Do you have your kids do workbooks or similar in the summer?

[mom2rtk]

Most of the kids around here go to summer school. Up through middle school, they get $50 if they go through the entire session and miss no days (down from $100 pretty recently). In high school, they go for credit instead of cash. When our oldest 2 were in elementary and thought briefly about going, I actually paid them that first year to stay home (so the decision wouldn't be about money). I didn't want them to sell their down time. It is sort of a bummer though to have all of their friends unavailable to do things most of the summer.

 

[clori]

Around here summer school is remedial only and kids need to be recommended. High school kids have to pay. I don't know if it costs on the k-8 level.

 

[PollyannaMom]

I always have grand plans, but never do everything I meant to. We've always done some sort of summer reading program though (or there has been an actual assignment from school).

This year I do plan to do something related to geography (which I think is getting squashed out in school) but I'm not sure exactly what - more fun than a workbook, but less expensive than actual travel. - Hmmm?

And DS actually said he needs to practice cursive. After they taught it in school, they let the kids go right back to printing, and it didn't stick.

 

[DVC-Don]

Yep, back in their elementary school days they worked on math, writing and reading workbooks in the summer. Usually about an hour five mornings a week. I would get them at a teacher supply store. This was back before internet access.

 

[lauradis]

Never would I ever force my normal grade student to do workbooks of any kind, durning summer BREAK!

Summer is a time for independent learning, social skills, physics. Also know as voluntior summer library reading, sleep overs, riding bikes, building forts.

Really life is to short!

What did you do as a child durning summer?

 

[taitai]

Absolutely. They do about 45 - 60 minutes a day of academics in addition to reading (which they love and do all the time anyway). I got them each a couple workbooks plus they are doing an online coding class. Writing too.

They are up about 13 or 14 hours a day and so spending about one hour of it doing something academic doesn't seem like a hardship to us. It should probably be more. The rest of the time they are playing baseball, basketball, riding bikes, ripstik, swimming, tubing or waterskiing in the lake, SUP, fishing, kayaking, visiting friends, walking the dog, going to movies, etc. They are having a full, happy, summer. In my next life, I want to be them.

My kids are going into 6th and 7th grades.

 

[Soldier's*Sweeties]

Never would I ever force my normal grade student to do workbooks of any kind, durning summer BREAK!

Summer is a time for independent learning, social skills, physics. Also know as voluntior summer library reading, sleep overs, riding bikes, building forts.

Really life is to short!

What did you do as a child durning summer?

I agree! I also schedule very little for my kids. Some of the best times of my childhood were when my mom "banished" me to the backyard



Swing set water slides anyone??? There's a physics lesson for you

That could be another thread all together.

 

[Gracie09]

The school does give us a few pages (like 4-5) to keep up skills over the summer. I might bring them on the plane to disney for something for them to do. Otherwise, I will sign them up for summer reading at the library and really work on that. (One dd has a learning disability and we suspect dyslexia so she struggles with it.) We are sending the girls to a YMCA camp where they will spend the day playing, swimming and chasing frogs. I want them exhausted and dirty by the end of the day!

 

[phorsenuf]

I never had the kids do anything over the summer. Summer was for fun. They have enough schooling the rest of the year. But then again, I am not a perfect Dis mom or have super smart snowflakes. I failed in that aspect.

 

[SLP958]

No. DS reads when he wants to but that is about it.

One day they will be grown and have no summer so I figure, enjoy while you can kids!

 

[Art 1]

The kids had summer homework from first grade on. By high school it was a decent amount. Due the first day of school no excuses. I didn't have a problem with it and it served them well in university.

 

[Teresa Pitman]

Nope. My kids always read a lot anyway. But I think kids really need the opportunity to play, be active, do nothing, relax and enjoy the summer.

 

[mtemm]

Pollyannamom, funny you bring up cursive. Our schools seem to be backing away from it and a lot of it depends on which teacher you got for a particular grade (3rd maybe?). I have twins who will be going into 6th and realized about a month or so ago that my son can't sign his own name and struggles to read cursive writing. We had gone to the jfk library I think and we were all reading some notes/letters on display and he could not make them out. His twin sister had no problem, but had a different teacher who was old school and did a cursive unit. I definitely want to work with DS on this over the summer

 

[msjprincess]

No, my kids have ELA and math assignments from school every summer. That's enough

 

[Art 1]

Lets say a student has 14 hrs available in a day after sleeping and eating and so forth. That's close to 100 hrs per week. To not expect or think your student can't do say 5 to 10 hrs a week of assigned homework in the summer, reading the classics and writing papers on them, math and such to me is just being lazy. I excepted more out of mine and couldn't imagine them spending a summer doing no brain work. One of the things that was attractive to me about their schools and to other parents as well was the summer homework.

 

[StephMK]

DD15 does not have anything and plans to work next summer. DS is going into HS and has to read a book and do an online assignment for a class. Otherwise, no work for them. Right now, they are washing the dogs! LOL
When they were younger, I did have them do a few activities just to keep their skills up but nothing regular.

 

[TipsyTraveler]

I would've been so bitter as a kid if I'd been given summer homework assignments. (Even regular school year homework is questionable in my mind.) Everyone deserves downtime to veg out and get a break from the daily grind, even kids.

As a matter of principle, how far into personal time should the school day extend? Can you imagine if your boss sent work home with you every evening, weekend, and holiday? If he sent work along with you when you went on a family vacation, or sent home busywork to "keep your mind sharp" while on a leave of absence? And, oh yeah, your job doesn't pay you, either. Nor, can you leave and find a new job. You're stuck with this one. Everyone seems to recognize that work/life balance is important; I feel the same is true for school/life balance.

On the topic of daily reading and/or writing requirements, which i guess are in part to help kids develop a habit or passion for reading or writing, I feel like there's a good chance of that backfiring. I was a voracious reader in my early school years. I read Jane Eyre when I was eight because I wanted the challenge of completing a 400 page book. Then they started the reading program -- We were required to read X number of books each month. Reading stopped being enjoyable for me. Now it was an obligation with a deadline. Something I HAD to do, no matter if I was tired or not in the mood or busy with something else. You can bet I stopped going for advanced level books like Jane Eyre. If I allowed a book like that to eat up so much of my time I wouldn't be able to fulfill the # required. The required reading program was essentially when reading stopped being fun for me. And once I soured on it, I never got back in the habit. I still don't read for enjoyment. Maybe one book a year, if that.

 

[DisneyMomx7]

Our school sends home math packets and a reading list. They have to complete the packets and do book reports, to be turned in at the beginning of the school year, as part of their first quarter grades, guaranteeing they can hate me all summer long for continuing to nag them over homework :/

Exactly! The school sends home enough. I do encourage them to read but that's it. No extra work from me

Seems to work fine - the older kids all graduated from college and one graduated from law school!

 

[joannamet]

Lets say a student has 14 hrs available in a day after sleeping and eating and so forth. That's close to 100 hrs per week. To not expect or think your student can't do say 5 to 10 hrs a week of assigned homework in the summer, reading the classics and writing papers on them, math and such to me is just being lazy. I excepted more out of mine and couldn't imagine them spending a summer doing no brain work. One of the things that was attractive to me about their schools and to other parents as well was the summer homework.

Exactly what I was going to say.

 

[Soldier's*Sweeties]

Lets say a student has 14 hrs available in a day after sleeping and eating and so forth. That's close to 100 hrs per week. To not expect or think your student can't do say 5 to 10 hrs a week of assigned homework in the summer, reading the classics and writing papers on them, math and such to me is just being lazy. I excepted more out of mine and couldn't imagine them spending a summer doing no brain work. One of the things that was attractive to me about their schools and to other parents as well was the summer homework.

I am pretty far from lazy.

I just think their little brains need a rest. Just because they aren't doing structured school work doesn't mean they aren't staying sharp and learning in other ways.

Granted, my kids are still young, but they do great in school. DS just won 5th place in a school wide science fair... In second grade!

I never had summer work until I was in honors classes in HS(they had required summer reading assignments) and I did very well in school. I didn't graduate college because my life took a different direction at that point, but it wasn't because of academics, and I'm starting again this fall. I sure as heck won't be doing summer work!