Let's check in with the kids halfway through summer:
Tents set up on trampolines? Check.
Small cuts in the corner of mouths made by the sharp plastic edges of Freezies? Check.
Maybe corn-rows or a bright red mohawk? Check.
Summer is nearly every kid's favourite time of year because, let's face it, when school's out, time slooooows riiiiiiight dooooown.
But just because they aren't in their classrooms with their teachers doesn't mean these two months are lost time for learning. In fact, the opposite is true; in the summer, many kids have time to pursue special interests, learn from summer job experience, explore new worlds by traveling or just relax with a book on the lawn for a few hours. These and other quintessential summertime experiences offer countless valuable learning opportunities for kids but it might just take a bit of extra effort on our part to facilitate these experiences.
In the summer, kids have time to further pursue their special interests in myriad specialty programs and day camps.
For example, my eight-year-old is learning to play quidditch at a Harry Potter camp in south Surrey. His love of reading is being reinforced as his imagination runs as wild as his and 11 other bodies are as they chase the quaffle while dodging bludgers. Last year was tennis camp, next year may be kayaking or cooking. Or maybe he'll be ready to go to overnight camp and learn about forestry or sailing - I don't know who's more excited about that prospect, him or me.
For teenagers, summer can be a great time to learn on the job, not to mention earn spending cash for that new electronic gadget or outfit. I fondly remember five summers of wrangling kids around the 40 acres of overnight camp when I was a teenager. I made many lifelong friendships and developed a deep love for educating and teaching. Gaining leadership skills, financial planning skills and an all-around sense of responsibility is what the weeks of summer can offer to teens.
Is a local teen serving you at a restaurant, pumping your gas or building your new patio? Is your neighbour's 12-year-old free to babysit Saturday night? Why don't you call them and find out?
Finally, summer can be a time to pursue quiet and more individual passions. You may offer to dust off that old tripod and get engrossed in creating a stop-motion animation with your eager young filmmaker. Berry-picking may lead to the sweet smell of blueberry pie as cooks of various ages convene in the kitchen.
I vividly remember the time my little brother built a wooden maze for our pet rat out of old wood scraps and my dad's glue gun. With his stopwatch, he then timed the poor creature as it tried to find its way to the cheese.
Kids won't realize it but new concepts of science, math, physics and chemistry can surely and unwittingly be discovered as projects big and small are undertaken.
But summertime can also be a time for kids to curl up in a tree and enter the fantasyland of novels, be it with a hardcover or their eReader. A true love for language will be developed when reading is for pleasure instead of homework. Haven't you ever read well into the wee hours of the morning with your book light when your parents thought you were asleep? The time to encourage our children's inner motivation for learning is as ripe as the tomatoes growing in our gardens.
What cool new things have your kids learned so far as they've been playing at the beach or camping with their cousins last weekend?
What squirmy discoveries are hiding under a rock in the local park?
Please remember that as you see the back-to-school sale signs start to pop up at the local mall, summer's really only halfway done.
Shanna Lowes of Coquitlam is a newly graduated teacher and the mother of an eight-year old.
