Coming to All Saints
Starting school is an exciting mile-stone in a child’s life. We hope that the following advice may help to make the first day as smooth as possible:-
- Make the first day as ‘normal’ as you possibly can by following your usual routine at breakfast etc.
- If your child cries when you arrive at school please hand him/her over to the teacher and leave. Although this sounds heartless it is amazing how quickly the crying stops once mum or dad is out of sight. You may telephone later in the morning to enquire how your child has settled, and put your mind at rest.
- To begin with, you may bring your child into the classroom but once he/she has gained confidence it is best if you say goodbye to them in the playground. The class teacher will bring the children to meet you at home time.
- Always make sure your child knows which adult will collect him/her from school. No infant may leave the premises unless accompanied by an adult.
- Your child may find the first few weeks at school very tiring as she/he learns to cope with all the new experiences involved in starting school. Try to help your child understand that we all have work to do and that children go to school for their work time.
- We understand that this step towards independence may be a slightly painful one for parents. It may be helpful for the first few weeks to have a ‘special time’ with your child after school.
- Our ‘staggered intake’ helps to settle your child in to school. Settling into school is important, but some children find it more difficult than others.
Preparing your Child for School
Parents have often asked if there is anything they can do to prepare their children for school. Of course you are already helping by encouraging and stimulating your children at one of their most crucial periods of development.
You can help a great deal by talking and reading stories and rhymes to them. They will also learn from T.V. and radio and listening to stories particularly if you talk about they have seen, read or heard – not too much TV, though!
Outdoor activities, picnics, walks, visits all encourage language development.
Young children love to help and many practical experiences such as gardening, shopping or cleaning will develop their co-ordination and concentration and language development.
Talk to your child as much as possible and always try to answer the children’s questions fully.
Don’t expect your child to read or write too soon. Drawing, crayoning, dot to dot and tracing will all help to develop pencil control. If you are teaching your child to write his/her name start by tracing it, please use small (lower case) letters only, except for the capital at the beginning.
Games like matching pairs, snap, picture dominoes, rhyming words, listening games, finger play, counting rhymes, sorting (buttons, shells, bottle tops etc.) help with mathematical concepts. Also make things like laying the table into a maths game
Play I-spy. Start with colours (I spy something …..yellow) then move to others (I spy something……you can eat, something… you can play with) before going on to words beginning with ‘b’ etc.
The important thing is the activities should be FUN for both of you.
