According to a recent survey, 93% of parents plan to have their children revise during the summer holidays, and the essential holiday notebooks are unanimous! But should you make your child work during the summer holidays or, on the contrary, let him release the pressure? The advice of Sylvain, teacher.
According to a recent survey of 1,100 families by Cours Legendre, a company specializing in school support, 93% of parents plan to revise their children during the summer holidays. They are 63% to declare that they make them work several times a week and 22% even hope to make them get a little head start for the coming school year. To put yourself in the professor’s shoes, 82% of respondents rely on the essential holiday notebooks! But are they really useful in the summer? Should you make your child work to prevent him from forgetting the concepts learned during the year, or on the contrary, should you let them breathe a little?
Should you make your child work in the summer?
For Sylvain, a teacher in Nancy, “it is important that the children have a real holiday during which they rest and cut off from the school rhythm” says the teacher. The holiday notebook can therefore be a good educational tool, provided that it is fun for the child and that it does not represent a source of unnecessary stress within the family.
Indeed, it is not uncommon for the child to have difficulty finishing his vacation notebook, which generally makes the parents feel guilty. “They experience a sense of waste when the notebook is not completely filled. The child then feels that he must do everything to finish it and puts unnecessary pressure on himself.“The holiday notebook must therefore above all amuse the child, without becoming a constraint.
Alternating school exercises and games, and sometimes even featuring their favorite heroes, these holiday notebooks have everything to attract children’s attention. “We must be attentive to the professions of authors. But, above all, parents must take 15 minutes of their time each day to accompany their child while he completes his notebook. Finally, you have to accept that he does not finish it! In summary, it is a question of supervising it with benevolence and with the objective of making it autonomous.“
Tips for revising your child differently during the summer
During the summer holidays, Sylvain advises favor cultural experiences rather than very academic exercises. “Children today lack concrete experiences. To overcome this, it is essential to punctuate the days with fun activities (cooking, playing sports, gardening, seeing an exhibition, etc.). Thus, depending on the approach chosen, each of these activities will make him work on reading and mathematics.
- Ask him to read a story to his little brother or sister
- Have him read the recipe when making a cake.
- Choose a postcard and ask him to write a note or a letter to his grandparents
- Playing cards, Mille Bornes, merchant, Scrabble, chess with your child is also a good way to get him to do math or French without him realizing it.
The fall is approaching… If the child must absolutely enjoy his holidays as he should, he must also get back into the bath of school before the start of the school year. So, “15 days before the start of the school year, parents can gradually immerse him in his lessons and remind him of what he did last year. He will be able to read, write, do mental arithmetic for 15 minutes a day, preferably in the morning. This daily work will then increase to 20 and then 30 minutes. In any case, you have to adapt to the child and above all don’t forget to give rhythm to the exercise“.