Abstract
The past decade has seen an unprecedented focus on kindergarten readiness aimed at ensuring that children have a successful transition into formal schooling. Most of the documented transition practices have focused on generalized top-down communication from the kindergarten teacher to the family and have excluded any input from the preschool teacher (Pianta Cox, Taylor & Early, 1999). The preschool teacher is an under-utilized transition agent who has valuable information regarding the child’s growth and skills that could be used to advance communication and inform instruction so the elementary school is truly ready for the child. The purpose of this project is to develop a tool that can facilitate preschool-to-kindergarten communication and improve kindergarten transition planning. Meeting notes from the Folsom-Cordova Community Kindergarten Collaborative provided the impetus and informed the format for the Preschool to Kindergarten Student Profile (PKSP). The design is based on the California State Preschool Foundations for Social-Emotional Development (2008), the five key developmental domains identified by the National Educational Goals Panel (Murphey & Burns, 2002), social-emotional measures recommended by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (2002) and Pianta’s (2001) norm referenced Student-Teacher Relationship Scale. This project has the potential to expand the awareness of both preschool and kindergarten teachers regarding the importance social-emotional development as a key factor that affects how children transition into new environments. The PKSP provides salient information so kindergarten teachers can create individualized transition plans that can not only create continuity for children as they move from the preschool to elementary environment but also can set the direction for children’s future academic trajectory on a more successful path (Gutman, Sameroff & Cole, 2003; Raver, 2002).