10 Fun Ways to Use School Year Skills Throughout Summer Vacation

10 Fun Ways to Use School Year
Skills Throughout Summer Vacation
by Rebecca Klempner

A lot of parents fear that, over the summer, their children will forget everything they learned during the school year. With a little forethought, you can turn the summer into a meaningful—and fun!—educational experience with activities that build on the skills they’ve learned. Some will require planning, effort and a little spending on your part, but others are cheap (the price of paper, pencil, and a stamp) and relatively independent.

1) Make a family album or scrapbook of summer vacation. This works well whether your family will leave town or you are planning a staycation. I’ve even seen older children do it at the end of camp. Allow your children take the pictures, but also encourage them to write captions for them. Younger children can draw their favorite bits of special outings. Many older children will willingly write little paragraphs about the places your family visited, especially if you do so, as well.

2) Send out letters or e-mails to others regarding summer outings or their week at camp. Let the children write or type them out themselves (computer access should always be monitored, of course). Insert a lesson on chessed: remember to send these notes to relatives or friends who might be particularly lonely; a widowed grandparent, a maiden aunt, or a classmate that moved away could all benefit from these messages. The lesson will be most effective if you do it, too!

3) Visit the library often. What’s a better way to cool down when it’s hot outside? If you are planning an outing or trip, use the library to prepare your kids. For example, if you are traveling to the seaside, select books about tidepools, sea creatures, fishermen, or a day at the beach in advance. You can also extend a visit to another city, a park, or a museum by looking up information later about their favorite parts of the visit. For example, if your kids particularly enjoyed a museum exhibit about cowboys, borrow books about the Old West on your next library visit.

4) Let your children have fun in the kitchen. Using cookbooks and magazines (kids particularly like ones with glossy, colorful photos), ask the children to select recipes for summertime treats: ice cream, granitas, picnic foods, and the like. Let the children read them, measure ingredients, and count how many items they need (or produce). My children take great pride in serving Shabbos guests the food they made. Ice cream can even be made without an ice cream machine (Ziplocs or tupperwares will do)!

5) Do your kids want to set up a lemonade stand? Selling lemonade, homemade cookies, crafts, and the like allows children to add up bills and make change. Then, they can add up the profits. Some children like the idea of donating some or all to charity (like giving maaser), which provides a chance to calculate percentages.
6) Traveling? Let the kids select their own postcards and write them to their own friends back home. Staying in a hotel? Some kids think it’s hilarious to use the hotel postcards and stationery that you often find in desk of your hotel room. Don’t forget to prepare in advance by taking the appropriate addresses with you.

7) Family vacations provide the perfect opportunity for older children to exercise their map skills. If you are driving, riding a bus or a train, let the kids have their own maps (which often are available for free). You wouldn’t believe how proud your kid will feel if they give you directions to reach your destination successfully.

8) Need to run to the store? Let your kids write the shopping list, hold the money, pay, and even check their change. Better yet, do this on a stop at the ice cream shop! See who can calculate the bill accurately.

9) Make time for foreign language practice. If your child studies a second language in school (whether it’s Hebrew or Spanish), and at least one parent can speak it, you can discuss the scenery on the roadside in that language while to drive to the mountains or to Grandma’s. If your child is at sleepaway camp, write them letters in that language!

10) Don’t forget to learn Torah and do mitzvot. Even if your child is not in a Jewish camp, you can create an age appropriate prayer service to share with them each morning. With a younger child, you can read a book about the parshah each week or about the Three Weeks and Elul. With an older child, you can learn the day’s aliyah together each night, or perhaps share a seder of mishnayos. If you learn mishnayos as a family, you can accompany the activity with treats and make a siyum upon completing the order.

Try a few of these ideas, or create your own. Remember that each activity will appeal to some kids more than others. Don’t force any of them down your child’s throat: these activities are supposed to be fun, not stressful or punitive. Success is measured by kids who have enjoyed themselves, not just how many letters they wrote to Grandpa or how much money they made selling popsicles.  Besides maintaining the skills your children have learned already, your child will have learned new ones by the end of the summer. More importantly, you’ll have learned a lot about each other through sharing and self-expression.

Rebecca is a wife and mother of four. A former teacher, she is the author of A Dozen Daisies for Raizy. She lives in Los Angeles.