While most of the parents move out for a week or two with kids, preferably to a much cooler location such as hill stations or beaches like Goa, there is a big chunk of summer holidays that remains and could be made useful, if planned properly. After all, just because it’s holiday time, it doesn’t mean kids can’t be creative or productive and have fun at the same time. There are numerous engaging and productive activities for your kids, this summer. Here’s a list of some of them.
Bring back the old-world charm
For parents who were born in the 80’s and before, one would remember and even relate to this. There was a time when summer did not mean watching endless hours of television, being busy on cell phones or indulging in mindless conversations. That time, it was about getting lost in a book, playing interactive outdoor games, writing letters to pen pals, and so much more. How cool it would be if you could bring back such activities for your kids and let them have a feel of old-school summers. Activities like these are not only incredibly fun but also educational for them.
For the love of Sports
The weather is hot, and we are all used to being in a controlled environment, with 24x7 AC’s switched on. But we have all grown up in schools, which were not centrally air-conditioned and our immunity level was definitely better then the kids have today. Of course, you don’t have to send the child to a park in mid-afternoon, but if your child is cooped at home playing computer games, chances are that s/he might turn out unsociable. Evening is a good time to head to the park for a team-based or individual activity. Sports has the additional quality of building confidence, self-esteem and developing team spirit amongst children. Apart from ensuring an active lifestyle, it develops a steady passion for discipline, motivation, and commitment. Parents with no background in sports can enroll their children in a sports club where the child will be exposed to several sports till he picks up a keen interest in something. So, this summer don’t slow down, let your kid freak out and enjoy their favourite game.
In the lap of Mother Nature
Today, a very important thing is to make kids responsible towards the environment and help them bond with nature. Free from the distractions of technology, a nature camp for a week can be a big booster in fostering love for Mother Nature and make them realise its importance for a sustainable living. Other benefits of nature camps include — ample time to relax, share, explore and learn a whole lot of fascinating things about nature, indulge in nature photography, bird watching and enjoying eco-friendly. It’s time to bring your kid a step closer to nature.
Bringing back the joy of reading
“There is no friend as loyal as a book.” Declining reading habit in kids is a cause of grave concern across the world. Reading is central to a child’s education and in preparing them for life after school. It helps children develop emotionally, socially, intellectually and culturally. Reading books can help kids develop better SPAG skills (spelling, punctuation and grammar) leading to better fluency, appreciative vocabulary and a more refined exposure to ideas and concepts. Being a part of a book club initiates a better understanding of perspectives that instills participation and discussion.
For those children who do not have a book club in their vicinity, there are interactive online book clubs such as Fiction Express, which can help kids develop a reading habit in an engaging and fun way, at the click of a button.
Train the Brain
If you have a child between the age of three and five years, keeping these cute devils engaged is a herculean task. Trust me when I say, coding is not a rocket science and your tiny tot can learn to code while playing a game. Imagine a wooden robot, designed to teach children how to code that doesn’t use screens or require children to be literate. The Cubetto Play set consists of a friendly robot made of hard-wearing wood, a physical programming board, and a set of colorful coding blocks that make up a programming language you can touch. Such play sets encourage imagination and exploration into the world of programming and provides gender-neutral play that boosts a child’s creativity, critical thinking, spatial awareness and communication skills.
In today’s digital era, we cannot completely move kids off screens, but we can definitely try and ensure that the time is used productively. If you have kid older than five years, there are umpteen coding clubs today that ensure coding can be fun and interactive. Using the approach of ‘learn by doing’ in a game style environment, several platforms with the help of different learnings extracted from school curriculums provide curated games with scenarios tailored into a story suiting varying age groups. With the help of blocks and visualising tool, kids can be taught literally any subject and utilise the screen time in the best way possible.
As parents and educators, it is our duty to pave the path of interactive learning and move kids away from rote learning. These are just some of the ways to do it, develop your own as you go along.
(The authors Vikas Sharma is AVP (marketing), Eupheus learning and IndraKohli, is the principal of Delhi Public School, GautamBudh Nagar, Noida)