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Planning the Transition to Kindergarten: Building Connections for Success

Beverly Sweeney, Ph.D.

Kindergarten Transition: Community Perspectives

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Goals for Today

•  Explore a comprehensive model for transition planning

•  Review why transition experiences matter for early childhood development and school success

•  Review current transition planning resources

•  Begin transition planning with a focus on school-school and community-school connections

Introductions

•  In the next few minutes: •  Introduce yourself to the person next to you •  Identify what your role is related to this work •  Share one recent transition you experienced

–  Examples: recent marriage, job change, having children

•  Talk about what challenges you had during this transition and what helped you cope with those challenges

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Transitions Across the Lifespan

•  Becoming a new parent •  Going to (or back to) college

•  Moving to a new town •  Starting a new job

•  Experiencing an empty nest

•  Retirement from a career •  Getting married

How do we cope with these changes?

Elements to Foster Successful Adjustment

•  Information •  Relationships •  Alignment

Successful Adjustment

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How Successfully are Children Entering Kindergarten?

Difficult16%

Some Problems

32%Successful

52%

Rimm-Kaufman, Pianta & Cox, 2000

Setting Changes

0%5%

10%

15%20%25%30%

35%40%

FreeChoice/Centers

Individual Sm Group Wh Group

Pre-KK

LaParo et al., 2009

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School Readiness and Transition: A Child-focused View

Child Child

Pre-K Kindergarten

School Readiness and Transition: When Connections are the Focus

Early Experiences

Child

Peers

Family Community

Teachers

Kindergarten

Child

Peers

Family Community

Teachers

Rimm-Kaufman & Pianta, 2000

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WHY ARE WE CONCERNED ABOUT TRANSITIONS?

Transition Experience Matters

•  In the NCEDL project, more transition activities were associated with all of the following child outcomes at the beginning of kindergarten: –  Greater frustration tolerance

–  Better social skills

–  Fewer conduct problems

–  Fewer learning problems

–  More positive approaches to learning

•  Transition activities were most helpful for children from disadvantaged families.

LoCasale-Crouch et al., 2008

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Effect of Transition Practices

•  Early Childhood Longitudinal Study –  17,212 children, 992 schools

Spring K Academic

Skills = Fall K

Transition Practices

Even more for children from disadvantaged families

Schulting, Malone & Dodge, 2005

HOW DO WE BUILD SUCCESSFUL TRANSITION EXPERIENCES?

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Successful Transition: Guiding Principles

•  It’s a process, not a program

•  Supportive relationships are resources for children

•  Different sets of relationships fit different needs – some are supportive, some informational

•  Connections serve as a bridge for child, family, and school across time and contexts

Transition Connections

• Child-school connections

• Family-school connections

• School-school connections

• Community-school connections

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Transition Tools

RSG HOME RSG VIDEOS RSG PREVIEWS TEAM RSG BUY NOW REGISTER

Welcome to Ready, Set, Go! where you'll find everything youneed to help children and families transition to kindergarten!

Unlike programs that focus on a single event, Ready, Set, Go!provides support at every stage of transition and is appropriate forfamilies, caregivers, and teachers of young children birth throughage five.

Ready, Set, Go! was collaboratively developed by Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, Child Care Resources Inc., and NCDepartment of Public Instruction. Presented in English andSpanish, the series includes 3 DVDs, a bonus music video, and aCD-ROM of resources to customize and print.

Whether you're watching the videos at home, using them with yourprogram or school, or embarking on a community-wide transitioncampaign, you'll find what you need to help every child be his orher own best ready for kindergarten.

Copyright 2008 Child Care Resources Inc. I Privacy I Contact Us

Ready, Set, Go! website by daveparrish.com

Ready Set Go – Kindergarten Transition Videos http://www.readysetk.org/index.html

1 of 1 2/1/12 10:37 AM

Smart Beginnings Transition Tools

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School-School Connections

•  GOAL: To provide children with stable high quality classroom experiences across time

–  Increase consistency for children across contexts through alignment of:

• Routines • Curricula •  Learning standards •  Assessments

School-school Connections

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What is school readiness?

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School to School Example: Early Childhood Professionals Working Together

•  Kindergarten, Head Start, and preschool teachers •  Meet four times a year focusing on aligning experiences for children •  Outcomes:

–  Increased participation in transition opportunities like K camp •  Children, families, and teachers more prepared

–  Increased consistency between settings related to routines and expectations

•  Pre-k teachers felt their knowledge of children and families was valued

•  K teachers felt children more socially and academically prepared –  Increased awareness of the community needs for more spaces for

children •  An additional preschool class is being considered to be added to

the elementary school

Smart Beginnings, 2011

Outcomes of Successful School-School Connections

•  Improved communication between pre-k and kindergarten teachers

•  Increased sharing of resources

•  Facilitation of other connections

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Community-School Connections

•  Goal: To facilitate the transition process within the community

–  Getting the word out

–  Providing resources where they are needed

Community in Action

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Preparing the Community

•  A public service announcement

Preparation for Parents

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grZc0lcliTQ

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Mom: Yes, Susie, you will. Hmm, that’s coming up pretty soon. I wonder if

there’s anything I need to be doing now!

Me: Yes, there is! The first day of school for your child may seem months off,

but school districts are holding kindergarten registration now. Every school

district in (name of county) holds kindergarten registration between February and

April. Registration is necessary to determine classroom and staff placement,

materials, bus schedules, and much more. Through the registration and

screening process, you and your child have the opportunity to become familiar

with school district staff and receive materials to make the transition to

kindergarten easier. To learn more about kindergarten registration, call your

local school district or visit (web address).

#2 Support and grow your child’s love for learning by registering them for

Kindergarten at (school or school district) and get them moving in the right

direction for future success in school and in life! If your child is five years old on

or before (date) then be sure to register your young student at (school name and

address) on (dates). Parents or legal guardians registering their children must bring a few things,

including (list of required documents). For more information call (NAME at

PHONE) or visit (WEBSITE). Kindergarten registration – (NAME at PHONE) or

(WEBSITE).

Creating a PSA is easier than you may think.

Public Service Announcements

You will want to get the

• Name and title of contact • Mailing address • Email address • Fax and phone number • Specific instructions they provide for submitting PSAs (including formats) • Would they also be interested in an electronic version that they could post

on their website?

2. Follow up by email or fax.

After speaking with the public service director, follow up by fax or email with a confirmation that you will be dropping off a tape/DVD of the spots, or emailing the audio files. The personal touch is also important in delivery. Probably 99 percent of PSAs are sent in the mail. If someone walks a PSA into a station, that has to leave a powerful impression. You can also attach a fact sheet that includes some of the language from the PSA.

Sometimes, if a relationship has been established, you don’t even need to send an actual audio file to the media outlets. This is especially helpful if you don’t have the budget or means to record a professional PSA. Just fax or email the actual copy of the PSA (or script) and ask them to produce it in-house and throw it into rotation. When stations produce their own version of a PSA they can add some ownership to the message that they are supporting the cause, which makes it more likely to run during better hours and more often during available unsold slots.

Also, many radio stations put PSA info on an index card that is added into a mix of community announcement index cards that the on-air staff flip through and use for things to talk about before they go from programming into a commercial block. Just be sure they don’t take longer than 60 seconds to recite. Be sure that your written PSA script has a start date and an end date. 4. Follow up again. After a few days, call your media contact again to make sure they’ve had a chance to review the information and ask if they would like any more information or if they have any questions. Example PSAs #1 Child: Look, Mommy – a school bus! I’ll ride one of those when I go to kindergarten, won’t I?

Public Service Announcement (PSA)

What Is a PSA?

Public service announcements are messages aired by radio and television

stations, or printed in written media such as newspapers at no cost to the

sponsors. Typically, they must have a message that is a public service and be

provided by a non-profit organization. Radio PSAs are powerful tools to create

greater awareness because of the number of people who listen to radio while

driving, in the office, working at home, weeding the front yard, etc. PSAs usually

are 10, 15, 30, or 60 seconds.

Possible uses of a public service announcement (PSA)

1. Pitch to your local radio and TV stations

2. Post on your website or favorite from your YouTube page

3. Forward the YouTube link to legislators, school and community leaders

4. Provide the PSA to local school district channels

5. Ask local movie theatres to show at the beginning of family movies or

during family movie nights.

Who Decides What Is Played?

Most stations will have a public service or public affairs director who receives

PSAs, decides which will be used, and when those will be played. The others are

thrown in the garbage. Smaller stations may not have a person with this title, but

you can ask for whoever is in charge of PSAs. It's important to remember that

PSAs are usually scheduled four weeks before they are played. Thus, if you have

a time in mind when you want your spot aired, you should approach the station at

least four weeks before you hope to hear it on air.

Is There a Best Strategy for Placing a PSA?

There is, and it's the personal touch. One should not just seek having their PSA

aired; they should attempt to develop a relationship with the public affairs director

that benefits both parties.

How to pitch the PSAs to local radio, TV stations.

Here are some tips to reach out to local media

1. Make initial call to confirm contact information, formats for spots. Identify

the media outlets that you would like to reach out to with the PSAs. You will want

to get contact information for the

• Program director

• Public service or community affairs department; or

• Public affairs department.

STEPS TO SUCCESS

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Six Steps to Transition Planning

1. Assess your partnership: Who is involved? 2. Identify the goals of the team around transition and

alignment 3. Assess what is happening now 4. Identify data that you have to support these

practices 5.  Plan and Prioritize: Reevaluate goals, choose steps

to take, assign roles, set deadlines, anticipate barriers

6.  Implement and Evaluate

1. Assessing Your Partnership

•  Who is involved?

–  Teachers (pre-k and kindergarten)

–  School leaders (pre-k and kindergarten)

–  Family representative(s)

–  Community leaders

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Assessing Your Partnership: Who is Involved?

–  Teachers from multiple school districts

–  Teachers from multiple pre-k programs

–  School leaders

–  Community representatives (Smart Beginnings and JMU)

2. Identifying the Goals of the Team

•  Choose several goals that fit your program’s needs

•  Examples:

–  Support children being ready for school

–  Help families know more about what they can do at home to help children be ready for school

–  Get community more involved with children

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3. Assessing What is Happening Now

•  Sort what you are currently doing into categories

–  What is fostering child-school connections?

–  What is fostering family-school connections?

–  What is fostering school-school connections?

–  What is fostering community-school connections?

4. Examining Data You Have

•  Is what you are currently doing working? How do you know?

–  Are children adjusting to kindergarten better because their preschool teacher is reading books about kindergarten before they enter?

–  Are more families registering early for kindergarten because of community efforts to disseminate information?

–  Are kindergarten teachers better informed about students because of school-school collaboration?

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5. Planning and Prioritizing

•  What are the next steps to take?

–  Reevaluate goals and formulate new ones

–  Plan steps to address new goals

•  Who is responsible for tasks?

–  Assign roles within the transition team

•  When should tasks be implemented?

–  Set deadlines for tasks and create a timeline

•  Anticipate barriers and make plans to overcome them

6. Implementing and Evaluating

•  Implement the plan you have created

•  Evaluate: Is what you are doing working? How do you know?

–  Examine data on newly implemented practices – do you see changes?

–  Modify practices as needed and define new goals

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For more Information

Contact us at: ncqtl@uw.edu or 877-731-0764

National Center on Quality Teaching and Learning

This document was prepared under Grant #90HC0002 for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Head Start, by the National Center on Quality Teaching and Learning.