It’s hard to believe the school year is almost over and summer is approaching so quickly! If you are a parent, and your children attend schools on the traditional schedule, this means it’s time to start planning for all of those long sunny days! Even if your child will be going to camp, or away to visit family, we’ll bet that there will still be plenty of “I’m Bored,” declarations. Here are some great activities to suggest that will keep your kid’s mind buzzing, in a good way.
This List of 48 Ultra-Cool Summer Activities
Here, you will find everything from number games to organizational activities to vocabulary enhancing strategies for kids. There are activities for kids of all ages, but the one that really stands out is called: “Who Pooped.” Because what kid doesn’t love talking about poop?
According to the website, “Who Pooped is a science site created by the Minnesota Zoo to help students begin thinking like scientists. One way scientists learn about animals is by studying their poop — also called “scat” or “dung.” Who Pooped allows students to investigate various types of scat and try to match the scat with its creator.”
Another fun one from this list is called: “Story Jumper.” This one is a website that allows kids to make their own books! Participants can use clip art, text, cover pages, and photos to make a creation of their own.
There are many more activities on this page, so check out the link above and find your favorites.
This list focuses on social and emotional learning, which the Collaborative For Academic, Social and Emotional learning defines as “the process through which children and adults acquire and effectively apply the knowledge, attitudes, and skills necessary to understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions.”
Some of our favorites from this list are:
A simple, but great way to help children build courage. This exercise involves helping kids to identify objects that make them feel safe. These could be things like flashlights, teddy bears, or even a favorite pen; anything that will encourage a feeling of safety and security in your child.
This one requires more than one participant, so it’s a great idea for siblings. In this process, children are encouraged to role-play a difficult situation, like someone stealing their toy, or knocking down their tower of legos. The idea here is to help kids brainstorm their way out of conflict.
This one helps children learn that families come in all different shapes and sizes. Although, it’s meant to be played out with a group of children, it can also be done using story books as well. Have your kids make a drawing of everyone in their family, and then draw the family members from their favorite story books. This is a great way to teach about diversity.
This one helps young kids to learn how to identify and express their emotions in a fun way.
While this one focuses on children ages 3-5, we suggest keeping a running dialogue with your children about how they are feeling. You know, until they are old enough to complain about you to their own therapist.
If you’d like help coming up with other ways to keep your kids engaged this summer, contact us. We are here to help!