Kindergarten Readiness

Surprisingly, there are lots of things that kids can learn from hockey that will promote kindergarten readiness. So far, there’s been blogs on learning numbers, colors, shapes, and opposites. Plus, 2 more with a simple science experiment and language development. With the Stanley Cup series tied at 2 games each, I’ll risk doing a blog post on the emotional lesson of winning and losing.

For little ones, parents and other caregivers try to make learning about winning and losing less hurtful. After all, it can be very painful even for grownups. We can’t shield kids from it all the time, and it wouldn’t be healthy for them on an emotional level, either. Sometimes, baby sister gets the cuddle or big brother gets an ice cream treat. Having some experience coping with things not always being equal really helps for readiness for kindergarten. There are lots more kids than teachers in a classroom and not every child can be first in line, or gets a turn that day with the big music drum. Sigh, it’s hard to learn but seeing grownups dealing with winning and losing appropriately can help kids learn this, too.

Sure enough, I had another suggestion for things kids can learn from hockey. Opposites! That idea is pretty obvious. Here are a few: cold-hot, up-down, in-out, win-lose, behind-in front, happy-sad, black-white, big-little, go-stop, and I’m sure there are more.  

Opposites are not easy to get right, but they are an important language and thinking skill. Some of them are easy to learn, such as hot and cold, and some are much harder, for instance little and big. A hockey puck is little and a hockey goalie net is big. Or is it? That same net looks pretty small in a big arena. Opposite words can be tricky and confusing. Lots of practice and repetition is needed to figure out opposites, but that helps with readiness for kindergarten. (This book Hockey Opposites is written by PerHenrick Gurth.)

Kindergarten readiness evaluations vary a great deal, but generally, kids will be able to correctly name simple opposites: cold and  ___, or up and ____.  Since kids learn best when they are interested, if hockey appeals to them, by all means let the fun of hockey help them learn. Onto Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Finals. Go, hockey, go.

After yesterday’s Stanley Cup Finals game, I’ll just blog about something neutral: shapes. Hockey has lots of examples to help kids learn about shapes. Pucks are round like circles. There are circles on the ice, too. Some people have flags on their cars. These are a triangle shape. Tickets are shaped like a rectangle. The scoreboard has rectangles and squares.

During breaks, you and your child can play I Spy with colors or shapes. Looking for details is good practice for kindergarten readiness. Sometimes kids are better at this than adults! It’s great fun to play I Spy in an arena. There’s so many choices of different kinds of shapes.

Ask your child about his/her favorite shape. Talk about the number of sides and points. (Sorry, I don’t mean score points but pointy corners on the shapes.) Hockey can help get in shape for kindergarten.