Because the formative, pre-school years – three and four years – are when feelings of self, God and others begin to formulate, they need to be treated with the utmost care.
An experimental age, children of pre-school years often want to feel (taste, smell, touch and hear) things for themselves and begin to show curiosity towards learning new things.
They learn through personal experience or through their playing activities.
Because pre-school years are the foundation of the child’s emotional and spiritual development, parenting a pre-school child is both exciting and challenging for most parents.
It is an excellent opening to build a better foundation for the kid’s life. The pre-school years – the first five years of life – are highly significant, as the things that children learn and feel during these years can have an impact on their rest of their lives.
Like all of us, pre-schoolers have specific needs. As a parent, you need to know their needs and find ways to fulfill them. Remember, the greater your understanding of pre-schoolers, the more effective the ministering will be.
Needs of Pre-school Children
Love and Care
These most essential needs of pre-school children are met by loving parents when they express kindness and patience, and give them support in things they find difficult to do on their own. In essence, loving a pre-schooler is giving your child nothing but the best.
Caring is taking responsibility for the child to lead a more positive way of life. Your duty, as a parent, is to understand your pre-schooler enough, recognize what is best and willingly and unselfishly implement ways to meet their needs.
Good Behaviour
A basic need for children of all ages, because temperament of children is on high gear during pre-school years. In order to understand their behavior, stay close to your child, spend time together, understand the child’s behavior and try to promote good behavior by example.
Encourage good behaviour in your pre-schooler by reminding them of what is good and bad, expressing your feelings openly about his/her behavior, appreciating and rewarding positive behavior, explaining the consequences of bad behavior, and changing the existing environment. At the same time, try to give your child the freedom of independence.
As an extra check, provide your pre-school [Preschool education] child with a list of good behaviours and ask him/her to assess it regularly. At the end of each day, ask your child how s/he has implemented these things and show appreciation for every accomplishment.
Skills Development
Children in pre-school years love spending time with each other, and parents should allow the child plenty of time for unstructured, imaginative play: this helps the child develop language and communication skills.
Encourage the child to write something using their fingers, as writing is basic and practice is the key. Helping the child to identify the sounds at the beginning of a word is crucial for developing reading skills.
