Many individuals find change to be unsettling; beginning a new career or relocating to a new house or city may make many adults feel anxious and fearful.
The transition to a new school or grade may also be too much for our young children.
Parents can use a few techniques to assist their kids work through their major emotions and practise some fundamental social-emotional skills before they join school for those kids entering Grade 1 in 2023.
Over the previous two years, the journey building up to the first day of school has been lengthy and uncertain.
Families and children may have lost opportunities to build the social-emotional skills required for school due to changes in our typical routines, according to Mari Payne, director of education and outreach at Sesame Workshop International, South Africa.
The innovative South African children’s programme Takalani Sesame has been educating and entertaining kids for more than 22 years. With television, radio, digital material, community and classroom participation, and support for South Africa’s mother-tongue-based education policy, this programme supports early childhood education.
Because parents are children’s first and most crucial instructors, she says parents can fortunately do a lot to help their children. Payne offers several games and activities parents may do with their kids to help get them ready for the 2023 school year.
Taking turns
When kids first start school, they might not know how to wait patiently for “their time.” With kids, practise taking turns by giving verbal cues like “my turn, your turn” or “first you, then me, now you, now me” and using timers to indicate how long they will have to wait.
You may use a sand timer, a kitchen timer, or a digital timer like one on a phone or tablet.
Sharing is caring
Sharing is a bit different from taking turns and is a crucial school preparation skill. Play together or collaboratively with young children to practise this ability, such as building a block tower together or painting while using the same set of paintbrushes (older children might join you in painting on the same page).
Playing Simon Says (or Elmo Says!) is a terrific approach to give kids practise listening to and following instructions. Whole-Body Listening: Play the game while including each aspect of whole-body listening (“Elmo says… sit criss-cross on the floor, gaze at my face, use calm hands,” etc.). You may also test them by asking them to remain silent throughout a narrative.
Independence
Assist kids in developing self-care skills they may need to do independently in a classroom environment, such as tidying up after themselves, putting on and taking off their own shoes or jackets, or utilising a lunch box.
Payne says that by having kids practise these social-emotional skills before they join school, it can help them be more prepared for the environment and make new situations less intimidating.
Payne writes that a youngster will have a lot of adapting to accomplish and may experience a lot of huge sentiments when the time for “school week” approaches.
The greatest thing to do at this time is to support kids in expressing and comprehending their feelings. “You can provide kids with critical tools in easy, daily ways that will help them handle large feelings, tiny feelings, and every feeling in between,” she advises.
The following tips are offered by Payne during the first few weeks of school:
It might take a lot of work to learn how to control strong emotions. In trying times, the three-step “Breathe, Think, Do” method might be helpful:
- Breathe: Tell kids to take three calm, deep breaths.
- Think: Assist kids in developing some potential solutions to their issues.
- Do: Select a strategy and test it out as a group. Test another if the first doesn’t work.
Introduce the sentence “I just can’t do it yet” to them. To reduce emotions of irritation, remind them that learning something new requires time and practise.
Demonstrate to them that making errors is acceptable and even necessary for learning.
Encourage them to communicate their feelings:
- Encourage kids to express their emotions via art or dance.
- Act out your feelings through play.
- Share your feelings so that they are more inclined to share theirs with you.
Parents will frequently discover that utilising the aforementioned advice for kids will also help them get ready for the big move.
“We recognise these are huge occasions for parents too, so knowing we’ve done everything we can to get our child ready for the next stage gives parents comfort,” says Payne.
The 13th season of Takalani Sesame, which airs on SABC 2 every weekday at 3.30pm, helps children deal with their “Big Feelings.” On Mondays, the episodes are accessible in English, Tuesdays in isiZulu, Wednesdays in Sesotho, Thursdays in isiNdebele, and Fridays in Afrikaans.
