Photo: Rob Buenaventura/Flickr
As this school year winds down, students are looking toward fun in the sun with a sigh of relief. But if they knew how much learning they're apt to lose over the summer, and how much harder they'll have to work in the fall to make that up, the three-month break might not be so exciting.
"The data says we have to keep our kids mentally engaged, or they lose everything," said Zac Stowell, a fifth-grade teacher at Northgate Elementary School. He said studies at his school have shown that students lose about half of the previous year's gains during the summer if they bypass all learning opportunities.
Not every opportunity is created equal, though, and students with different needs will benefit differently from formal classes, summer camps or private tutoring.
For those who have been struggling with a subject, summer learning can allow the student to focus exclusively on that subject, and to receive instruction that might be more individualized or taught differently.
"In private tutoring, you can slow the pace down. I see a lot of students that just can't keep up in class," said Mark Batho, owner of Fusion Math, a Seattle math and science tutoring service. "The summer allows us to do things that are outside the scope of regular math but might be very interesting to kids. I teach kids to look at numbers in different ways. They can come back to school with very strong number skills, and have more confidence in math class."
These different teaching methods, combined with a relaxed atmosphere in many camps and classes, help parents avoid feeling like they're "mean" for enrolling their children in summer learning.
"Just going to more instruction that wasn't working for them, doing more of that isn't going to be beneficial; it's going to be very frustrating for the child," said Jessica Ruger, admissions associate and school counselor at Hamlin Robinson School in Seattle. She suggested looking at methods, pacing and how hands-on and experimental a class will be when choosing one for your child. "When the kids are in an environment where they're being taught in an approach that works for them, that's fun. It's fun to ‘get it.' Every child has that eagerness to learn, but it's when they're not getting it that it's painful."
Of course, each family has to balance the needs of the whole family, including siblings, and it's good to fit in some summer fun, too. Many summer learning programs don't fill the whole vacation with schoolwork. Batho, for example, divides his summer classes into sessions on individual topics because he knows students won't be available to learn the whole time.
"It's not summer school or nothing, there are in-betweens that can fit with your family plan," Ruger said.
The teachers noted many informal opportunities for learning in the home and on vacation, whether that's investigating footprints in wet beach sand or practicing fractions while preparing a recipe for a barbecue.
"There has to be a fine balance of academic rigor and not burning the kid out," Stowell said. Ultimately, keeping your child's mind engaged between the end of one school year and the beginning of the next is the goal, whether that is achieved at home, on the road, or in a classroom. "Any parent who is thinking, ‘Should my kid be learning over the summer?' is doing the right thing."
