by Elizabeth Shelton

Worried that your child’s brain is on vacation during the lazy days of summer? Here are some tips to make reading, writing and math enjoyable, ensuring your child will return to school ready to learn.

Karen Jones, a fifth grade teacher at Hembree Springs Elementary in Fulton County, believes the best way for children to stay sharp is to read, read, read.

Make reading a family activity. Jones suggests the whole family read one evening a week. She also encourages families to create their own book clubs. “Go to the local library and have your child pick one book and you pick the other. Get two copies of each. The parent sets the pace of the reading, explaining, ‘By Friday, we will need to be through Chapter Two.’ On Friday the parent can ask a few engaging questions and then set the next goal. I always suggest Newbery Award winners; those stories are engaging and have at least one character that all kids can relate to.”

Celia McCoy, a reading specialist at Austin Elementary in DeKalb County, recommends the following:

1. Determine your child’s reading level using the Five-Finger Rule. “Have the child open the book to a random page and begin reading. They hold up a finger for each word they may not know per page. If they get to five fingers, the book is probably too hard for them.”

2. Create a contest by determining a certain number of books to read during the summer. Decide on small rewards at various levels and a bigger prize when the goal is accomplished.

3. Mix it up. It is important for kids to read nonfiction and informational books about things they’re interested in. Kids often discover new interests, which, in turn, may encourage them to read more.”

4. Keep it real. Encourage children to write letters home from camp, send thank-you notes for gifts, create invitations for parties. Even writing can be a family activity. “Starting a family journal becomes an interactive reading and writing journal. You write your thoughts then have the next family member read what you have written and pass it along.”

Additional suggestions:

5. Measure accomplishment in a way that visually proves to your child all he achieved over the summer. Have your child write words he does not know on an index card. He can look up the meaning online or in a dictionary and write it on the card. At the end of the summer he has a stack of cards showing all of the new words he has learned. He can trade the stack for a pre-determined prize.

6. Many counties post grade-level curricula online. If your child will study Georgia history next year, plan a visit to the Cyclorama, then encourage him to write a “newspaper review” or a letter about it to a favorite relative.

Anne Collins, director of mathematics programs at Lesley University in Boston, offers these tips to enhance summer learning in math:

7. Set a budget for a picnic and ask your child to “find the bargains” using the price per ounce figures on the supermarket shelves. Which one is really cheaper?

8. Play “War” with a deck of cards, but with math twists. Each player throws down two (or three) cards and adds or multiplies them – the highest (or lowest) sum or product wins the hand. Ask your child to invent a new version with the math he or she knows.

9. Dominos – an old fashioned game that teaches number sense, strategy and problem solving and strengthens those skills at any grade level.

10. Cook! Following recipes, cutting it in half for fewer servings, or tripling it for a large gathering teaches very practical skills. Even a batch of lemonade can reinforce these skills.

11. Track the temperature and humidity over the summer – plot it on a chart.

12. When doing home improvement projects large or small, even young children can assist with taking measurements and computing amounts of materials needed – and feel great pitching in as well.

13. In a garden have the children determine the area of the garden. Have them calculate the amount of space taken up by tomatoes versus cucumbers, etc.

14. Get odometers for their bicycles and use the distance traveled to calculate their average rates of speed.

15. Have your children keep a chart indicating how much time they spend reading, watching television, doing chores and playing to determine what fraction of the day or week they spend on each activity.