i opened my kid's backpack after school today expecting to see their folder or maybe a note from the teacher. instead i pulled out three random playground rocks, a dried up glue stick cap, eight crumpled paper scraps with one crayon line on each, and a completely untouched lunchbox.

i spent twenty minutes sitting on the living room floor sifting through actual pocket debris while my kid gave me a super intense 15 minute breakdown of kindergarten recess drama. apparently someone used the green bucket during sandbox time and it completely ruined the entire afternoon.

My daughter has been ROUGH the past 5 days. I know she had a little cold, so I kept her home on Friday. Friday-Sunday was awful. She might have been sick, but she had SO much energy, she was cranky, and aggressive. Monday and Tuesday her teacher left notes that she's been aggressive at school and not focusing or listening.

Today was a struggle. We all had a hard time waking up today- it was a little later than normal (time change, you know lol). I had a firm, no TV in the morning rule, but she's actually been great about listening and turning it off when she needs to, so we let her watch now in the morning. Today she didn't want to listen- didn't want to eat, get dressed, let me do her hair... the whole morning was a battle. She got super cranky because she couldn't take her seatbelt off- like rageful. Then when the teacher opened the door for her to come out of the car, I watched her put her backpack on and go running to the playground. She looked so sweet and innocent. I teared up. It made me question everything- like the previous 20 minutes... is home 'chaotic'? Do I need to be more gentle? Is there something I'm doing wrong? Is this a normal parent feeling?

What toys are your 5-6 year olds really into?

My 5yo doesn't play with toys much but likes flipping through books, listening to the Yoto player, and kicking or throwing a soccer ball. She has never been into toys and I think she may be on the spectrum.

Just trying to get a feel for what most kids this age are into, and if your kid is Neurodivergent, let me know if you have any suggestions for toys as Christmas is approaching!

Not specifically kindergarten related per se but My sweet kiddo turned 5 a few months ago. All of a sudden it’s like a switch flipped and there has been back talking nonstop and arguing about everything. It’s driving me crazy! Has anyone been dealing with this at 5?

The second my kid gets home from kindergarten, the stories begin. Apparently, someone had a different lunch, someone said something funny, and there was a whole situation involving a pencil that I still don't fully understand. I'll be halfway through making dinner and get hit with another 10-minute recap. I love that they want to tell me everything, so I try to listen even when the story takes several unexpected turns.

I'm curious how other parents handle this stage. Do your kids tell you every little detail as soon as they get home, or do you have to ask a hundred questions to get anything out of them? What kinds of stories do your kindergarteners tell you that you secretly hope they'll keep sharing even when they're older?

Coming to Reddit because I’m not sure where else to go and there’s probably others with shared experiences here.

My 5yo son (6 in Dec) started kindergarten this fall. He’s been in daycare since he was 3 months old so he’s used to leaving home for the day and being in a teaching / learning environment with others his age.

For some reason he is having a really hard time adjusting to kindergarten. He argues and yells at the teacher, throws things, says nasty things to his teacher and other kids. Just this week he said he was “going to destroy the school” and also dragged his finger across his throat directed at another kid when they asked him to stop talking in line.

We’ve talked to him, limited and now removed screen time, and changed his bedtime routine so he gets more sleep. We’ve discussed consequences and had to cancel his attendance to things like birthday parties and damn near close to cancelling trick or treating at this rate.

We have also seen the pediatrician as well for recommendations. They suggested art therapy for his age but the only facility around that does that is full and not able to take more at the time.

My husband and I are at a total loss on what to do at this point. Our son knows he’s behaving badly but faced with the situations in real time all he does is react and say and do these nasty things.

Any advice and experience you have is appreciated. This is such a hard thing to navigate.

i stopped by the school today to check the lost and found for a jacket my kid left behind earlier this week.

i spent ten minutes looking through the rack hoping to spot ours. didn't end up finding the one from tuesday, but i somehow stumbled across a fleece sweater my kid lost back in september that i had totally given up on. my kid was super hyped to get their old sweater back, even though the jacket we actually went for is still floating around somewhere.

the lost and found bin truly works in mysterious ways.

My kindergartener has not been eating food that he used to eat. Lunchboxes are often a sad sight to see in the afternoon when he gets home. He said he does not have time to eat but they get an hour of break.

We have a pretty good rotation I would think but now my husband and I are at a loss. He also recently stopped eating ketchup which he absolutely used to love.

Anyone who has had a similar experience? Tia

My 6 year old son started kindergarten this year. The beginning of the year was great with no issues to report. He was doing great academically and seemed to be doing well socially. He was excited about school and thoroughly enjoyed going.

A couple weeks ago he and another boy made a poor choice and said some unkind things to another student at recess. Following this incident, he met with the principal, I was called, and he received a lunch detention. He was also grounded at home with no TV. He is now experiencing crippling anxiety surrounding school and getting in trouble. His teacher called me last week and said he is now crying multiple times a day and is constantly asking if he's in trouble or if she is going to call his mom. She said he no longer plays at recess. Instead, he sits on the bench or stands by the recess monitor. When I asked him about this he said that he wants to play but is just too scared of getting in trouble.

We had parent/teacher conferences this past week and the recess monitor/PE teacher attended as well. She said that one day last week she finally got him to go play. He found a group of kids to play with and they were standing on a bench on the playground when an aide came over and yelled at them. My son shut down again and has refused to play since. He just has an overwhelming fear of getting in trouble now. Other kids can take it in stride, and mine used to too, but everything has changed since the day he had to talk to the principal. He has a twin brother who is in a different class, but is still at recess at the same time. My son's teacher said his twin brother is now growing worried about his brother at recess. It should also be noted that his teacher reported that she does have an extremely rough class this year with a lot of behaviors, but my son isn't typically one of them.

He also now has separation anxiety that he never had before. He asks me to sleep with him each night and he tells his teacher that he misses me throughout the day. We are planning to start seeing the school counselor, but I just don't know how to get him past this. On weekends and evenings he is completely fine, but when Monday rolls around he is back to crying and shaking before school. We assure him that he's safe and I will pick him up right after school.

I just don't know where to go from here. Should we seek outside therapy? Should I be doing something different? Is there something his teacher can try? I've lost so much sleep over this and need help.

My 5 year old go to a private Montessori school in a MCOL area, a big college town, many of her friends' parents teach at the college, not sure how relevant this is. I am constantly hearing about how well she is dressed. For example, she found her shirt from lost and found bin and the teacher said: oh you always have the best outfits. And when I pick her up at aftercare, more than once her teach would say: I always tell her how much I love her outfits. Other parents have also said my girl always dress so well when I meet them like at a b-day party.

I do not buy her expensive outfits, usually between $10-$15 range, but they are from South Korea so maybe her clothes appears cuter? Am I overreacting on all the compliments and worrying that she will be too focused on the way she look? I am not sure how often the teachers will compliment other kids at school. But I just feel like this comes up a LOT.

I am also not a spotlight person, could that be the reason that I am not super comfortable with these comments?

Hope to hear from other parents' view. Thank you for reading!

Hi! My son will be unenrolling and then enrolling to our new district on December 1st. Their calendar in his current district has a week off for Thanksgiving, then 2 weeks off mid December through early January.

What’s the least chaotic way I can get him back on track for school? I was wondering if academically, the pressure is low around this time of the year with the holidays. I’m not sure if he should do the 2.5 weeks at the new school then the break. Or if it’s better to start after the breaks? This is my first kid and I’m open to any suggestions! I want to do what’s best. I definitely feel a little lost and want a plan before I touch base with his school this week.

Thank you in advance!

My son has been having issues all school year (and honestly, also in the 3s and pre-K classrooms in his preschool) with acting out physically - hitting, kicking, knocking over other kids' block towers, butting in line at soccer practice, kicking other kids water bottles and soccer balls away at practice. It happens almost 100% of the time when he is bored - he is very smart, and when he's finished his work, or during transitions, or when he has to wait (like during soccer practice) is when it happens. He absolutely 100% knows it's wrong to behave this way, but even though we have talked about it 1000 times, it hasn't stopped. At school, and at home, we have implemented sticker reward charts for good behavior, have given him a journal to draw in during transition times at school or when he's finished his work, we pull him out of practice until he's ready to behave at soccer, we do time-outs or remove screen time privileges for at-home behaviors (though these don't seem to make a lot of sense to me for at-school behaviors which may have occurred hours earlier).

His older brothers both have ADHD but I have never thought that he does. In fact, he's my only child that can focus intently on projects that he's interested in, and he only does this impulsive behavior if he's bored. It's embarrassing, if I'm being honest, and I worry that he won't have any friends at school if he acts like this. What else should we be doing? Could he still have ADHD? Thank you so much in advance!

My daughter starts K next fall and I am watching other parents in her class already doing phonics at home. She knows some letter names but not sounds. I always assumed kindergarten was where reading instruction started. Now I am wondering if we have already missed a window. Is starting at four useful or will K cover it regardless?

We live in SoCal and we sent our son to day care when he was 20 mos old, the transferred him to an accredited Montessori school in Feb this year. He’s now 3 years and 4 months old and he loves the school. Since CA offers free TK program, I started looking at what kids learn and found out he knows most of the stuff already, such as numbers, colors, shapes, etc.

My son is an observant and has quite an attention span imo (he can play independently up to 1.5 hours, and can be reading books for up to 30 mins ), and he’s already building Legos that are for age 8+ with minimal guidance. I think the Montessori school works really well for him but that also cost over $2300/mo.

Would love to know what do kids learn in public TK and kindergarten that private preschools don’t offer, and is it worth going back to the public route if my son is thriving in his current school?

Ok not really but it sort of feels like it and I’m surprised how upset the whole thing is making me.

So my daughter has a classmate we’ll call Nora and Nora has become fixated on the fact that I’m overweight. Daughter likes to play on the school playground after school and so does Nora so they often play together. Twice now Nora has come over to me while I’m watching them play to literally point at me and tell me I’m “so big” or “huge”. I initially felt like this was just a young child making an observation so I didn’t really react. I mean she’s not wrong, I am big. But then Nora started making these comments to my daughter while they played, just again repeating “your mom is so big” and kind of giggling. These comments started on the playground after school where I was present so I figured Nora was just saying it again because she saw me.

But my daughter has let me know that Nora also brings me up during school when I’m not there. Today my daughter told me that during free time she and Nora drew a story book about me and how big I am and something about a poop storm? My daughter seems to think it’s great and hilarious that her friend wants to talk about and tell stories about me. My daughter is very much a “mama’s girl” and talks about me constantly so I think she’s just happy her friend is also talking about me, but I don’t think she understands that being called huge is not a nice or funny thing and that her friend isn’t talking about me with the same admiration she is.

I’ve had a couple of conversations with my daughter since this started about how it’s not nice to talk about other people’s bodies, and I told her what Nora is saying isn’t funny or kind, but I don’t know how much of our conversations are sticking because I’m not sure daughter understands the concept of being overweight or that it’s seen as a negative. I’ve made it a point to avoid using words like fat or skinny in front of her and we generally just don’t talk about people’s size so she’s pretty naive in that regard.

And I know Nora isn’t being malicious, probably more curious than anything, but it’s been a few weeks now and she hasn’t moved on. Tonight when my daughter showed me the story book she and Nora drew about me I was honestly surprised how upset it made me. I tried not to let my daughter notice but I think she caught on that, at the very least, I don’t find it funny like her, so she started changing her story a bit and then told me it’s actually a story about how much she loves me. Part of what’s so upsetting I think is the fact that my daughter is so amused by Nora’s comments, even though I know she doesn’t really understand.

I’m not sure what I should do from here, if anything. I was hoping it would just go away on its own but that doesn’t seem to be happening. I’m the “room parent” for my daughter’s class and this coming week there’s multiple Halloween in-school events that I will be in the classroom helping out for. I’m assuming Nora will approach me again to tell me I’m huge and I don’t want to be embarrassed in front of my daughter’s teacher or the other parent volunteers. Do I let the teacher know this is happening? Should I try to talk to Nora’s parents? I know who they are and we say hi in passing at pick up and drop off but we’re not super friendly so I feel that would be an uncomfortable conversation. Honestly talking about it at all with another adult seems pretty humiliating but I feel someone needs to have a conversation with Nora to let her know her words are unkind and that she shouldn’t be talking about other people’s bodies.

My son started Kindergarten end of August. I was surprised how well he was doing with the long day. He was completely normal until maybe 2 weeks ago. Every day now is just so rough when he comes home from school. He is constantly just yelling at us and his younger sister, talking back, not listening, hitting his sister, and throwing his body on the floor while having meltdowns. It is so draining. Idk if school finally kicked in or this is something else.

There is also a child in his class that we know acts like this during school time. There is a behavioral counselor with him in the classroom all day. It almost seems like my son is copying this boy’s exact behavior. Will this get better with time ?? I honestly just miss how my son used to be 😔

my kid comes home from kindergarten completely worn out. sometimes they get upset over the smallest things, refuse to do anything, or just want to lie around for the rest of the afternoon. mornings are usually fine, so i think school is just taking a lot out of them. does this get better as they get used to the routine?

I have a 4yo with a May birthday. She is friends with this other girl that turned 5 yesterday, and is well more advanced than my daughter. Language, motor, the way she portrays herself is just more advanced….
I am getting nervous about sending my daughter to K next year, given that she will be compared to girls like her friend and she’s just not there yet.
It’s 8 months difference and it is a lot when it comes to milestones.
How is that fair to “younger” kids go to school with older kids and how can their little brains manage all of this?
Am I overthinking???
My husband said is we were to hold her back, she would be made fun of at school.

Anyone with younger kids could chime in and share their experiences please?

Thanks!

I just received my child's Early Reading Screening results and am trying to make more sense of them. More specifically, what the benchmark numbers mean, and what would be considered a very high score (he is well above the benchmark). Is the benchmark standardized across all TDSB schools or is it specific to his school?

Looking for the perspective of teachers and support staff who work with kindergarteners aged 5-6. First, I'll say my daughter seems to be struggling with anxiety since starting kindergarten, and I have an intake assessment with a child psychologist on Monday.

My daughter just turned 6, is very small for her age (still wears size 4T), and is also outspoken. She has been complaining about the boys in her class not listening when she says to give her space, following her, and coming home with stories of boys pushing or "punching" her in the stomach. Based on her description, these stories don't seem very troubling to her. Except for one boy in particular, I'll call him Tom.

Tom has obvious behavioral problems. Based on my daughter's retelling, she once saw him pull another student's arm, and she intervened. Tom then "licked her neck," and other kids saw. After that, my daughter talked to her teacher and asked to be moved away from Tom. I emailed the teacher to document the situation. Last week, while waiting in line, Tom announced he could pick up my daughter and then squeezed her very hard. I asked my daughter if she told her teacher or if she yelled, and she said she didn't want to tell her teacher.

For background, when my daughter was in preschool, a teacher found another boy putting her hands down her after playing out of sight for a few minutes. I've talked to my daughter about the "stop, walk, and talk" method: tell a bully to stop, walk away, and tell the teacher.

Tom, combined with the other stories about boys, is making me wonder: Is this normal behavior for boys in kindergarten? Or is my daughter being targeted more than usual?

Thanks for any advice or insight.

My son (kindergarten) came home today and pulled his penis up through his waist band to be funny. He had never done that before, so I asked where he learned that (after explaining that isn’t appropriate behavior lalala) . He proceeded to tell me that in his class today, his teacher was absent so it was only the aid. The aid left the room to fill a child’s water bottle. During this time, another boy walked around the classroom with his penis out. When the aid came back in, his penis was still out, and the aid “got really mad at him.” I’m shocked I didn’t receive a message from the school. What would your expectations be here for how this should be handled by the school? I get that 5 year old boys pull their pants down. This happened at our last school and we were notified immediately. But I’m also concerned that the class was left unattended, even for a short amount of time.

Some people on Reddit were talking about this app. It looks like there is a login via the school which I don’t have :/

Can anyone give me a quick synopsis of the kindergarten reading level skills?

I’m familiar with common core standards is it similar to that?

Thanks