Afternoon preschool anyone

[Anonymous]

Let me preface this by saying that I'm no longer in DC and our preschool situation is not competitive--more of a first come first serve.

That said, I goofed and didn't get us enrolled before we went out of town for 3 weeks to finish our move to get the morning session at one of the preschools at the top of our list--but there is space in their afternoon class.

Any thoughts on morning vs. afternoon? This is for a pre-K ages 4 and 5, and my son doesn't take naps anymore, so I'm not to worried about that. It's just a new idea for me and I'm not sure what to think. Do most people do morning because it fits in with the rest of their schedules? I'm thinking afternoon might be nice because more places where I can run errands will be open, roads won't be so frozen in the afternoons in winter, and it will probably mean a smaller class size. I don't have any other kids (TTC) so don't have to worry about other schedules.

Just looking for opinions, thanks!

[Anonymous]

If your child doesn't take a nap, it sounds fine. It will actually be nice: your mornings will be more relaxed because you won't have to rush out the door, and you'll have time with your son when most children are at their best.

[Anonymous]

I would do it - I am not a great morning person - so I think I would love to not have the stress of getting out the door on-time. You can always take a swimming class or something with him in the AM and then head to school. I think you will be fine.

[Anonymous]

I find that the afternoon sessions are not as meaty... meaning that most of the activities are in the morning, and afternoons are more laid back (fewer things going on) and of course there is nap time where the other kids are sleeping and your child would be sitting quietly on his cot. For pre-k, and getting ready for K you might want something more rigorous... just my thoughts

[Anonymous]

My DD is in afternoon preschool and is doing fine. She falls asleep on the way home from school occassionally if she didn't sleep well the night before. Its a little harder to juggle classes, since many places don't consider afternoon preschools when scheduling and sometimes don't offer classes in the morning, but really its been fine. If she was in the morning class, she'd have to be there by 8 each day, so that would've been a problem too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I find that the afternoon sessions are not as meaty... meaning that most of the activities are in the morning, and afternoons are more laid back (fewer things going on) and of course there is nap time where the other kids are sleeping and your child would be sitting quietly on his cot. For pre-k, and getting ready for K you might want something more rigorous... just my thoughts

I think OP was talking about distinct morning and afternoon sessions. Locally, I know NCRC and St Columba's and probably other schools offer such options. In these cases, I don't think there's any difference between the activities in the two sessions. Certainly there's no nap time in the afternoon.

[Anonymous]

OP here--it is a distinct afternoon class-same activities as in the morning, just a different group of kiddos. It's a Catholic preschool, with a teacher and an aide for 10-12 kids. I talked to them today and we're going to stop by the PM preschool tomorrow to see it in action (went to a Sunday open house a few weeks ago). Currently there are only 4 kids FT in the afternoon preschool class, so we may start after Easter and see how it goes, but I'm thinking we'll like the PM pre-K, there are plenty of other activities around here in the morning and on the days we're not in class.

[Anonymous]

I have a baby at home so it doesn't work for me, but otherwise I would certainly consider it.

[Anonymous]

I did it with both kids and loved it. Some mornings we took a class, or went to the park, or had a play date. After that we'd have lunch and go to school. When my older one was in school, the younger one napped and I had a couple of hours to myself each afternoon. After school we'd hang around the school's playground and then go home for dinner. A very relaxing schedule in my opinion.

Drawbacks, if your child is still napping it's an adjustment the first month or so. We found with our second that she just started going to bed earlier and skipping her nap so both kids went to bed at 7:30 each night.

Also, some ballet, gymnastics, and other such programs for ages 4 and up generally offer afternoon classes as most kids are in AM or full day school at that age. So, we had to search a bit more and sometimes organized our own classes at these places in the AM time slots and filled it with kids in our class.

I highly recommend PM preschool!