Combine Traveling With Learning for the Summer

Wherever your summer travels take you, there will be many learning opportunities for your young child. Places you visit can lead to fun exercises in both reading and math.

For reading:

• Make a point to see any attractions that might involve books. For example, maybe there is an author’s home open for visiting, or a location that was a backdrop for a favorite story. If possible, go to that location’s library and compare and contrast it to your own town library.
• Take time to read together all tourist information provided. For example, if going to a national park, be sure to read the signs and plaques that tell about the topography and wildlife you might encounter on a trail. Or at a zoo, help your child read informational signs about the animals and their environment.
• Stop at a local bookstore and ask about a simple, inexpensive story that describes the area you are visiting. Purchase it for her as a keepsake of the trip.
• Have him start a simple “travel diary.” In a small notebook, have him write the date at the top of the page. Then ask him to draw some of the things you did that day. Before bed, help him write some simple sentences to go with the pictures. This is a great reference if he’s asked to tell about “What I did this summer” once school resumes in the fall.

For math:

• When getting ready to travel, show him how you calculate the distance from your home to the destination. Estimate together how many miles you will be traveling during the entire trip. Even though a young child might not understand more complicated math, he will remember and have a frame of reference about doing this as a family when he encounters higher level calculations in upper grades.
• If you are visiting historic sites, pay attention to dates on buildings or statues and help her figure out how old the sites are. Create a comparison; for example, “Grandpa wasn’t even born when this bridge was built.”
• Have him look for and count specific road signs. Point out and help him count forward (or backward numbers, depending on your route) the highway exit sign numbers. Ask him to predict which one will be next.

These easy and fun ideas make a young child involved and vested in using skills learned this past school year. Activities like these will keep skills sharp and ready for a new school year!