Is part time school harder for kid to adjust?

[Anonymous]

A couple people have mentioned that when starting part time preschool or daycare it’ll take longer for the kid to adjust since it’s not consecutive days. We are thinking of doing Tue/Thurs in the fall for my daughter who will be 2 but should I consider consecutive days? Does that make the transition easier or does it not matter for the kid?

[Anonymous]

Depends on the kid. I've had 2 go through half-day preschool and they were fine with different days. They would just ask if it was a "school day" in the morning sometimes and that would be it.

[Anonymous]

OP - when thinking through this, consider the number of days your child will actually be in school given holidays. My DD attended a Jewish nursery school 3 days/week and there were weeks when she would only attend 1 day because of the various holidays. Perhaps not an issue for the daycare/school you are considering, but I just thought I'd mention it.

[Anonymous]

I think if it matters, it will only be for a short while.

[Anonymous]

Completely depends on the child. Some have more difficulty with transitions and being enrolled in more days helps them get used to school easier. Some are fine. If your daughter is generally easy going and doesn’t require a lot of structure for normal every day life, she will be fine. You can up it to more days at 3 and 4.

—preschool teacher

[Anonymous]

Preschool teacher here. Yes, it takes children longer to adjust to preschool if they attend for fewer days per week. If you think about it, how long it takes a child to have 10 days of school is very different if they go 2 days per week vs 5 days per week. It's not a big problem, though, that they take longer to get settled.

[Anonymous]

Something else to think about is how many consecutive days your child will be out of school per week. If she attends Tue/Thur she'll be out 4 days in a row. If she attend Tues/Wednesday she'll be 5 days in a row. This can also affect how quickly they adjust.

[Anonymous]

Teacher here. In my experience, Tuesday/Thursday kids have the hardest time adjusting. Think of how confusing an on/off schedule would be for a 2 year old. If possible, I would recommend at least going Monday/Wednesday/Friday, although my preference (and the kids who adjust the fastest) is 5 days a week.

[Anonymous]

Totally depends on the child. I have two and one adapts easily and quickly. The other, no.

[Anonymous]

I agree, depends on the child but part-time usually takes a bit more time for children to get use to in my experience. Try to keep the out of school routine consistent.

[Anonymous]

OP,

Not all kids are the same, but for most kids 5 days/week is an easier adjustment than some other arrangement. Also helps if school hours are the same every school day.

[Anonymous]

It was for my toddler. He definitely settled in better to a 5 day a week but shorter day schedule than two longer days. Agree though that for many kids it might not matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - when thinking through this, consider the number of days your child will actually be in school given holidays. My DD attended a Jewish nursery school 3 days/week and there were weeks when she would only attend 1 day because of the various holidays. Perhaps not an issue for the daycare/school you are considering, but I just thought I'd mention it.

curious which Jewish preschool has a 3 day option?