Having Fun to Prevent the Summer Slide

The first summer with no summer school? I was panicking. Both the teachers and I knew my oldest needed to be reviewing and relearned materials from the school year.

I took several deep breaths and started working on a basic plan for the summer. I made several themed sets and worked on a small summer program for her to do with her sisters.

Having Fun to Prevent the Summer Slide - simple and easy ways you can help prevent the summer slide - 3Dinosaurs.com

This might be shocking but we don’t spend our whole summer working on printables! Yes, I have a lot of them and I do use them regularly with my girls but our whole summer is not about work.

I pick ideas that each needs to review over the summer and build a summer of fun around it! This may be shocking but we don’t do many summer camp programs. We use one and it is half day and then they are mine again to play with.

Learning on the Go

We take our learning wherever we go! I create fun ideas for when we are driving around. You never know what you can make into some fun learning activity until you try. We do a lot of field trips out of the house. We go to museums, science centers, and parks. Each has it own unique way of providing a learning environment.

Lots of Reading

One huge part of preventing the summer slide is Reading! I read to them. They read to each other. They read by themselves! During the summer, we visit the library at least 3 times a week to change out books. You can read more about why we visit the library here.

Plus there are so many different ways to use the library. Are you doing the local library’s summer reading? We plan to do ours! it keeps the girls reading. Plus there is one for adults as well. it makes me record my reading as they are recording theirs.

We make a list of books we are all going to read together during the summer and we love it. Reading is a huge part of our summer and it does help prevent the slide! We check out 30 to 50 books each week and if we can’t find our book we might want to read we order them so they are there the next time.

Here are some Summer Reading Charts:

Explore New Places

Every year my girls have a list of places they want to go or check out. We might even revisit places we have been. I let them help in the planning of activities and where we might go. Is there a new museum to check out? Or maybe it is a new park to visit and play in. This allows them to grow. Plus maybe we revisit a place they have not been to in a while. They can see how much it has changed.

Summer Learning Programs

I do have some summer learning programs that Royal Baloo and I have created together. They are an easy no-prep printable system for kids to learn with. We love using the. There are three versions and each version has a variety of levels. These have tot through 4th grade in some of the. There is Swing Into Summer Learning which is a new one this year, Build Up Summer Learning and Jump Into Summer Learning. The systems can be used in any order.

Swing Into Summer Learning has 7 levels 6 levels Tot, PreK, Kinder, First Grade, Second Grade, Third Grade and Fourth Grade. The themes are Zoo, Superhero. Explorer, Bugs and Monster.
Swing Into Summer Learning: Week 1 Zoo
Swing Into Summer Learning: Week 2 Superhero
Swing Into Summer Learning: Week 3 Explorer
Swing Into Summer Learning: Week 4 Bugs
Swing Into Summer Learning: Week 5 Monsters

Build Up Summer Learning -6 Levels of Learning - 3Dinosaurs.com

Build up Summer learning has 6 levels Tot, PreK, Kinder, First Grade, Second Grade, and Third Grade. It themes are Pirate, Pond, Robot, Farm, and Camping.

Build Up Summer Learning: Week 1 Pirate
Build Up Summer Learning: Week 2 Pond
Build Up Summer Learning: Week 3 Robots
Build Up Summer Learning: Week 4 Farm
Build Up Summer Learning: Week 5 Camping