Children and Learning: Opportunities Over Summer Build For The Fall

By Doug Paterson

For most children in schools with traditional calendars, summer is a time to leave classes and homework behind. However, when they return to school in the fall after the long summer break, students can find themselves struggling to catch up. Skills and knowledge gained throughout the school year fade during the summer months. Without reinforcement, about 80% of what a student has recently learned can be lost.
A break from school is great for recharging your children’s batteries, but if they aren’t using some of the skills and knowledge that was learned in the classroom, they could find themselves lagging behind when school starts.

For children who have been struggling at school, summer can be their opportunity to catch-up on key skills and feel more confident when they head back to class. For students who do well, it’s an opportunity to keep their enthusiasm for learning high.

READ WITH YOUR CHILD. You can’t start too early. Reading to young children nurtures an interest in language, words, and communication. Age does not matter. For kids of all ages, reading together can be fun and interesting.

CREATE A READING LIST. Search the Internet … there are an abundance of sites that provide summer reading lists for children. At <www.bookadventure.org>, children in grades K-8 create personalized book lists from thousands of titles, take quizzes, and earn prizes for understanding the books they’ve read. The program is designed to motivate students to read more often, for longer periods of time, and with greater understanding.

PLAN A FIELD TRIP. Plan a trip to an interesting site close to home – an historic site, a museum, The North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro, etc. Research the trip in advance with your child and discuss it afterwards.

Studies show that the more involved parents are with their children’s education, the better the children do in school. What the studies don’t say is that this involvement is not just with the children’s school, but also with the children’s lives. Summer is a perfect time to remind us all that education neither begins nor ends with the school day.

You can make summer a time when you have made it clear that you have a year-round home for learning. Set up a simple table or desk in a well-lit area. Add a supply of pens, pencils, markers, and paper and you’re set. Make sure you have a dictionary, atlas, and other resource materials available so your child can look up information. Encourage learning activities by example.

This way, you are easing the transition from lazy summer days to the structure of the school year. Let’s not call these hints “back to school,” which may be unwelcome words to some, but instead we’ll just call it continuing to stay actively involved as your child starts thinking about a new set of personal goals. Setting goals gets your child off on the right foot, helping to minimize stress throughout the year (both yours and your child’s).

GET BACK IN THE ROUTINE by re-establishing bedtime, mealtime, reading, and homework routines.

SET EDUCATION GOALS. Help your child set goals at the very beginning of the year. Whether it is striving for an “A” in reading, handing in all homework on time, or preparing for tests well in advance, setting goals can help set the routine for the new year.

As you help your children think about the goals they set, remember how you were as a student. “What good is grammar (or geometry or social studies) going to do for me later in life?” Be honest.

Now, return to today. When was the last time you took notes at a meeting? Or prioritized your “to-do” list? Or organized a project from start to finish? The skills you use to perform such tasks at work and at home today are the same skills you learned and honed in English class (and geometry and social studies). Now your children are developing those skills, which will enable them to read analytically, write and speak expressively, and think strategically. And when they ask, “What good is this going to do me?” you know that it all starts with taking notes in history class, studying for that biology test, and juggling time to accommodate school, sports, and social calendars.

Organization, time management, note taking, test taking, and strategic reading are all essential study skills that are first introduced to young people in the classroom, but ultimately transfer far beyond school. To help your child develop these skills in a way that is meaningful to them – mainly applying them to their “job,” which is school – here are some tips which parents can follow.

ORGANIZATION AND TIME MANAGEMENT
Have your children track daily, weekly, and monthly assignments and responsibilities. Encourage them to break down large, complex tasks into manageable pieces. A child should prioritize homework and other tasks when he or she gets home from school, then complete the tasks in that order.

NOTE TAKING
Don’t panic if a child’s notes look sloppy and disorganized. It’s often just a sign of an active mind organizing things in ways that work best for that child. Encourage your children to rewrite them as they review them, to identify the most important points and highlight them.

TEST TAKING
A child should study those notes over a period of time, days, or weeks, instead of cramming the night before.

READING
Teachers love books. They teach from books, assign homework from them, and make their tests from them. Encourage thinking about reading; encourage pre-reading headlines, pictures, captions, charts, tables, and graphs. Urge them to read different types of writing, such as books of fiction and nonfiction, newspaper and magazine articles, letters, and websites. Talk with them after they read a book or article. Have them tell you what the story was about, why it did or didn’t interest them, and how it relates to their own life.
Because life is a balance of basic core skills such as reading and math, personal skills such as communication, and responsibility skills such as organization and time management, parents need to nourish all these skills, not just the ones that yield a grade. And the summertime is an ideal time to do just that. 

Doug Paterson is the director of education at Sylvan Leaning Center for Wake Forest, as well as the Raleigh and Knightdale locations. He has also taught in Wake County for six years. He may be reached at 846-1975 or dpaterson@sylvanraleigh.com. For more information about Sylvan Learning Centers, visit <www.educate.com>.