Preschool hours

[MrsC]

How long/how many days do your kids spend at preschool?
C's preschool is part of the Catholic school here so his days are a little longer than most in our area. Right now, he goes 3 days a week from 8:30 to 11:00. He's in the 3 year class but he is one of the oldest with an early October birthday.
In August he will start PreK and the options are 5 days or 3 days from 8:30 to 2:30. I signed him up for 3 days and everyone is acting like it's super long because most PreK classes here are 4 half days. I think this is because most public schools around here still have a half day kindergarten. In comparison, C's school, which he'll stay at through middle school, has 5 full days of kindergarten. I think he's ready for a longer day and will do fine in PreK.
I'm just curious at to what other experiences are since I know the whole preschool thing varies greatly by region.

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[civilspouse]

That doesn't seem unreasonable. DD is 4 and goes 3 days a week from 9-12. Next year we are planning on kinder which is full day here.


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[houseelf]

By the time #3 rolled around, I chose a preschool based on equal amounts of child's needs and my needs. I drove him out of our beautiful little bubble with 3 highly acclaimed preschools because I needed more time than 2 hours and 45 minutes. I chose a flexible Montessori school where he went 5.5 hours a day two days a week for his first year. I could take care of myself with appointments and/or spend time doing older kid stuff. By the third year, he went three 5.5 hour days to school.

I only give you this information because my BTDT mom self recognizes that preschool needs to fit the needs of the family, not just the child.

[SoonerTexan]

2-3 days for longer periods of time seems to be the norm here. Honestly, I prefer it because drop offs and pickups suck up a lot of time and 9-12 isn't very long. Plus we can do other stuff on the off days. The 12-2 portion is mostly made up of a 2nd recess and a rest time, which is pretty much what we would be doing at home with them.

Here it is: (all 9-2)
18-24 months-- 1 or 2 days
2 year olds--2 days
3 year olds-- 2 or 3 days
4 year olds--3 days

There is an option for 12-18 months that is 1 or 2 days from 9-12, but it wasn't worth it for me. I started my oldest at 4, 2nd at 2, 3rd at 18 months. See a pattern?

FWIW, full day kinder is also the norm here. My daughters day is from 7:40-3, which I do think is too long.

[OrionGrad]

DS2 (3 years old) goes 3 days/week from 8-2ish. His actual preschool day is 8:30-12:30, but I pay for the longer day so I can pick him and DS1 up at the same time. I was worried about the long days at first, but it’s been fine. He still naps when we get home, usually from 2:30 to 4. The he’s in bed around 7.

[alotofyarn]

Mine are full time, but the school's hours are from 8-3ish (drop-off is from 7:30-8, and pick-up is from 2:45-3:30). We do 5 days/week, and I drop them off around 7:30-7:45 and pick them up from after care by 4. There are a lot of kids who do 2 or 3 days a week though and don't use before or after care.

[Phoebe]

Where we used to live, preschool was 9 to 1 or 9-2:30. We went to the longer day school. Preschoolers went two days and Pre-K went three days. In IN, kindergarten is full-day. Preschool in our current town ran 9-11:30 two days a week for 3 year olds and three days for pre-K. I sent my daughter to extended care one day a week because 2.5 hrs is ridiculous in my opinion.


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[TulipsAndSunscreen]

I’m so interested by all these preschools with longer hours. In NC, the norm is 9-12 or 9-1. But same with 2-3 days for kids up to age 3 or 4 and then more after that.


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[L.Jane]

E is in the threes class and he does Tuesday through Friday 9-12 with the option of going all five days and I can sign up for early and late care. Next year he will go all five days in the preK 9-1:30 with the option of early and late care. Then kindergartens here are all full day now.

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[Auspicious]

Our first, church-basement preschool was 9-12 and we chose MWF.

Then our most favoritest teacher left to start a small preschool in her home and set the hours 8:30-12:30 and we followed her and chose MWF again. She said she always wished for an extra hour at the other place to get the things done with the kids that she wanted to do.

Kinder here is regular elementary school day, 8:00-2:45 M-F.


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[MrsC]

Just revisiting this. It's very interesting, the variation in length of time at preschool.
I've been thinking about sending R for a couple of days this fall. He turns 2 in August. But all the programs for 2 to 3 year olds are 2 hours long. By the time I got home, I'd have to pick him up again!

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[JDAZ11]

You will, but honestly, you won’t have a mess at home to clean up. I hate getting messy art supplies out because it takes some time to clean them up, and while I’m doing that - craziness. Absolute craziness. You won’t have to feel badly if you don’t schedule enough play dates. Things like the little gym and all those classes really add up, so I was happy to just send them to school. (But I think I was also pretty excited about not having to stay! Lol I hate that stuff, and with two, it’s awful).

I felt the same way last year (but at least mine was 3hrs). It’s too short, but nap wise, it’s not a bad start. Three hours was hard for my kids (August bday also) at first. Lots of falling asleep in the car 🤬. They started giving us options to have the kids stay longer as the year progressed. 30 extra min for lunch. And then once they are potty trained they can stay for little “enrichment” activities. Mine still can’t do that nap wise.

They were also so helpful with potty training!!!

How have you been feeling? One huge negative is that your morning is totally shot on those days unless you have a sitter you trust to drive them. So no doctors appointments etc. that’s been kind of hard for me. But it’s sort of worked itself out.


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[TulipsAndSunscreen]

Just revisiting this. It's very interesting, the variation in length of time at preschool.
I've been thinking about sending R for a couple of days this fall. He turns 2 in August. But all the programs for 2 to 3 year olds are 2 hours long. By the time I got home, I'd have to pick him up again!

You don't go home. You plan to grocery shop or do other errands that morning. Even if you just make calls from your car.
You find a walking/running route or a nearby yoga/barre/underwater basket weaving class and do that instead.
You go to a coffee shop

I mean this is all theoretical because I've never had a drop-off where I wasn't working at least PT but that's what I would do. But I'm the queen of stacking errands and planning everything out with the fewest/shortest trips. It's like a game to me...

[MrsC]

You will, but honestly, you won’t have a mess at home to clean up. I hate getting messy art supplies out because it takes some time to clean them up, and while I’m doing that - craziness. Absolute craziness. You won’t have to feel badly if you don’t schedule enough play dates. Things like the little gym and all those classes really add up, so I was happy to just send them to school. (But I think I was also pretty excited about not having to stay! Lol I hate that stuff, and with two, it’s awful).

I felt the same way last year (but at least mine was 3hrs). It’s too short, but nap wise, it’s not a bad start. Three hours was hard for my kids (August bday also) at first. Lots of falling asleep in the car 🤬. They started giving us options to have the kids stay longer as the year progressed. 30 extra min for lunch. And then once they are potty trained they can stay for little “enrichment” activities. Mine still can’t do that nap wise.

They were also so helpful with potty training!!!

How have you been feeling? One huge negative is that your morning is totally shot on those days unless you have a sitter you trust to drive them. So no doctors appointments etc. that’s been kind of hard for me. But it’s sort of worked itself out.


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Oh yes, I'm over the Mommy and me stuff haha! I can only imagine bringing two 😮 oh I wish they had something like that here, where you can add on time. It's 2 hours of preschool or daycare if you want longer before age 3. Although I think 2 would be enough for his age.
Good point about appointments etc. I've had a rough week so maybe after Monday we'll have a better idea of what I'm dealing with. There's also C's school. I probably won't find out what days he's going until late summer 🙄

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[MrsC]

You don't go home. You plan to grocery shop or do other errands that morning. Even if you just make calls from your car.
You find a walking/running route or a nearby yoga/barre/underwater basket weaving class and do that instead.
You go to a coffee shop

I mean this is all theoretical because I've never had a drop-off where I wasn't working at least PT but that's what I would do. But I'm the queen of stacking errands and planning everything out with the fewest/shortest trips. It's like a game to me...

You're right. I had this idea of going home and getting stuff done there but that's not realistic.
I used to study in my car while R napped in his car seat between C's drop-off and R's play and Learn class haha.
It never crossed myind to do something for myself 😲

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