The summer holidays are the perfect opportunity to spend some quality time with your child while they’re taking a break from preparatory school. But did you know children can lose up to 40% of what they’ve learned at school during the summer break?
Don’t worry! There are plenty of fun and exciting ways you can help keep your child learning this summer! Here are just some of our suggestions to help your child avoid summer learning loss.
How Much Learning Should My Child Do This Summer?
We’re not suggesting you spend the entire summer in a classroom-type setting and don’t have any fun! Instead, we recommend setting aside perhaps an hour’s worth of fun and replace this hour with educational tasks that can be spread across the entire day in chunks of a few minutes per task.
How much learning you try and encourage your child to do this summer will depend on a couple of factors, namely:
- Your child’s age
- Your child’s stage
- Your child’s willingness to learn
No one knows your child like you do, so you will be best able to gauge when your child has had enough of learning and needs some time to relax. Try sticking to 10-40 minutes per task and make sure you reward your child for a job well done!
How Can I Keep My Child Learning This Summer?
Here are some of our favourite ways to help keep your child learning this summer!
Continue Reading
Not only will continuing your child’s reading be a big help when they return to school this summer, but it can also be a great way to help your child relax and unwind.
Set some reading goals for your child this summer, so they have something to strive towards without pushing them too hard. The recommended amount for your child to read each day is a minimum of 20 minutes, but this will depend on your child’s ability and interest.
If you’re going to the cinema to see a film based on a book, why not sit down with your child and read the book beforehand? Or, you could look into weekly magazine subscriptions to give your child something to read that interests them!
Practising Writing
Reading and writing go hand in hand, so it’s important to make sure you’re also keeping up your child’s writing practice this summer.
A great way to encourage your child to write is by keeping a daily summer journal! Not only will this keep your child writing, but it will also promote thoughtfulness and introspection. Plus, it will be a great little keepsake for years to come!
Some other ways to keep up your child’s writing practice could be:
- Writing postcards to friends and family
- Making a holiday scrapbook
- Handwriting practice
Maths Practice
Understanding maths is an essential skill that helps to support your child’s mental agility.
Keeping up your child’s maths learning doesn’t have to be a drag! Why not try:
- Counting holiday or pocket money: why not give your child their pocket money in a variety of coins and have them count it?
- Card or board games: this is a great way to stimulate your child’s problem-solving while also helping them find maths fun!
- Baking: weighing and measuring of ingredients as well as learning the differences between ounces, kilograms etc.
Speaking and Listening
By encouraging speaking and listening with your child, you can help your child better understand social situations as well as helping to expand their vocabulary.
Try sitting down at the end of each day and talking about what they’ve seen or learned. Make sure you give them your full attention when they’re speaking and encourage them to do the same for you.
If you want to keep things fun, why not try storytelling exercises like ‘what if’ scenarios to really boost your child’s imagination.
Encourage Independence
Another summer holiday means another year gone. We understand that sometimes doing things for your child is easier and more convenient; but, they’re growing up, and the summer holidays are the perfect time to encourage some independence.
Try starting by giving your child one small task to help them understand how to follow instructions, then add a second, and so on.
Some more great ways to encourage independence in young children are:
- Let your child choose: this could be as simple as what they wear that day, which can help your child become more confident in making decisions on their own.
- Let your child help: be it with cooking or tidying, letting your child help out can build confidence in new activities and also help diffuse tantrums.
- Give your child small, manageable chores such as putting away their toys when they’ve finished playing with them.
- Encourage free play: unstructured play is excellent for building creativity and problem-solving in children and also gives you the chance to take a moment for yourself.
Tips For Helping Kids Learn At Home
Here are some of our tips on how to help your kids learn from home this summer.
Make Learning Fun
No matter what the topic is, make sure your ‘lessons’ are as fun and engaging as possible! If you’re practising reading, why not ask your child to act out the line they’ve just read? If you’re working on maths, why not try baking together or have a go at some of these great summer craft ideas!
Educational trips
Everyone needs a break from time to time, and what better way to do that than with a great day out? But that doesn’t mean you have to stop learning.
Why not check out some of our top picks for educational days out in the UK with your child?
The summer holidays might feel like a long time now, but they’ll be over before you know it. We look forward to hearing all the ways your children have carried on their classroom learning when we welcome them back this September!
If you’ve been considering private education for your child, please feel free to get in touch with our Director of Admissions & Marketing, Rachel Elliott, on 01395 280335 or by email at rachel.elliott@stpetersprepschool.co.uk.
