Fun-educational activities for Summer

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Fun-educational activities for Summer

Summertime is the time when a lot of children are off from school. But it is important for them
to continue to learn. The children need to be occupied and engaged in fun learning activities.

This will help children with:

  • Good practice – Reinforcing the skills they have learned at school.
  • Language – Keep enhancing their vocabulary.
  • Science/Cultural studies – Learning about a new animal, plant, place etc.
  • Fine and Gross motor skills – Outdoor fun.
  • Creative thinking – Reading books and telling stories, Arts & Crafts.
  • Cooking – Food prep at home.
  • Practical life – Helping hands at home.
  • Mathematical concepts and much more.

Language:

  • Playing “I spy” beginning sounds/ending sound games at home.
  • Read minimum 2-3 books each day/night.
  • Rhyming words game – red, bed; mat, sat
  • Giving 5 new words each week to improve vocabulary.
  • The older children can put those words into sentences.
  • They can create story and share with the family members.
  • Ask the children questions about the story. Ex: so, what happens next?
  • Listening to the audio story helps with language too.
  • Participating in social events.

Gross Motor activities:

  • Gardening
  • Playing games outside. Such as, hopscotch, hide & seek.
  • Washing the car
  • Riding a bike
  • Sing and dance
  • Yoga in the backyard
  • Take a nature walk
  • Playing with bubbles/water sprinklers
  • Making nature Mandela with rocks, leaves, sticks etc.
  • Watering the outdoor plants.

Cooking:

  • Washing and scrubbing the fruits and vegetables.
  • Peeling or cutting them with adult supervision.
  • Making salad/sandwiches.
  • Spreading butter or jam on a toast.
  • Mixing the dough for baking.
  • Serving the food themselves.

Practical life:

  • Setting up the table for mealtime.
  • Folding their clothes and arranging them.
  • Cleaning up the toys and containing them.
  • Sweeping/mopping the spill.
  • Making grocery list.
  • Helping to carry the groceries.
  • Doing flower arrangement using garden flowers.
  • Helping with young sibling (if any)
  • Watering house plants.

Math: It is everywhere around us. Here are some ideas to develop this skill at home:

  • When setting up the table, ask your child to count and bring any number of utensils. For ex: 4 plates, 4 spoons and 4 cups etc.
  • While folding the laundry, a child can count the pair of socks.
  • Let them count the fresh produce in a pack. Such as how many apples in one bag?
  • Looking at any item at home, talk about the size, shape, and volume.
  • Reading the numbers on a car tag.
  • It is a great way to teach children fraction, while eating graham crackers or pizza.
  • A child can count any objects and match with numbers. 5 beans with number 5.
  • Then they can put 2 beans and 3 beans together to make 5 beans and that’s simple addition.
  • Playing the game, what come before —-, what comes after —-

Sensorial:

  • Gather items from home that is of same color. Ex: Today we are going to find all the things that are red.
  • Then let the child compare the shades of the red color. Darkest to lightest red.
  • When flower arranging, have the child smell, feel and look at the different colors.
  • Cooking is the best time when a child can use all the 5 senses.
  • Ask a young child to collect things of different textures.
  • The older children can gather items and classify them by senses. Such as, perfume for smelling, picture is for looking, food is for tasting, music is for listening and ball is for catching with hands etc.
  • During nature walk, listening to and watching different types of birds/critters etc.

Arts & Crafts: To develop fine motor skills, concentration, hand eye coordination etc.

  • Young children can enjoy crumbling up the tissue paper and make it into a ball.
  • Playdough work. This can be home made too. https://livingwellmom.com/easy-homemade-playdough-recipe/#makeplaydough
  • Different kinds of cutting work can be used for the older children.
  • They can glue them on a paper and make designs.
  • They can cut the pictures from Grocery store flyers and glue them.
  • Looking at the paintings or wall decorations at home, the child can draw his own picture.
  • The children can use small beans, pasta, beads etc., to make Mandela designs.

A special note:
It is always helpful to ask your child’s teacher about the level of learning that he/she is in and how you can help them at home during summer.

Since your child is a Montessori student, the new lessons should be saved for them to learn at school using the Montessori materials. That way we don’t confuse the child with his/her learning.

PS: The children in the pictures are our SSMS students.
Harneet Soor
May 2023