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Summer vacation is here for students and teachers in the Northern Hemisphere, and with it comes more downtime, freedom, time to rest and time to reflect. All of those things are important to a child’s development and, according to the Pathways platform, may even help prepare kids for the next school year.
As a parent, grandparent, teacher, aunt, uncle or someone who has little people in their life, you may be wondering how to make the most out of the summer months and help these kids rest, while at the same time ensuring they don’t forget what they learned during the year or at least don’t regress in a meaningful way. You are not alone! Learn about some of the ideas you can put into practice to have a balanced summer vacation and make the most out of this unique time of year.
Learning opportunities during summer vacation
Learning can take different forms. Not all learning needs to take place in the classroom, for example, learning how to ride a bike doesn’t happen in a classroom, or learning about a specific culture by visiting their country. The summer provides a unique opportunity to learn about things in an informal fashion. For example, as the educational website E-School News suggests, they can go to museums, take walks, visit places, meet new people and just experience life.
According to the Edutopia platform, other things that can be included in a child’s summer repertoire, which are super relevant to parents and teachers as well, are listening to educational and enjoyable podcasts in the car, going to the library and taking out interesting books, and even encouraging them to spend time on interesting blogs and valuable social network platforms online. You can also always go back to the good old fashioned worksheets and encourage doing a few workbook pages from their books or print out some review sheets for them. Little prizes might do wonders to encourage it.
Resting with a purpose
As explained previously, resting is an important and possibly even critical part of the learning process. Interestingly, according to The Natural Nurturer blog, part of the important part of downtime is learning how to be bored. She explains that children are often too busy, with activities taking up almost every minute of their waking hours, especially if they own their own cell phone and have access to it whenever they want. That creates a situation where kids aren’t used to the feeling of boredom, and don’t know what to do with themselves when bored. Rest and downtime allow them to explore those feelings and learn about themselves. It allows for self discovery and serves as a valuable summer learning opportunity.
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