| spontaneity—skills
that will help them become successful adults. The activities that
I will suggest should not be fully controlled—they should
be used as activity prompts. When your child moans, “I’m
bored. There’s nothing to do,” take that as your cue
and suggest one of the following activities.
These activities can be customized according to
your child’s age and interests. The key is to be creative
and have fun.
Continue lessons for music, arts,
and sports to a certain extent. Your child has spent the whole year
going to classes, rehearsals and practices. Won’t he or she
(not to mention you!) need a bit of a break during the summer? Focus
on what your child will enjoy continuing during the summer—don’t
feel like he or she has to keep doing everything. Keeping
up with lessons will provide consistency and a foundation for the
next school year, when they’ll be tackling other challenges.
Use the Web to download age-appropriate worksheets
from Summer
Skills or puzzles from Activity
Village. For preschoolers, websites like Nick
Jr., PBS Kids
and Disney
Playhouse have interactive games, stories and printable activity
sheets as well. Search the web for Soduku puzzles for kids—this
numerical logic game will help enhance your child’s critical
thinking and problem-solving skills. Websites for your child’s
favorite educational television shows usually have fun games and
activities that will engage your child in fun learning.
Visit an arts and crafts store. Arts and crafts
supply stores usually offer inexpensive art kits that will allow
your child to learn how to knit, sew, make jewelry, build model
cars or airplanes, draw or even sculpt. Encourage the artist in
your child to make gifts for friends and family or to make items
to sell at a garage sale. These stores also frequently have activities
for children—just ask for a calendar. Such activities help
younger children strengthen their manual dexterity and see a project
to completion.
Kick the playgroup activities up a notch. Organize
your child’s friends to meet weekly or monthly. Get the other
parents involved and committed to the project and share the responsibility.
Start with age-appropriate summer reading
lists from libraries and schools and start a book group.
Have each child share the books he or she has read, through artwork,
skits or reports. Consider adding a movie night if books have suitable
movie tie-ins. Depending on the age group, there are movies or television
shows for everything from The Berenstain Bears and Clifford
to the Harry Potter series.
Create a money-management activity.
For first to third graders, Pigs will be Pigs: Fun with Math
and Money by Amy Axelrod is an educational book that will aid
your children’s math skills. In the book, the Pigs need to
find money, so they can go out to eat. Readers need to keep tally
of the nickels and dimes they find. This book works well for a group
because children can compare their answers to the questions at the
end of the book and have fun choosing different combinations of
menu items for the Pigs' meal. Another useful book is The Coin
Counting Book by Rozanne Lanczak Willliams. This book has simple
rhymes and large, clear photographs of coin denominations and groupings.
The text begins with an introduction to coins and visual equations.
At the end of the book, the readers are asked to think of the many
ways a dollar can be made (100 pennies, 4 quarters, etc.). Bring
out a large jar of loose change and have the children match and
sort. If the children are a little bit older (five and up), help
them start a lemonade stand—but make sure to supervise. If
your children are in junior high, consider introducing them to the
stock market. Have the children pick stocks to follow in the daily
paper, then ask the children to invest imaginary amounts of money
in the stock of their choosing, keeping daily track of the market.
Don’t underestimate the power of
summer camp. If you are a busy or working parent, you might
not have time to organize activities for your child yourself. Look
for summer camp options in your area, and ask your friends if their
children are involved in and enjoying any particular programs. Want
to keep your children close during the summer? Consider a day camp,
as opposed to a sleep away camp. Think about your children’s
interests when choosing a camp. Is your child particularly interested
in sports or theatre? Look for a camp that focuses on your child’s
preference. Would your child prefer to have a wider variety of activities
from which to choose? Look for a camp that has art and sports programs.
Remember that camps can fill very early, so start looking for programs
for next summer at the beginning of the school year.
Maximize your vacation activities.
Remember the family car trips when we piled into the trunk of a
station wagon and passed masala puris and Ritz crackers
back and forth? Now our kids are strapped into their captain chairs
watching DVD’s and eating organic granola bars. Nonetheless,
vacation still holds the prospect for educational fun!
Consider limiting in-car movie time. After your child is finished
with one movie, have him or her keep a log of cities or famous sites
that you have passed. Give your child a map and small sticky note
flags, and have him or her track of your route and the landmarks
along the way. At home, you can extend this activity into a geography
or history lesson—have your child research the background
of the places you visited.
Create a scrapbook or a travel journal
with illustrations or digital pictures. When I was eleven,
my father asked me to keep a journal on my trip to India. I wrote
down everything I did, the food I ate and the people I met. I actually
made adults quite nervous with my constant note-taking—even
though all I wrote about was ice cream flavors and my cousins! I
still have my book and love knowing my childhood perspective of
that trip.
Is there a family picnic on the calendar?
The children will gladly look for an excuse to step away from the
cheek-pinching aunties for a bug or plant expedition. On your nature
walk, have the children draw any interesting plants or insects that
they see, but teach them to leave nature as they found it! Follow
up with a science lesson at home, perhaps helping the children identify
the insects or plants that they observed. Accompanying the children
on their nature walk has the added benefit of allowing you to escape
as well!
The key to helping your child have an exciting
summer is to see what your child enjoys and where his or her interests
lay. Who knows where a little prodding in the right direction can
lead? The skills that your child can develop during summer play
can be instrumental for their successes later in life; all skills
and interests are valuable and should be encouraged. Like sprinkling
sugar on top of medicine, blend play and learning together. If your
children are having an enjoyable experience, they won’t even
know it’s good for them!
Ashini J. Desai is a software professional,
full-time mother and wife, and a creative writer for various websites,
including her own blogsite, www.ashinid.blogspot.com.
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