What's a Family to Do?

Time to start planning for summer. Here are a few ideas to get you thinking about ways to support young learners when they are ouyt of school for two months.

1. Library cards open door for kids. Books, CD's, DVD's and summer library reading programs will help keep reading skills sharp. It's been said that reading as few as a dozen books over the summer will help prevent reading loss. Add in reading with and to young kids makes your efforts even more valuable.

2. Math activity box. Gather together a ruler, tape measure, a pocket full of change, a calculator, a mini-notebook, a pair of dice and a deck of cards. Encourage young kids to measure things around the house (or the entire house!), count money or make change, do ridiculouysly long math computation problems on claculators and record results. Dice and playing cards can be used to create games or play games you find in math game books from the library or encourage your kids to create their own games. Practice makes for understanding and camn be fun along the way.

3. Maps, travel vacations guides and magazines about the world open doors to actual trips or imaginary ones. Look for interesting destinations, local points of interest or interesting words or names. Learn about a country or a language, ethnic foods and celebrations all without leaving the backyard.

What's a family to do? Create experiences that encourage thinking and keep those young brains active.