ImageTransitioning to Kindergarten: A Toolkit for Early Childhood Educators is a comprehensive resource for educators that includes tools and materials to help implement strategies to facilitate and enhance children’s transition to kindergarten.

Whether you are a school administrator, pre-K teacher, child care provider or kindergarten teacher, you will find practical and easy-to-use tools, materials to pass along to parents, and resources and guides to steer you through the process.

Transitioning to Kindergarten: A Toolkit for Early Childhood Educators is free to download. You can print it in color or black & white. You will need the free Adobe Reader to open the toolkit files. If your computer does not already have it, you can download it at http://www.adobe.com.

You can use everything in the toolkit, or just pick a few pieces that will be most helpful for your particular situation.

Each part of the Transitioning to Kindergarten toolkit can also be downloaded and printed separately.

Introduction
School Readiness
Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool
Parent Resources
Transition resources on the Web
Training guidelines
Training PowerPoint presentation 
Research and Resources

Introduction

School Readiness
How do you know if a child is ready for kindergarten? The time that you spend with a child every day can give you lots of information about how he or she is progressing. Many states and school districts have developed kindergarten readiness checklists for their educators to use. 

The kindergarten readiness indicators checklist in this section is an example of what some states are using. It has been developed to help you ensure that the educational experience of the children in your care gets off to a good start.

Here is what you will find in this section. You can use all of the resources listed here, or just choose what will be most useful for you.

Kindergarten Readiness Indicators Checklist
This is a short checklist that helps you keep track of skills that children have mastered as they move through the pre-kindergarten year. You can use one checklist for each child, and check off skills in the fall, winter and late spring. Some children will not possess all of the skills included here, but that will not prevent them from entering school. This is simply a list of skills that will give you, as an early education professional, a place to begin in preparing children for entering kindergarten.

Kindergarten Readiness Indicators: Observation and Activity Guide
This is an in-depth guide to the kindergarten readiness indicators. It helps you know what to look for when you observe a child and gives you a place to write down your observations. The guide also includes some ideas for skill-building activities for each skill that can be done with a child who needs some help.

Creating an "Early Learning Passport"
Use this helpful guide to create an "Early Learning Passport" for each child.

Drawing and Writing Sample Template
Use the template at the end of this section several times during the year to collect writing and drawing samples from each child.

Get Ready to Read! Screening Tool 
The Get Ready to Read! screening tool is a 20-item early literacy screening tool for young children in the year before kindergarten. It was developed in conjunction with the National Center for Learning Disabilities by some of the country's top reading researchers, and is available in English and Spanish. To date, an estimated 345,000 four year-olds have been screened using the tool.

   Getting Ready for Kindergarten handouts
There are seven of these handouts for parents on different aspects of early childhood development. You can give one out each month with your newsletter over the course of the year, or give them out at parent meetings.

Next Steps:  What to Do If You Are Concerned About Your Child's Literacy Development (English)
This is a useful resource to give out when a you and/or a parent has concerns about a child.

Parent Resources
Research shows that when parents and families are involved, children and schools are more successful. This section contains resources to help you reach out to families, and keep them involved as their children move through the pre-kindergarten year and into kindergarten. The resources in this section are available in both English and Spanish.

Introduction to the parent resources (English) | (Spanish)

Transition Resources on the Web

Training Guidelines

Training PowerPoint presentation

 

Research and Resources

Next:  Ensuring Program Quality