• April 2, 2021

Stop the summer brain drain on your kids

As the school year quickly draws to a close across our country, parents are scrambling to come up with ideas to keep their children busy. There are day camps, weekly camps, sports camps, and countless special interest camps to fill the summer hours.

But what happens to all the information your children spent learning during the last school year? Many studies have shown that about a month or two of academic performance is lost during the summer months. The term educators use to refer to this fact is learning loss. Some call it the summer brain drain.

According to a May 5, 2010 press release in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, research shows that students retain 8 months of information from a typical 9-month school year. For math and spelling, they lose 2.6 months and retain only about two-thirds of the information learned.

Even First Lady Michelle Obama is engaging in learning loss when she said: “We also know that during the summer, when our children take a break from school, many of them experience what they call summer learning loss. And many children sometimes find that they forget some of the things they learned throughout the school years, and as a result, if they stop learning over the summer, they can be left behind and struggle throughout the year. “

The brain needs to exercise as much as our body. If an athlete took a two to three month break from training, it would come as no surprise to anyone if their athletic abilities were poor.

Here are some suggestions to help sharpen your children’s minds so that you can help prevent summer learning loss, also known as summer brain drain:

Reading: Summer reading will help your child develop reading and comprehension skills. Take the whole family to the local library. Most libraries have a summer reading program ranging from toddlers to teens, where students can set individual goals and earn books. While you’re in the library, grab a book or two for yourself and lead by example.

Explore your local area: Visit the nearest zoo, museums, historical sites, and botanical gardens. As you walk through the exhibits, point out fun and interesting facts. Some historical visits will help keep the story real when you read about the events at the school. Make learning fun.

Math: The numbers are over. There are many ways to practice math without making it seem like too much work. The next time your child asks you how long it will take to get to a certain place, ask him to find out. By giving them the distance to your destination and the average speed you are traveling, you can have them determine how long it will take. When you fill up on gasoline, they can calculate how many gallons it will take. This helps bring math to life. Make the math real. When mathematics is real, they will see the need to learn it. For young children, parents can teach them to count objects. Just taking your kids to the store can be an opportunity to learn more math skills. By asking your children simple questions, you will help them develop those skills to master story problems. The math opportunities are endless.

Daily: Keep a summer family journal. Leave a piece of paper where everyone can write. That includes you. Have your children write something they liked about the day or what they did. Make sure they write at least one or two items a day. By doing this, you can observe their spelling and, if older, the structure of their sentences. When he comes across a misspelled word, help him pronounce and correct it. Make it fun, don’t be picky. They will not only practice their writing skills, but you will also have a great memory of the summer.

Cook up some fun: There are many lessons to be learned from supervised cooking. You will help your child learn to follow directions by giving them a recipe. With your help, let them plan a meal, do the shopping, and once home, let them measure. The recipes are full of numbers and many have fractions. Cooking gives your child reading and math practice; along with learning to interpret instructions.

It doesn’t take a lot of boring workbooks to keep skills sharp during the summer months. A little creativity in finding daily opportunities will make learning fun and keep you interested. By integrating these opportunities into your daily life, you are developing self-confident and independent children. These are lifelong skills that they will use into adulthood. It is a gift of love for life.

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