July 22, 2004
State Schools Chief Jack O'Connell Releases Tips
for Getting Kids Back on the Learning Track
SACRAMENTO — In response to research showing students lose academic skills over vacation breaks, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell today released a list of tips for parents to help their children keep learning habits fresh.
"It's important that students keep learning even while on vacation," O'Connell said." Research shows that children who don't keep up on their skills over a long school break can lose up to two months of math and reading skills. When this happens, valuable class time in the new year must be spent brushing up on lost skills, rather than tackling new, grade-level material."
For many of the 22 percent of California students at year-round schools, intersession is about over, and for those on a traditional calendar, summer break is more than halfway over.
"Even students on year-round schedules can get out of the learning habit quickly," O'Connell said. "But there are lots of fun ways that parents can help their children become active learners, every day of the year."
"Parents are children's first and most important teachers," O'Connell added. "It's my hope that these tips will help California parents instill everyday learning habits so that all students will return to school ready and eager to learn." The tips include ways to encourage students to read, write, and use math skills daily. They are posted on the California Department of Education Web site: Schools Chief O'Connell Releases Tips for Learning - Year 2004. They encourage parents and students to frequently visit local libraries, which offer a variety of learning programs over the summer months. Research has shown that students on traditional school calendars who read regularly during the summer maintain their reading capacity at a much higher level than those students who do not. And readers return to school ready to learn in the fall.
"These are just some ways educators suggest parents can help prepare their children for going back to school," O'Connell said. "We hope they'll inspire parents to think of new ways to incorporate learning into daily activities, and keep their kids on the learning track."
# # # #
Attachment
State Superintendent Jack O'Connell's Ten Tips for Vacation Learning
1) Use the STAR student report to focus on skills.
- Under "Your child's strengths and needs..." parents will find specific content areas shown by their child's testing results to be areas in need of academic focus. Talk to your child's teacher or ask your local librarian for help finding materials to work with in these areas.
2) Make a weekly library date with your child.
- Check out a new book, go to a library activity, go online together or just browse in a new subject area.
- Pick a biography of an interesting person to read and discuss each week.
- Find out the library's group reading schedule.
- Read books nominated for the California Young Reader Medal. Visit California Reading Association [http://www.californiareads.org/] (Outside Source) for the categories and titles.
- Start a neighborhood book club.
3) Write and share vacation journals.
- Even if your school break is right in your own backyard, there's plenty to write about each day. Ask your child to write a paragraph or page each day.
- Get kids in the habit of describing their surroundings and activities in writing.
- Interview a neighbor, or find out and write about the plants and flowers that grow near your home.
4) Count and compute as you go.
- While shopping for groceries, practice counting change, budgeting, calculating best buys, and nutritional values of food.
- Calculate gas mileage and distances or time traveled in a car or on a bus.
5) Learn the history of your neighborhood.
- Interview longtime residents in the neighborhood.
- Go to the library and research old newspapers.
- Take a family field trip to the local museum or city planning department.
6) Make mealtime a learning occasion.
- Figure out the nutritional value of your meals.
- Discuss current events from the newspaper, and relate them to history.
- Have students prepare food and calculate measurements (e.g. Doubling a recipe).
7) Turn off the TV and read.
- Set aside time each day to read with your children.
- Have your children read aloud to you.
- Discuss what has been read to develop reading comprehension.
- Remind high school students of research showing that one of the best ways to prepare for SAT (college board) exams is reading a variety of literature and many titles.
- Read and interpret technical manuals together - your children will likely understand them better than you!
8) Encourage citizenship skills.
- Volunteer. Visit a nursing home, work at a food bank, do chores for someone in need.
- Help a neighbor with some yard work.
- Start a neighborhood cleanup campaign.
9) Learn about science.
- Pick a theme to study (e.g.: astronomy, biology, paleontology, geology).
- Visit a park in your neighborhood and observe the animals, insects, leaves, and rocks.
- Make homemade ice cream or other foods to show children about the properties of salt, liquid, and solids.
- Visit Exploratorium [http://www.exploratorium.edu/] (Outside Source) or interactive online activities or ideas for easy activities to do at home.
- View Web sites like the Discovery Channel [http://www.discovery.com/] (Outside Source). View the U.S. Department of Education site, "Helping your child learn science," [http://www.ed.gov/pubs/parents/Science/index.html] (Outside Source) to obtain fun and simple experiments that you can construct with your child.
10) Use the Web as a learning tool.
- Visit CDE's Web site Recommended Literature (K-12) - Reading/Language Arts that contains a collection of outstanding literature for children and adolescents.
- Find ways to motivate your child to read by visiting the Reading is Fundamental [http://www.rif.org/parents/] (Outside Source) Web site.
- Instructional materials such as lesson plans and worksheets can be obtained at Learning Page [http://www.learningpage.com/] (Outside Source).
- Visit Johns Hopkins University's Center for Summer Learning [http://www.summerlearning.org/] (Outside Source) Web site for entertaining activities.
