It is another Wednesday afternoon! Time for our weekly round-up and link party – It’s Playtime. Thanks to all the terrific bloggers who helped contribute to this list of fun, educational activities for our kids to enjoy this summer – ones to keep their brains alive and active – stop the summer brain drain! Link up more activities in the party and I will try to remember to add them to this list later.
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- Read a book together – then dramatize the story.
- Make spelling fun (and a wee bit crazy) with a game of paint-hangman.
- Play-Doh for math – these are some great ideas to use on a rainy afternoon to keep math alive.
- Watch bugs grow – have a pet caterpillar, make a wormery, or feed praying mantises. Journal what your insects are doing.
- Use story-telling dice to roll a story. Write your story out for others to read later.
- Graph the flowers you find on a nature walk through your neighborhood.
- Write Grandma a letter in code – what a great way to work on doing math problems “backward” (good for pre-subtraction skills).
- Learn about atoms by creating a model with wire and pipe cleaners.
- Eat edible tanagrams – what a great sandwich puzzle activity.
- Learn direction by creating a compass and a compass rose. Compare the directions on a map and to the instructions on a gps device.
- Play the card game war – learn place value and/or addition at the same time
- Learn geography while decorating and snacking on cookies.
- Play a speed game with familiar facts – examples are multiplication problems, sight words, memorization, etc.
- Drive your cars on a sight word road or parking lot.
- A Candy-Land reading “variation” can be a great refresher course to keep learning alive in the summer.
- Create patterns with a set of homemade dice. Draw or copy the patterns you create.
- Experiment with household items to see what is the most absorbent. Measure the water remaining.
- Go on a trip to a new place – only travel through research!
- Learn about fractions by baking and eating cookies.
- Participate in a summer reading program.
- Play learning bingo – with a free printable featuring word families, but you can use the same concept to create your own games.
- Learn one-to-one number correspondence with pipe-cleaners and beads. Maybe you can make your own pipe-cleaner abacus.
- Create and illustrate a lapbook of one of your kids favorite activities.
- Build a DIY terrarium. Research to find the plants that would last the longest.
- Make a game of memory to match similar concepts with a set of homemade garden rocks.
- Create plastic with this science experiment. All you need is milk and vinegar.
Want more ideas?? Check out my pinterest boards. Also, if you have an activity that is missing from this list, link up! I will try and add new ideas as I discover them. If you are an active pinner and want to contribute to the boards, please let me know.
Learn to Read Activities
Math Activities for Kids
Science Projects Collection
**Just a note: By linking up you are giving us permission to feature you and a photo from your blog, either on our blog or on our pinterest boards. Also, we’ll add you to our weekly newsletter 🙂 Happy linking.
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Love the ideas. This one thing I am concerned about this year with my oldest who has a learning disability so thank you for the list!
This is a great list! I found a bunch of things I haven’t seen yet. I’m excited to put them on the summer schedule.
Thanks also for the shout-out. Glad you liked the pattern blocks!
What fantastic ideas to help kids retain their knowledge this summer and keep on learning!
This is why I do summer school with my son every year. I have since he was in K-5. He’s going into the 3rd grade this year in July and his last day of school was April 27th. He got a two week vacation then we started in with our summer school activities. We work on his cursive writing, reading, math skills, phonics, do a little art if he wants, plenty of outdoor time and fun with the sprinklers. 7 weeks of summer school may sound likes it’s too much but really our day takes less than 3-hours (if that) because he’s itching to go do something else! It just helps to keep his skills sharp and ready for the coming year 🙂
Thanks so much for the shout out! Let me know if you ever want to team up for a giveaway. I’d be more than happy to donate my teaching items :o)
Mel D
Seusstastic Classroom Inspirations
Awesome links!!! My goodness, so much fun!!! And thank you so much for including one of ours!!! Hope you have a brilliant summer, from a cold, wet, wintry Cape Town!!!
What a fantastic list! Thanks for the link!