Whitehead Learning Group
Empowering students to thrive.

Academic Milestones

Curious on ways to help support your elementary school student academically and socially at home? We've curated a list of educational and social benchmarks by grade-level, including strategies to partner with your student during each year's transition.

Pre-K: Educational and Social Benchmarks

Pre-K:

Math: In pre-kindergarten, children ages 3-5 develop a basic understanding of numbers and counting, and connect both to the idea of “how many.” Pre-k math tips work on recognizing, grouping, and comparing objects of different sizes, colors and shapes, and identifying patterns.

Language Development: 

  • Understand and use new words.

  • Expressing ideas and needs. Use language to express a variety of ideas and needs, like telling a story, explaining, or making a request.

  • Complex sentences - Understand and speak in increasingly complex ways; for example, use longer sentences, and understand and ask questions with words like who or what.

  • Conversational skills - Engage in classroom conversations, and use conversational skills like taking turns speaking, and responding to what a friend has to say.

Reading and Writing:

  • Exploring sounds - Explore sounds; for example, detect the beginning and ending sounds of familiar words and names, or listen for words that rhyme.

  • Learning letters - Learn about letters of the alphabet; for example, recognize and name letters, understand that letters are associated with a sound or sounds, and name some of those sounds.

  • Appreciating print - Appreciate print and understand that it carries meaning. Recognize common print, such as familiar signs and logos.

  • Understanding print - Understand the way print works: that it moves from left to right and top to bottom, and that letters are grouped to form words.

  • Enthusiasm for books - Show enthusiasm for books; for example, pretend to read a book, or listen to stories read aloud. Ask and answer questions about a story, or retell information using words, pictures, or movement.

  • How books work - Understand how books work; for example, how to hold a book correctly, turn the pages from front to back, and recognize features such as the title or author.

  • Engage with a variety of texts - Actively engage with a wide variety of rich texts including stories, poems, plays, and informational books read aloud.

  • Exploring writing - Explore writing and recognize that it’s a way of communicating. Experiment with writing tools; use scribbling, shapes, letter-like forms, or letters to represent ideas.

  • Writing letters - Copy, trace, or independently write letters.

Social Development:

  • Connect feelings with words.

  • Validate your child’s feelings.

  • Teach your child that it’s O.K. to ask for help.

  • Talk to your child about perseverance.

Rebekka Whitehead