Summer Slide and School work over the holidays

[TisforTreacle]

Good evening,

With the schools breaking up for summer in the next few weeks, have any of you thought about organising school work over the summer? AIBU to set work for my kids?

Now hear me out. I know there is some dispute as to how much a child is likely to forget over the holidays if anything at all, but everything I’ve come across has said a couple hours a week would mitigate any learning loss. For the sake of a few hours, I can’t see it would do much harm.

I don’t want my kids, stuck indoors with their heads in the books. But they are early risers, I thought maybe two mornings a week to do an hour of school work. Probably 7-8am. That way, it leaves the rest of the day.

Bit of maths, bit of reading and a topic of their choice.

Is this unreasonable? Am I a terrible mother for contemplating such a thing?

• I’m not a tiger mum, I rarely have anything to do with their homework. Was thinking of just setting aside a few worksheets they can do when eating their cereal.

Secondary school teacher here. No I won't be setting work for my children (only 4 and 7 at the moment). The 7yo enjoys reading so she'll do that a lot voluntarily and will probably choose to write a few stories by herself. She also likes doing timetables in the car so we'll do that if she wants to.

I read with the 4yo every day and he counts as part of his play. That's enough IMO.

If your child is finishing Year 10 and halfway through a GCSE course, I can maybe see why you would want them to look over a few things but, even then, if their teacher hasn't set them anything, I probably wouldn't worry too much if they didn't.

We do extra work every day as a way of entertaining the school age child while the nursery age child is dropped off and the parent at home has a teams call. My bosses boss got in on the act and had a go at explaining fractions / thirds this morning.

Our plan for the summer is some handwriting work books, problem solving and reasoning work books, times tables practice and read least one book every day.

We also have some Rainbows badge stuff planned.

we did similar last year to avoid the dreaded dip. However o have a very biddae child who loves a workbook and reading, I’d they didn’t want to do it, I wouldn’t force matters.

@TheOnceAndFutureQueen

Thanks, good to have a teachers point of view

@Marmite27

Yes, that’s what I was thinking. Maybe give a little bit of structure

Do you plan as you go along or do you prep before the break up of school?

I was the kind of DC that loved doing workbooks so if they are like that then go ahead! But if they don't like it you're likely to put them off learning. I would find a more creative way to learn.

That said school might set something. My DD's school usually does a reading challenge. They usually do one at the library too.

Apart from reading I won't be setting any work for my children to do.

@UndertheCedartree

Yes, it may start off enthusiastically but they may be fed up by the second week. I don’t want a return of the dreaded lockdown learning!

Will maybe ask them what kind of workbooks they would like

Worksheets doesn't sound like much fun. Is there something more fun you could plan together, like a reading challenge (libraries usually do one every year) and a project/topic of their choice to investigate with the promise of a museum trip as part of their research?

I spent my summers reading my way through my dad's eclectic library, so I'd want to somewhat recreate that.

@Everydayimhuffling

I agree worksheets don’t sound fun, but they don’t actually like me too involved with their work.
With homework the prefer me to stay out of it, only occasionally asking me a question if stuck.

So I thought I could just leave the sheets on the breakfast table, maybe with some colouring in sheets or something?

We will be planning day trips here and there but to be honest I’m not the best at incorporating maths lessons into real life situations- eg getting them to count the change from the taxi etc. Hence, I’m back round to the worksheets again!

I’ll definitely be doing reading with my y1. She’s on the cusp of reading for pleasure so don’t want her to go backwards after all the work she’s put in and it will be nice not to plough though some of the dull school books.

I also want to do some light touch maths and spelling. I feel her writing could do with some more work but don’t want to push it to be a chore.

If you’re talking about doing schoolwork at 7-8am I’m guessing your kids are quite young still (my teenagers rarely wake before 11am on the weekends and in holidays!)

do you need to do formal learning with worksheets or can you just bring a bit of maths and English into every day life - shopping with money, games with money and spellings, looking at signs, menus etc while you’re out?

I would definitely prefer to keep things informal.

Sorry - just seen your update! I still prefer informal learning, even if it’s pretend roleplay rather than worksheets

When DD was in primary the school asked for them to participate in the library reading challenge and do one little project to practice writing. They gave a very broad topic, one year it was "Great Britain". DD did a bit on Queen Victoria, another child did a poster on various sport personalities etc. It's about keeping some skills up and doing something fun.

DD is now nearly 15 and in Y10. She needs to read her next English Lit text over the Summer and I know some teacher will set work for her. I am annoyed as she battles anxiety and self-harm and needs a proper break.

Is this seriously a thing?

Sorry to be blunt but what the actual fuck is going on? Why are parents setting work for children? They do all that stuff at school.

It's a thing in lots of Europe where they have long summer holidays - I remember my cousins would have to do an hour of their school set "holiday workbooks" every afternoon.

DS1 (6) is going to be at holiday club for 3 weeks - so doing lots of crafts and sports, and then in Italy for 2 weeks - practising his Italian with relatives, so I think he'll be OK learning wise.

I will chuck a few activity/workbooks in the suitcase just in case he is jealous of his cousins getting summer work (when we visited in the summer I always wanted to join in with my cousins when they did theirs)

Take them to a museum, wildlife reserve, botanical garden etc. There'll be worksheets there that'll be a lot more interesting than ones in a book. What are they gaining from ones they can do no problem? Feels a bit like keeping them busy work.

I would try to encourage them to learn something outside of the normal school like opportunities. Maybe they'd like to have a go at coding using an app, or take up Duolingo? Or learn the ukelele from videos or a book? Or if they're still little perhaps set up some novel role play each week? Have a corner that is a travel agent one week, an opticians the next and spy hq after that. Follow their interests. See if there are puzzle books on topics they like. Buy some bulbs and wires and let them learn through tinkering. Make predictions about the world around them and test them. Keep it playful and fun.

Oh and read lots. Read to them. Get them to read to you. Take them to the library lots. Talk about what you've read.

I will be working with one DD but not the other. My eldest doesn’t need it. My youngest has severe dyslexia and dyscalculia. If she doesn’t do anything her slip will be very obvious and going back to school will be incredibly stressful. So we will do ten minutes or so of reading each day. But we curl up in bed and then she reads to me and I read to her so it’s not hard. We also have a kids first cookbook which has very simple instructions so we will cook, as she loves that, but she will have to do the reading. For maths, the cooking again, plus we have a few Orchard Toys games which help maths do we’ll play those. And we’ve got a website subscription with some games on that she likes, so I’ll prod her to play those a couple of times a week. Each week I will try and grab a few times to sit and do a couple of maths questions of a sort she struggles with and needs to know. She can do them but she’s not ‘fluent’ yet so we’ll try and keep that ticking over. But it’ll take ten minutes a go, tops. I don’t want her to feel like she’s worked. But I do want her not to go back further behind than she already is and the key to that is practice, little and often. And done slyly!!

But don't bother with worksheets.

Think about what you're trying to achieve with them. If you think their handwriting needs work then they could make invites to a pretend party that you then attend. If you just want them writing leave notes ending "please write back."

Kids don't need worksheets in the holidays.

Yes, my dc will be doing work on the days we're in. They'll be reading anyway and do some online maths.
They'll also be having lots of days out, sleepovers with cousins and relaxing.
They've done that every summer and it's really helped them.

I think I'd want to be more creative about it than just work books but I really enjoy creative science stuff so I might be over enthusiastic.

Things I remember fondly as a child: treasure hunts with clues you had to do maths to get the answers for e.g. 4*6 steps east or whatever.

"Archaeology" i.e. digging in the garden and then looking up the pots we found.

Building a light house: there was loads of craft work but also if the base is a circle with X diameter, what length of card will we need to make the right sized cylinder. Then we built a circuit so it has a light in the top of it.

Baking cakes - if you have a recipe for an 8 inch round tin but you want to make it for a 6 inch round tin how much less do you need (16:9 ratio because of pi R squared, noting that pi cancels which is interesting).

Building a miniature garden where it was designed for drought and I read all about climate change.

Growing plants in different light conditions.

Making a volcano out of flour and bicarb and vinegar.

Non Newtonian fluids using cornflour and water.

I also used to actively enjoy algebra as a child, as well as things like cube numbers, square numbers etc.

I enjoyed the "uncle Albert" books about relativity etc as well.

Usborne Puzzle books might be your friend. There are the big ones like ‘Puzzle Train’ and ‘Puzzle Planet’ for younger DC and then a more advanced series for older DC (that I adored 30-odd years ago and have titles like ‘The Curse of the Lost Idol’).

Other than helping my currently Y10 child clean up her notes so they're ready for the autumn, I've no academic plans beyond our weekly library trip unless she asks for further help.

I do sometimes use the school breaks for larger practical learning than comfortable fits in school weeks so I've some summer projects planned for that, but they'll be at most 1-2 days a week. One of mine is very excited about the idea of checking the attic for some reason and is trying to find something we can do that lets her use a saw. However, the closest those get to academic is when I've used videos or short writings to help with discussions for relationship topics.

@HappyDays40 seriously? Teachers see kids for about 6 hours a day, term time only. You think the sole responsibility for teaching them absolutely everything should be their job? It depends very much on the child's disposition and age but some version of learning, whether that's through workbooks, reading together, play based science / maths / nature etc or whatever is not outlandish. Let's not pretend that all our kids will be out having an Enid Blyton summer, large chunks of time will be watching mindless crap on YouTube, or consuming ten second memes that wreck their concentration span. A bit of something constructive isn't really all that odd surely?

Absolutely will be doing work with my yr1 - realistically every other day not every day.