We reminisce about our summer break as fondly as we obsess over our weekends in adulthood. What we probably overlooked as a child, enjoying the long weeks without a care in the world, were the low test scores after the holiday. This phenomenon is called the summer slide. It’s an adverse effect on the academic development of the students due to a gap in regular studies.
What is Summer Slide?
The summer slide refers to the learning loss that occurs over the days that students remain out of school. It’s a form of academic decline or regression. They forget a substantial amount of skills and knowledge, which they acquired in the previous school year. The damage worsens the longer children are kept away from regular classes. The decay in learning is due to loss of contact with education material, activities, and lack of practice. The impact is so severe that teachers have to re-teach the same concepts again, before moving on to the new material. According to the renowned Quinn and Polikoff’s education research, key summer slide statistics are as follows:
- Summer slide leads to a decline in the students’ achievement scores. The loss is equivalent to a month’s worth of school education.
- Older student’s summer learning loss is higher than younger students.
- Maths skills degraded more than the student’s reading skills, over the holiday.
While gender and race remain neutral, socio-economic status plays an important role in the summer slide. According to the Faucet Theory, middle or upper-class students have more access to educational resources than children from lower-income families. Thus, it hits the lower socio-economic strata of the population harder. It also widens the achievement gap among students.
How To Prevent Summer Slide?
Now that we are familiar with what is the summer slide in education, you need to realise how and why it’s crucial to nip it in the bud. Here’s how you can assist your child to avoid it altogether:
Reading
Students suffer a 25% reading loss over the summer months. Reading half an hour a day can fend off the summer reading slide and preserve their language skills.
- Build a consistent routine of reading for the student. Exchange screen time with fictional or non-fictional books. Or you can merge the formats and have them read digital books.
- Urge them to read newspapers, comics, and general knowledge magazines.
- Make it a family hobby. Reading becomes more enjoyable when done together. Have healthy discussions over each book to facilitate its comprehension.
- Create go-to lists of different genres of books for various occasions. For example, books for beach reads, long-drive reads, etc.
- Take them to a library and encourage them to get books of their choice. Ask recommendations from the librarian or shopkeeper for intriguing and age-appropriate books.
- Enrol your child in summer reading programs available online or at local libraries.
- For young children, find picture storybooks and read them to. Make them recite paragraphs with you as well. Reading aloud will improve their pronunciation and intonation.
Writing
Writing skills such as grammar, spelling, and punctuation degrade over the summer. The speed and legibility of penmanship also decline due to lack of practice.
- Fix a specific time of the day for writing exercises. For instance, provide a random prompt and ask your child to write a short story on it.
- Make your child write summaries or essays on the books they read. It will improve their writing skills as well as their understanding of the reading material.
- Introduce new words to the child to increase their vocabulary. Or you can ask them to make a list of interesting words they find in newspapers or books.
- Discuss their writing mistakes together to provide proper guidance to them. Or find a tutor for comprehensive language training.
- Inculcate a habit of diary writing in your child. This will help them express their thoughts and emotions clearly.
- Use whiteboards, chalkboards, or colourful stationery to hook their attention and elevate their interest in writing.
- Get a tutor for calligraphy classes to enhance their handwriting. You can also hire them to revise and advance the child’s existing literature skills or to learn a new language.
Maths
Numeracy skills decline fastest and a student can lose 2 months’ worth of knowledge in a span of a holiday. Maths requires an indefinite amount of practice to gain proficiency over it. Without consistent practice, maths skills are the first to decline.
- Ask your child to help you with household chores that require maths. For instance, measuring ingredients for cooking, budgeting monthly expenses, planning road trips according to distance and time, etc.
- Use random trivia questions to stimulate their numerical ability. For instance, make them calculate the area of their bedroom or the volume of water in the swimming pool.
- Help them memorize multiplication tables, formulas for various equations, and other important concepts.
- Find a tutor for the subject if your child finds it difficult and needs additional help. The extra preparation with undivided attention can help them catch up with others when the school resumes.
- Encourage your teenagers to take on part-time jobs that leverage maths. For example, a cashier at a local eatery, a research or lab assistant, etc.
Tutoring
Extra weeks of one-on-one or group tutoring can prevent summer slide as well as augment your child’s academic growth. They can provide at-home or virtual lessons and can function as a summer school for the student. A tutor can help them in a plethora of ways:
- Most tutors offer learning programs for specific subjects or the full syllabus of the grade. Thus, they can prepare your child to excel at school.
- They provide a routine and structure to the holidays while still leaving room for relaxation and family time.
- The child can revise and relearn old concepts and will be ready to begin with the new topics as soon as the school restarts.
- Tutors and students form a learning partnership. Children are more likely to engage in study-related summer activities with a tutor than their parents.
- A tutor can help your child acquire necessary life skills such as time management, reasoning and critical thinking.
Additional Tips
- Make sure to keep the summer schedule light and fun. Long vacations are a privilege of childhood, let your child enjoy it to the fullest.
- Invest some ample time in a new hobby or skill. For example, one can learn coding or a computer language over the summer.
- Keep the mind active with puzzles, crosswords, and quizzes. Indulge in games that stimulate and facilitate high-order thinking in the child.
- Arrange educational activities for your child with friends or fellow students. A book club or sudoku group will keep their cognitive and social skills sharp.
Steer clear of the summer slide rather than wasting precious academic time to overcome it. Disguise learning as engaging activities without stripping away the fun from the holiday. Take advantage of the online resources at EzyMathsTutoring or let a tutor do the job for you. Advance your child’s knowledge and skills this summer, instead of making them bear the setback of the break.