The editor was gone. The evening editor needed a column, so I wrote this up in a couple hours for him.
Summer vacation engenders visions of sleeping in late, lazy days by the swimming pool or just hanging out with friends. But do not completely yield to such mindlessness activities for your children these last seven weeks of summer vacation.
Be like Sonya Carson, the mother of brain surgeon Ben Carson (the first surgeon to successfully separate conjoined twins) and refuse to let your child’s mind die in front of the electronic entertainment. Rather than allow her sons to waste their time in front of the television set, Sonya insisted they read two books each week and write a book review on each book. Her insistence on not wasting educational opportunities improved Carson’s skills to the point that Yale University accepted him for his undergraduate studies and the rest is history. Unplug the television set and pull out the books — including some on that list the school suggests for summer reading.
Summer also provides a great opportunity to help your child strengthen skills in math: work on flash cards, pull out workbooks, review last year’s math skills and play games involving numerical skills with them. If you know how to play chess, teach them or pull out another strategy game, such as Risk, and give the younger set a mental challenge.
Expand your child’s educational opportunities this summer — and we do not mean turn on the television and watch the nature shows on the Discovery Channel. No, we mean pull down that book with the neat ideas for simple science experiments to do at home, have your student make a small garden plot, plant it and research what he or she needs to do to raise a few vegetables.
Get outside: take a picnic (and a book about plants) to the South Arkansas Arboretum at the corner of Mount Holly Road and Timberlane and spend some time identifying the variety of plants in the area. Or get the app for identifying plants. Peter Belhumeur, research botanist and curator at the Smithsonian Institution, developed LeafSnap, an electronic field guide that is now available on the iPhone and iPad, and will be on Android phones later this year. According to the Associated Press story, it is easy enough for a child to use, but goes well beyond the basics for botanists.
“The app, which is free, allows a user to photograph a leaf, upload it and see a list of possible matches within seconds. There is also a complementary website (http://leafsnap.com) with profiles of each species. Initial interest is high; the app has been installed 150,000 times.”
Get around to finally visiting the Museum of Natural Resources in Smackover, not just to wander through, but to read, listen and visit with the staff. Make time to research other areas that experienced boom times such as the gold rush to California and Alaska. Find out when other oil booms have happened across the country. (Hint the answers can be found in encyclopedias, on the Internet and in books at the library.)
Add some hands-on education: Take out a recipe book (or find recipes online at Cooks.com or some other recipe website) and let the kids try their hands at making two or three meals (or more) each week. Ask friends to teach your child the skills you do not possess, whether it is the mechanics of sewing, auto repair or building.
Plan to visit a couple historical sites this summer. Have your readers research the background of these sites and report them to the family during supper before you go. Say the summer vacation goes through Little Rock. Plan a stop at Central High School, log onto the Internet and research the vast amount of information from that time, bring some pictures to the supper table and then go visit the museum across the street from CHS.
Or just pick one word to learn each day. Explain it to them in the morning, listen for them to use it at least twice in a sentence and talk about it at the dinner table.
A brain is a terrible thing to waste, even for a couple months in the summer. Be proactive. Make this summer a great educational experience for your student and you.