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Kindergarten: What your child should know

Keep tabs on your kindergartner's development with this handy checklist.
By Miriam Myers, GreatSchools Staff
 

No two kids are alike, especially when it comes to hitting developmental benchmarks. But it helps to have a rough idea of which academic and social skills your child should acquire at his or her grade level. Learn more about the kindergarten classroom in these subject areas: reading, writing, language arts, math, science, technology, social studies, art, music, and physical education.

By the end of the year, you can expect your child to:

  • Follow class rules
  • Separate from a parent or caregiver with ease
  • Take turns
  • Cut along a line with scissors
  • Establish left- or right-hand dominance
  • Understand time concepts like yesterday, today, and tomorrow
  • Stand quietly in a line
  • Follow directions agreeably and easily
  • Pay attention for 15 to 20 minutes
  • Hold a crayon and pencil correctly
  • Share materials such as crayons and blocks
  • Know the eight basic colors: red, yellow, blue, green, orange, black, white, and pink
  • Recognize and write the letters of the alphabet in upper- and lowercase forms
  • Know the relationship between letters and the sounds they make
  • Recognize sight words such as the and read simple sentences
  • Spell his first and last name
  • Write consonant-vowel-consonant words such as bat and fan
  • Retell a story that has been read aloud
  • Identify numbers up to 20
  • Count by ones, fives, and tens to 100
  • Know basic shapes such as square, triangle, rectangle, and circle
  • Know her address and phone number

 

 
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Comments from GreatSchools.net readers

12/3/2009:
"Please read the California State Standards to find out what a Kindergarten should know at the beginning of the year. Check to see what they should know to be ready for 1st grade. numbers 1-30 25 words all upper and lower case letters (out of order) beginning, middle, and ending sounds of three letter words Reading levels to 4 Writing sentences/short stories Rhymes Follow 2-3 step directions and all of the things you listed on your list colors "
11/2/2009:
"I think this is a wonderful article and guide for new parents and grandparents too! Thank you."
09/21/2009:
"It seems that many parents who have commented are saying that their children already know most of what is listed. Maybe there should be two tracks for kindergarten. One for those children who have attended pre-k and have been exposed to all this 'preparatory information' and one for those children who have not attended pre-k, or who seem to need more socialization skills. Kindergarten looks like 1st or 2nd grade these days. What happened to children playing to learn!!"
09/8/2009:
"Parents, you should realize that sooo much more goes on in the classroom. They are also learning about social studies, science, art and much more. This is not what they work on for the whole school year. This is just what they HAVE to know before going on. They will learn and be exposed to so much more."
09/2/2009:
"These are all things most children know BEFORE beginning Kindergarten! No wonder my 5 year old is bored and upset and unhappy!"
09/1/2009:
"I find it obsurd that's all my daughter should know by the end of K. She knew this stuff PRIOR TO PRE-K!"
08/27/2009:
"This seems like what Kindergarteners should know going into Kindergarten! It's going to be a long year for my K if this is the expectations. I wonder what the expectations are in other industrialized nations?"
08/13/2009:
"the basic colors should be taught based on primary and secondary colors, red, blue, yellow-primary, purple, green, orange- secondary, with white, brown and black as nuetrals, adding black shades a color, adding white tints a color making it lighter. Pink is not a basic color it is a tint of red. I am a color expert. Kids should be taught about color properly. They should be taught about the prism, etc. Kids love to learn about color and pick it up easily it is science. "
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