Helpful Tips for Parents

• Choose toys that grow with the child: open-ended materials (blocks, clay, art supplies) remain valuable for years; single-use toys with one correct answer produce brief engagement.

• Sleep is educational. Memory consolidation — the process of moving learning from short-term to long-term memory — happens during sleep. Well-rested children learn more effectively.

• Model learning yourself. A parent who reads books, asks questions, visits museums, and says "I don't know, let's find out" teaches learning as a lifestyle, not a chore.

• Learning is most durable when it's embedded in play. Don't pull children away from play to "do learning" — find the learning inside the play they're already doing.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I support a gifted preschooler who seems to need more than peers?

Gifted preschoolers benefit from depth rather than acceleration — instead of teaching next-year's content, provide deeper engagement with current concepts. A preschooler fascinated by numbers doesn't need grade-school arithmetic; they benefit from mathematical puzzles, spatial reasoning challenges, and mathematical exploration at their own depth. Social-emotional support is equally important: gifted preschoolers often have asynchronous development (advanced intellectually but emotionally typical for their age) and need appropriate peer interaction alongside intellectual challenge.

Related reading: See also our read-aloud guide and our kindergarten readiness guide for more ideas on this topic.

🎓 Skills Your Child Will Develop

• 🧠 Memory & Recall — Remembering rules, retelling a story in sequence, and practicing skills to automaticity builds working memory and long-term recall — the cognitive foundation that learning in every subject depends on.
• ⚡ Executive Function — Planning, sequencing steps, holding rules in mind while acting, and stopping a prepotent response all build executive function — the cluster of cognitive skills most strongly predictive of long-term academic and life success.
• 🤔 Critical Thinking — Being asked "why do you think that?" and forming and defending an answer develops the analytical reasoning children need for reading comprehension, mathematics, and evidence-based argumentation.
• ✏️ Pre-Writing Development — Drawing, tracing, and early mark-making develop the fine motor control and visual-motor integration that handwriting requires — making every drawing activity a contribution to writing readiness.

1. Spread out while you are working on arts and crafts projects with preschoolers. Give each preschooler plenty of space to work so they do not bump into their friends and cause arguments. It is easy for preschoolers to get upset if they are disturbed while they are working on a special project. If you do not have room to spread out, consider having preschoolers work in shifts. Have half of your preschool class work on the art project while the other half of the preschool class participates in center activities or free play.

2. Do as much as you can to prevent messes before they happen. Keep several old sheets on hand for messy projects. Sheets can be spread beneath easels or craft tables to prevent the floors from being damaged. When you are finished with your art project the sheets can be taken outside and any excess craft supplies can be shaken off.

Ask the parents of preschoolers in your program to send in their old newspapers to be used for arts and crafts activities. Newspaper can be spread over the craft table or on the ground outside for messy projects.

3. Have a paint smock for every preschooler in the class. Paint smocks can be made or purchased and they will help protect preschoolers clothing. Old button -shirts work well as a paint smock for preschoolers. Regular shirts need to be pulled over a preschoolers head when they are done painting and this can smear paint that is on the shirt on a preschoolers face or hair. Button-up shirts are easy to take on and off even if they are messy and they provide excellent coverage to protect a preschoolers clothing.

Even with a paint smock on, there is the possibility that preschoolers will get some paint on their clothing while they are working on an art project. Be sure and use washable, non-toxic pain in all of your painting projects with preschoolers and let the parents know that their preschooler will be painting while they are at preschool and they need to come wearing play clothes.

4. Make your art materials preschooler friendly. If the preschoolers in your class are having trouble using a glue bottle or use excessive amounts of glue in their projects, pour some glue on a paper plate and have preschoolers use q-tips to apply the glue to their art project.

Fill paper plates with small amounts of paint for preschoolers to use so preschoolers will not become frustrated if paint colors mix together.

5. Enjoy the process and have fun. Arts and crafts projects with preschoolers are not about the end result. They are about the process and the things that preschoolers learn along the way. Do not get hung up on what the end result is supposed to look like. Allow preschoolers to be creative and experiment with art materials in their own way.

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