Activities can ease school transition

Here are some ways to get your kids back into ‘back to school’ frame of mind.

BALTIMORE — Summer is rapidly coming to an end and parents are beginning to think about getting their children ready to go back to school.

But Patricia Hoge, senior director of curriculum and instruction for Connections Academy, an online charter school operator, thinks parents shouldn't think of summer fun and learning as a contradiction in terms.

Incorporating active learning activities into family time during summer's final days can help ease the kids’ back-to-school transition, and help them start off the new school year on the right foot, she said.

Tips for parents

She offers 10 easy parent tips to inject fun learning into kids’ summer routines:

•Infuse learning into everyday routines. Encourage children to help with baking to practice basic measuring and math skills. Promote strong writing by encouraging children to write letters to friends, grandparents and others. Look at shapes of items around the house for a quick refresher in geometry.

•Encourage kids to keep a journal. Writing about daily events allows children to tell a story and boost their vocabularies.

•Play car/travel games. Play the “license plate” game and try to name all 50 states. Challenge children to also name the state capitals. If going on a trip, do research about scheduled destinations and share tidbits of interesting facts or history with children.

•Visit favorite online education sites. There are a number of good Web sites that offer interactive educational activities.

•Make family time into “field trips.” A trip to a local museum, zoo or pool can become a minifield trip. Children learn well when exposed to hands-on activities. Look for an unusual local field trip, like making your children “geologists for a day” on a local area hike.

•Take the kids shopping for school supplies, giving them practice in simple finance and counting skills. Give them a basic budget and suggest that they identify what they can buy.

•Get organized. Going through school materials will help get kids thinking about the great things they did in school and will help parents get organized for the new year.

•Start back into routines. A couple of weeks before school starts, it’s a good idea to get them headed toward their normal school routines.

•Incorporate arts and culture. Music, art and theater are all proven to help encourage children to be well-rounded learners.

•Go to the library. Get children their own library card and make it a regular destination both in the summer and during the school year.