TEANECK, NJ - Summer is just around corner, and school-aged children are gearing up for two warm months of fun and relaxation. Although school will not be in session, the learning process does not have to stop. In fact, it is imperative that children, and particularly children with special needs, continue to practice and review what they've learned during the year in order to maintain educational goals and ease the transition back to school in September. Parents can help keep their children's academic skills sharp this summer by incorporating learning into everyday activities.
Laurette Rothwachs, Dean of the Sinai Special Needs Institute, an organization dedicated to educating special needs children and young adults within the Jewish community, issued the following tips for promoting education this summer vacation.
1. Continue to strengthen language and organization skills by encouraging children to
keep a journal or create a scrapbook. Even sending postcards, letters or e-mails to friends can keep them on track with grammar and punctuation. It's a fun way for your children to record and share with others how they spent their summer vacation, while fostering creativity and reinforcing the importance of language arts.
2. Show your children that math can be fun. For example, make up songs for
multiplication tables and sing aloud during car trips. When dining at a restaurant, encourage children to tally up the bill, and see if their calculation is accurate. Watching or attending sporting events is a good way to incorporate numbers and statistics to further develop a child's math skills.
3. Learn through cooking and baking. Children love desserts, so why not let them bake
their very own cookies or cupcakes? Giving them such tasks as writing the grocery list and searching for those items at the grocery, measuring the ingredients and mixing everything together can create fun opportunities to review math and organization skills.
4. Science and nature are all around us and learning about it can be an easy everyday
adventure. A simple checklist of items such as rocks, flowers, animals or trees can easily transform into an educational scavenger hunt. Children can draw pictures or take of items they have found and visit the library to learn more about them.
5. Try a new hobby or sport. Open their eyes to new forms of self-expression by
introducing them to such things as photography, painting, music or dance. Take the fun outside and play sports like tennis, baseball or basketball. These types of activities strengthen hand-eye coordination, improve concentration and help build self-esteem.
Founded in 1982, Sinai Special Needs Institute (www.sinaiinstitute.org) provides for the educational, psychological and emotional needs of Jewish children and young adults with varying types and degrees of learning and developmental disabilities through its elementary school, and girls and boys high school programs. Additional programs such as Supervised Home Environment for Learning Independence, self-advocacy, Project 'SELF', life skills, college guidance and vocational training enable students to continue their education as they transition to adulthood. It is the only Jewish day school for special needs students to be accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges & Schools.
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