Summer Learning for Little Brains
Summer is a great time to get out and play, and play is the work of early childhood! Whether you have an infant whose brain is developing at lightning speed, a toddler exploring their world with fresh eyes, a preschooler on the verge of outgrowing naptime, or a school-ager on break until August, there is so much to do to grow their blossoming minds! Keep reading to find out how to foster summer learning with your kids.
Water Sensory Play
With the summer heat, water is a great way to cool down, but it also provides lots of learning opportunities! Talking to your kids about how it feels/what it looks like/what happens when they splash, “painting” with water on the sidewalk, or doing a sink or float experiment are all valuable ways to incorporate learning into water play. Talking with them about their experiences with water invites critical thinking but also develops their language skills. Their fine motor skills and artistic abilities are used when painting with water. The sink or float experiment allows them to hypothesize, test, and discover buoyancy and density with different objects. Here are some more ideas from the National Association for the Education of Young Children about using water as a learning tool for your kids!
Garden Play
Summer is an amazing time to grow things in a garden, and learning naturally goes hand in hand with that. It doesn’t have to be a big garden, and you can even use containers on a window sill or landing to grow your garden. Letting your children touch the dirt and the plants, walking them through the process of how the plants grow, making them involved in watering/weeding/harvesting, or using the plants for art projects are all ways to bring learning into your garden. Being hands-on with the dirt and plants is a wonderful sensory experience. Learning about the plant life cycle gives them a concrete understanding of botany, as well as their involvement in caring for the garden. Art with leaves, petals, fruits and veggies, or roots gives them unconventional materials to get creative with. Here is some good insight from The American Montessori Society about the benefits of gardening with young children!
Sidewalk Chalk Play
Who doesn’t love sidewalk chalk? It gives the children so much freedom for learning! There are tons of ways to use sidewalk chalk, it’s an inexpensive resource, and it can be used at the park, in your driveway, or even on garden stones (which you can decorate your garden from the last idea with!). Practicing writing their name, drawing whatever sparks their imagination, tracing their bodies, or making an obstacle course are lots of ways to bring learning into play. Writing their name is an important language and literacy skill. Drawing brings in fine arts to the mix. Doing tracing activities helps with both fine motor and body part identification. An obstacle course is a fun way to incorporate gross motor and problem solving. Here are some more activities from the Scholastic for using sidewalk chalk as a learning tool through fun play!
Whether you use one of our ideas here or create your own fun this summer, we encourage you to think of how you can bring learning into play for your children!
