Five Ways to Beat Summer Learning Loss

I think every student can agree that the best time of the year is when the last day of school kicks in.

The summer holidays are a time for kids to kick back, relax, and go swimming during the months of July and August. But did you know that research studies shows that over the months of July and August, most students lost between one to over three months of skills they’ve just learned in the previous school year!

What’s a Summer Slide?

This loss of skills students experience is called the “Summer Slide” or summer learning loss. If you think your kids won’t experience it, think again. When kids are pulled out of their regular routine and stop learning in a traditional classroom setting, their minds focus on something else – which is usually nothing, besides having fun.

So this summer, you can prevent your kids from experiencing their own summer slide. All you need to do is follow these five ways to beat summer learning loss, and by September your kids will be ready for the upcoming fall term.

1. Make Time for Summer Reading

During the summer, students have more time to read books they enjoy. So this gives you a chance to maintain and strengthen their reading skills. If you think they don’t like reading, did you know that 92% of kids say they are more likely to finish a book they picked out for themselves?

So make it a library date, where you take your kids or teenagers to the public library or bookstore and let them pick out some of their own “Summer Reading Material” that will be perfect for them to read on the beach.

Check your local library as they usually host summer reading groups that your kids can join, if they’re a proverbial book worm and want to join discussions about the books they read.

2. Develop Math Skills

Even though your kids might cringe when you mention the idea of them working on some math problems, just reassure them that it’ll just be three to four math problems per day.

Add the element of fun by making it a daily “to-do” math challenge to proudly check off their agenda and reward them with ice cream, a snack of their choice, or free time to do their own activity.

Working on just a few math problems a day prevents a summer slide in their math skills, it preserves what they learned during the previous school year, and prepares them for the next term.

3. Encourage Creative Writing

Creative writing is the best way to keep your kids writing skills afloat. Encourage them to write a paragraph or two in a journal about anything they would like. It’s also fun on their part because they get to keep track of all the things they did over the summer.

So let’s say on Canada Day, they can write a paragraph about what it means to be Canadian or what they did to celebrate Canada Day.

If your child has a flare for creative writing, let us foster it! At ICan Education, we have creative writing activities in our English Summer Academic Enhancement Program that covers different writing tasks such as narrative and descriptive writing.

4. Develop Science Skills

Summer is a great time for kids to get their hands dirty by creating their own science experiments. The fun part about conducting science experiments is that kids can do them in pairs or small groups and, often, if their successful they’ll make an amazing discovery. How cool!

If your child is a scientist in the making, we want them to gain valuable scientific skills. At ICan Education, we have the STEM Exploration and Renewable Energy programs that are part of our Summer Enrichment Activities.

5. Join a Summer Camp

Another way to tame summer learning loss is by registering your kids in one of our summer camps because they get to do a whole heap of fun activities in a group setting.

This summer, ICan Education has several exciting summer camps lined up. We have our Academic Enhancement Programs which focuses on four core subjects: English, Math, Science, and French.

We also have Summer Enrichment Activities which encourages your kids to explore their own imagination and build things with their own hands!

We’re offering several hands-on learning activities such as Sound Circuits, Animation, and Light Circuits. The most exciting Summer Enrichment Activity we have is Robotics where your kids get to learn about computer programming, then build their own robots!

At ICan Education, we love it when kids have fun while they learn. So our upcoming summer camps are meant to help students develop essential learning skills that they can apply to their next grade level!

Register In ICan Educaton’s Summer Camps Now – Spaces are Limited!

Since summer is right around the corner, you shouldn’t wait last minute to register your kids in our summer camps. We’re pretty flexible as we know you’ve got a long list of activities lined up for the kids this summer. So we’re offering half day and full day summer camps at an affordable price!

Do you agree or disagree with the “Summer Slide” learning loss? Have any tips on how your kids can continue learning throughout the summer time? Post your comments below or let’s move the conversation to social media and post your comments on Twitter @icanedu and with hashtag #Icaneducation. We also invite you to ‘Like’ our Facebook page!