School is out. Summer is here. The long vacation should be
relaxing and fun. But are you afraid your children will make like a
potato and head for the couch? Here are things to do to keep their
brains engaged. Try them. They’ll be fun. And the kids might not
even know they’re learning something.
School is out. Summer is here. The long vacation should be relaxing and fun. But are you afraid your children will make like a potato and head for the couch? Here are things to do to keep their brains engaged. Try them. They’ll be fun. And the kids might not even know they’re learning something.
1. If you don’t already have a library card, get one. Then sign up for your local library’s summer reading club.
2. Make a necklace out of uncooked macaroni and string.
3. Start a journal or diary.
4. Look through your family photo albums or scrapbooks, and tell your favorite stories.
5. Teach your child classic card games such as gin rummy or go fish.
6. Create something using only toothpicks and glue.
7. Write and draw a comic strip with your child.
8. Encourage your child to be a pen pal, either with classmates or faraway relatives.
9. Cut bread into different shapes: squares, rectangles, triangles, circles. Have your child match them while making a sandwich.
10. Look up a new word in the dictionary and use it that day.
11. Give your child a pail of water and brush to paint on the driveway or sidewalk.
12. When filling up at the gas station, ask your child how much gas you needed and the cost per gallon.
13. When you’re driving or walking, have your child look for things that start with the letters A through Z.
14. Make up a story about an animal, and tell it to someone.
15. Take a field trip with the family.
16. Read a story to your child and stop before the end. Ask your child how the story will turn out.
17. In the car, play rhyming and other phonics games: What words rhyme with “hat”? What words start with the same sound as “boy”?
18. Send a card to someone you haven’t seen in a year.
19. Have your child cut pictures from old magazines or newspapers. Put them together to tell a story.
20. Ask your child to help plan part of a family meal, such as a salad. Make the shopping list, figure out the best buys, calculate how much ingredients cost.
21. Measure every room in your house and draw a floor plan.
22. Make a collage with items around the house: beans, buttons, yarn.
23. Come up with an invention. Draw plans on paper and then see what you can create.
24. Count the number of steps it takes to walk to the corner.
25. Have your child tell you a favorite story.
26. List your monthly bills: electricity, water, telephone, cable, rent. Ask your children to guess each cost.
27. Give your child an old shoebox to decorate for his or her treasures.
28. Make a time capsule to save for several years.
29. Start a hobby with your child, such as collecting rocks or baseball cards.
30. Learn a tongue twister.
31. Set up a backyard feeder. Look up the different birds, and listen to their calls.
32. Keep a world map or globe and reference books near the TV. Have your children locate places mentioned on the news and research them.
33. Choose a book you can read aloud to your whole family. Read it every night.
34. Lie on your back outside and name the cloud shapes.
35. Stay home and play a game of Yahtzee or dominoes.
36. Have your child find five jobs in the classifieds that interest him or her. Talk about why those jobs would be interesting.
37. Guess the height of your entire family (including pets). Then measure them and see how close your guess was.
38. Learn to bake bread with your child.
39. Plant some seeds in a cup or pot. Be sure to water them.
40. Draw a map of your neighborhood. Then take a walk and draw your route on the map.
41. Read a book with your child. Then suggest he or she watch the movie based on the book.
42. Create a new color.
43. Organize a family book club. Have everyone read the same book, then choose a night to talk about it.
44. Write a limerick.
45. Teach your child to play chess (or backgammon or checkers).
46. Play I Spy.
47. Start an autobiography.
48. Cook dinner with your child. Go over the planning, measurements and the do’s and don’ts of preparing food.
49. Start an alphabet book. Write capital and small letters; draw a picture for each letter.
50. Make a paper chain; use bright summer colors and add to it all summer long.
