How to make summer learning fun

Summer break can be a great time to learn new skills. And to keep old ones from getting rusty. But how so?

In this episode, Julian shares how to prevent the “summer slide.” And gives tips on how to create moments for learning.

Related resources

• Stopping “summer slide”

• Summer survival guide: Hacks to help your family thrive

• Summer learning programs for kids who learn and think differently

Episode transcript

Julian: Summer break can be a great time to learn new skills and keep old ones from getting rusty. But how do we do that? What is there to do during that nice long break from homework, classwork, tests, the rush of getting to and forth from school? What are we going to do?

Hey OG family, welcome to a brand new episode. On today's show, we're talking all about summer break. All the fun activities that you might want to do. Some ways to make learning a lot more fun. And I'm going to give you some specific tips on how to prevent that dreaded summer slide. All right, let's get started.

So, first and foremost let's talk about preventing summer slide. So, we want to define that, right? Like if you are like me and you have children at home, you know that they are different kids from June to when they go back to school at the end of August. And in some cases, something called summer slide happens. So, you might ask, "Julian, what is that?"

Summer slide is a situation — and it's been documented in research — that there's a situation where students might lose some of the academic gains during the month and a half or two months that they are off from school during the summer.

So, for example, maybe your kid has been knocking it out of the park all year long and they've grown like 3 or 4 reading levels. They're almost close to reading, on their grade level, and they're doing fantastic. And then school stops and either they're going to camp where they're at home with you, and they go back to school the following school year, and their teacher reports that their reading level isn't where it's supposed to be. It's lower than it was when they ended the school year.

And you might ask yourself, "Wait, I thought you were here. How are you going back to school and you've lost skills?" That's what summer slide is. It's when there's a slide of academic growth, and sometimes kids slide back. And for our babies, with learning and thinking differences, it can be even more intensive. It can be really, really difficult time for them.

And so, there's a bunch of different things that we can do to try to prevent that dreaded summer slide. Number one, the number one thing is reading. You got to read, baby read. The more you read, the more you know. The more you know, the more you grow. Knowledge is power.

And it's important that we develop a love of reading with our children, regardless of their learning and thinking differences. The idea of really reading and getting their hands on literature as much as possible is really going to encourage that. There's a reason why there's a summer reading list in every school experience ever.

Now, I know when I was a kid, I didn't really do my reading list as much as I should have. But my own children, we make sure that they do their reading. And so, this could be reading novels or reading books. This could be reading magazines. This could be reading articles in the newspaper. This could be reading articles on their tablets.

Somehow, getting our kids to get practice reading and especially reading independently is really important. And one way you can do that is by modeling reading with your children. So, everybody chooses a time to sit down and read together during the summertime. That is one tip to really prevent that big-time summer slide.

Another tip is every single moment you have can be a learning experience. Every moment you have with your children is an opportunity. Hear that? "Opportunity," like no gap. There you go. It's an opportunity to really get a chance for kids to learn as much as possible. So, this is another time where anytime that you're out and about with your kids, ask them questions.

If you have kids that you know might struggle with directions, have them look at the GPS in your car as you're driving and have them point out the direction before they see it.

Or, I know that for me, we go to the grocery store a lot, we always are doing the budget together. We map out what kind of money we're going to spend, and we almost play like, almost like a game show, one of my all-time favorites, The Price Is Right, where I have my kids guess how much they think the final total is going to be for the grocery bill once we're done shopping. And we have, like, a little prize for whoever gets close to it, and sometimes you can even bid $1.

And so, it's another way just to use an opportunity that it's a mundane task, but it's an opportunity to learn and grow. So, second big, big tip: every time you have a moment for a learning opportunity, use it. Ask lots of questions, even the daily chores and the mundane tasks they can be used as something for supporting our kids and learning.

Last but not least, my third big tip for preventing summer slides. Play board games and play video games. I know I said it. Play video games. Play video games. They really strengthen math skills. Mathematical reasoning, algebraic equations, or anything that's going to help your children practice problem-solving is going to really help them continue at that high level of academic growth.

And so, something that we do in our household, we have game nights. Saturday night, maybe 4:00 in the afternoon, 5:00 in the afternoon, we make a giant charcuterie board where I chop up a bunch of veggies and fruits and salamis and cheeses and whatnot, and it's kind of like a grazing thing. And the kids get to pick a game each.

One of my favorites is Monopoly. We do Scrabble, we'll do Clue, we'll do a whole bunch of different games that we get to pick. Sometimes we'll invite some friends over. Mom and Dad have a couple of wines and some drinks, and we sit down and we play, and we play some games. And as we're playing games, we know that the kids are going to sharpen their skills and their critical thinking skills.

And so, it's a fun way to get them to practice some of those mathematical skills, those problem-solving skills that they have to, to develop in school. Another game that I would really recommend as much as, I hear about it all the time in my household, the game of Minecraft.

I'm learning all about it now. But those of you with younger kids, the five, six, seven, eight-year-old kids, even all the way up until early teens, Minecraft or games like Minecraft are great for strategy. And so, it's not something where you can just let your kids take a deep dive and play by themselves. The tip is to use the game to start a conversation about their learning.

Have your children explain their strategy to you as they're playing the game. Ask them questions about the different characters in the game. "Hey, tell me, how did you defend yourself against the Enderman when you were playing survival mode? Did you use, table or did you do a crafting table? Tell me what strategy or what weapons or what tools you might have used when you were playing Minecraft to help you get the goal you're trying to accomplish?"

And so, it's a way for you to really practice that internal conversation of learning that our children lose out on sometimes when they're not in a school, in a formal classroom setting.

So, again, how do I prevent summer slide? I read, I read, I read. I make sure that every single moment is a fun learning opportunity. And I use games, whether it's board games, whether it's video games, whether it's Legos, anything that's going to practice. Some of those problem-solving, tangible math skills are great ways to prevent summer slide.

Now, a lot of the things I just talked about, it sounded a lot like school, right? You're asking questions, and your kids might look at you like, "Are y'all crazy? Why are you making us do school right now? It's summertime. We're trying to chill." And that's where you have some tips to keep summer fun.

So, the first thing is really for parents, a lot of us, are working during the summertime, right? So, the summer is not a break for us. It might be a break for the kids, but we might be working. So, if your kids are going to camp, then that's something that will definitely impact what you plan. If you're just home with them all summer long, then that's going to change what you do.

So, the first thing I would recommend to keep things really fun, there's this great website called "Let Grow," "Let Grow." And it's a website that, you can Google "Let Grow" or it's letgrow.org, but it's a great website that my wife and I use all the time, where it gives us tips on how to develop independence with our kids. And basically, it's just like a list of different activities or different challenges or tasks that we allow them to practice as a way for them to start developing their own independence.

And for kids with learning and thinking differences, this website would be really great. It's a way for kids to to get some ideas about how to take a little bit of time away from mom and dad and really figure out how to do some of these things on their own, and it's really fun. So, that's a really cool website. It's a great place to check out some good ideas to keep things fun.

Another thing that's really kept my family and our fun household going is something called fun afternoon Friday. Fun afternoon Friday. So fun afternoon Friday is something that my wife Elizabeth created.

She is the architect of a lot of things that are really awesome in our household. But this is one of my favorite things that she did, where we basically we got together with a bunch of families, four or five at first, and we said, "You know what, all of us are home on Fridays after school or in the summers. We're not doing camp. We're just kind of hanging out. What if we get together and we plan some fun things at each of our homes, and everybody can come over and we take turns?

So, for example, we'll do a theme of saying, "We're going to do a fun afternoon Friday, science style." And so, whoever is signing up for that Friday, the families come over, they bring their kids, they bring some snacks. We provide some stuff to everybody, hangs out outside, and we do activities where we'll make slime or will do some science experiments, or we'll do some things to really get the kids involved and engaged, and the other parents get to hang out, enjoy it too, and they don't have to do the planning.

And so, you're getting time to socialize together. You're getting all your friends together in one place, and you only got to do it like once every month or once every six weeks, where it's your turn to kind of bring everybody together and plan something. But your kids get to do this fun Friday activity every single Friday.

So, it's kind of like this awesome recess thing, except it's at somebody's house and it takes the pressure off you as the parents to create something every single week. It's something that really has helped us a lot. So, fun afternoon Friday, bringing your families together, bringing your friends together to hang out, and playing a cool activity, it's a really great way to keep things fun.

The last thing that I would highly, highly, highly recommend is checking out some of the beautiful, natural things that are around us. Depending on where you live, you might have a whole bunch of them. If you live out west, you might have a ton of these. If you live on the East Coast, there's still some there, but the national parks are one of my favorite activities to do that's really fun and really affordable.

My kids have just eaten up the opportunity to learn about the national parks. And there's a program called the Junior Ranger Program. So, here's what it is. You get to go to a national park, and at the national park, the kids have to learn about different things at the park. And so, they get a booklet, or they get an activity guide, and it's differentiated at many of the parks. They've had educators develop these.

And so, at the park, they create these activities that the kids have to take part in, and then at the end of their activity completion, they talk to a ranger, and the ranger swears them in as a Junior Ranger, and they get this cool little patch and this little light, you know, little emblem that they can put on a vest. And for younger kids, it's such a mark of accomplishment that they were able to get this patch.

And it's something that really is accessible because we have over 60 national parks across the country. And again, they're super accessible, and it's a great way to get your kids out in nature to have fun, but also to not break the bank. And for those of you that have fourth graders, there's even a special happening where anybody who has a fourth-grade child, you can get into the national park with your child for free. There's free admission for fourth graders across the country.

And so, that's another way to really involve your kids in the beauty of nature, but also to have a little bit of fun. And for many of us, it's just a drive away. It's not that difficult to do.

Other things that I would recommend are starting a garden. Start a garden at your house if you have the capability. Even if you live in an apartment building, you can go and just have a garden in your window. The amount of time and fun that you can come with from having your kids learn about growing their own food is amazing.

We're fortunate enough to have enough land that we can have an entire garden full of vegetables, and we have chickens, and we have ducks, and we have a pond. And sol, we have a whole little farm in our house. But it's one of those things that it takes a little bit of money to set up, but once it's set up, it's so much fun.

My last recommendation is to check out some of the websites that are in your location. In Philadelphia, we have something called "Mommy Poppins," and there's a website called "You Wish You Knew." And we use those websites to look at the events that are happening around our town. And it's a great way for us to really get a sense of the different cool activities that are happening. And a lot of them are free.

Summertime is the time of free festivals, so it's a great time to really check those out. Another website that I would highly recommend is something called "Thrillist." "Thrillist" is a website that, again, shares a whole bunch of activities that are happening in and around some of the major cities, and it's a great way for you and your family to check out what's happening. So, you're just not, looking on your own. It collates it by cost, so you have a good idea of what's free versus what has a small admission price.

In closing, summer learning can be so much fun. I love the summer. It's my favorite time of the year. It's so much good times that can be had, and it just takes a little bit of planning and a little bit of proactive thinking, and your summer can be amazing.

I hope today's episode affirmed the belief that summer learning can be super fun. And please let me know what tips you think you might try with your child. You can always reach out to us. Give us some ideas about what might work for summer learning in your child.

So, before you go, check out some of those really cool additional resources in the show notes. Thank you all so much for tuning in. Until next time. Talk to y'all later, OG fam.

Thanks so much for listening today. We love hearing from our listeners. So if you have any thoughts about today's episode, you can email us at OpportunityGap@understood.org. And be sure to check out the show notes for links and resources to anything we mentioned in the episode.

This show is brought to you by Understood.org. Understood is a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering people with learning and thinking differences, like ADHD and dyslexia. Learn more at Understood.org.

"The Opportunity Gap is produced by Tara Drinks and edited by Daniela Tello- Garzon. Our theme music was written by Justin D. Wright, who also mixes the show. Ilana Millner is our supervising producer, Briana Berry is our production director, Neil Drumming is our editorial director. Our executive directors are Laura Key, Scott Cocchiere, and Seth Melnick. Thanks again for listening.