teaches some basic problem solving scenarios and putting the pieces of a puzzle together helps lay the foundation for basic math problem solving skills.

Remember the first five years of life are critical for development since this is the time where the brain gets wired through experience. The people, places and things that cross your toddler’s path during this all important period shape who they will become. Preschool is significant and a great way to make sure they get off to the best possible start.