Preschool is a beautiful age for children to absorb and learn from everything around them and establish a strong foundation for their future. What we tell them and what they see while at this age is what we will see from them for the rest of their life. Here are the things that are critical for us to do as parents or caregivers:
- Be a role model. Don’t say to the child that they should not yell or scream when you scream at them to stop! This won’t go a long way in changing that behavior. You teach them anger management by role modelling to them how you behave when you are angry. I told my daughter once not to yell & she asked me with those innocent eyes – “Why mom- you yell when you are angry at us”. That was an eye opener for me.
- Expose your children to a variety of things. It is important for you to expose your child to different musical instruments, different dance forms, different places and different ways of thinking to enable them to learn and think differently. This allows them to figure out what they enjoy & don’t enjoy as they get older. I tried to expose my children to as much as I could & now when they are in grade school they enjoy dance, music, singing, sports etc.
- Choose the right preschool program. A preschool or kindergarten program does not need to be all about academics or just about play. Choose a program that incorporates music, dance and academics and anything else that will enable your child to develop a well-rounded personality. It is hard to find a good preschool program but there are a few out there like the SimplySmart child care program that incorporate dance, music and yoga into the curriculum and have French as a part of their curriculum as well.
- Engage in sports and an active lifestyle with your little one. As much as you might think that your little one is tired, they are as strong as we let them be. If we engage in sports, playing outdoors and different physical activities with our preschoolers and kindergarteners we are making them more active and stronger everyday which will enable them to lead healthier lives as they grow up.
All of us as parents and caregivers have very hectic lives between work and children and home. It does get hard to schedule in everything in a week. But if we try to even play soccer with our children in the backyard or slide down a snow slope with them in the winter, we still are encouraging them to play and be active and try out different things without making it too stressful for us…