A big concern in any grade level is the refusal or inability for some children to respect authority. For kindergarten students, school may be the first place they have ever been given limits in regard to respecting others and play materials. Some students may need direct teaching on how to respond appropriately to adults, such as saying please and thank you. Other students may also need to be taught to put away their own class materials or toys because they no longer have a parent or caregiver around to pick up their mess. Although it may come as a shock to the students, after a few days or weeks they quickly accomplish this behavioral goal.
On the first day of school, teachers review the classroom/school rules, rewards, and consequences for expected student behavior. The teachers help their students learn the rules by modeling and providing examples. Although most students gain the skills quickly to follow classroom and school rules, some will need frequent reminders of the rules throughout the school year.
Along with learning to follow adult requests and rules, kindergarten students are expected to learn how to transition between activities without throwing a tantrum. The kindergarten teacher's responsibility is to guide the students through the school day through different lessons and activities. For kindergarten students who have never been in preschool or a daycare setting, they may commonly react to transition times in a negative manner. They may pout as they take their time to transition, or completely melt down and tantrum. However, with guidance form the teacher the kindergarten student is expected to master this behavioral goal and transition quickly and easily between activities by the end of the school year.
It is important to keep in mind that kindergarten students are still children. They are inexperienced and have many years to learn all the appropriate social behaviors expected of them. Playing cooperatively with peers their age is an important first step in learning to share and empathize with others. Because kindergarten students have to share materials and toys on a daily basis at school, they are expected to quickly learn to socialize and share in order to master the behavioral goal.