10+ Ways to Actively Engage Your Child’s Mind this Summer {Math, Science, & Technology}

by Tiffany · June 29, 2017

This is the second installment of our Avoiding the Summer Slide series. The first one was about all things writing and reading and art. Go take a look!

I think the hard part about doing math, science, and technology activities over the summer is that it takes more parent-guidance. That’s fine, but sometimes I’m all like, “hey, it’s summer, let me read my book!” So, if you’re like me, I’ve tried to include some activities the kids can do on their own along with a few that require more parental involvement.

Math

It can be hard for me to figure out what is going to be “fun” for the kids to do in the math arena… because isn’t all math fun?!

This summer a couple of kids have gotta keep those stinkin’ math facts alive, and while I refuse to call memorizing math facts “math” (it’s just not), I’ll put what we’re doing in this category anyway:

Apps: Sushi Monster, Pet Bingo, Operation Math, and Math Monsters.
Roll ‘n Race Addition/Subtraction games (I’ll need to make it for multiplication too!)
Subtraction dot games to use with dot markers or bingo chips.
Multiplication Bingo.

In addition, before bed we sometimes like to read a Bedtime Math story (book or app). It’s great for families with different age kids because each story has 3 levels of math problems. It’s doesn’t feel lesson-ish, but has a true bedtime short-story feel.

If you’re looking to strengthen the mental math muscles (we sure are), Zeus on the Loose is a fun game that gives kids practice (and they probably won’t even realize it).

Asante has been super into Rubiks cubes… the 2×2, 3×3, 4×4– there are many and each require their own method of solving. If you have a puzzler on your hands, Rubiks cubes have been genius for long car rides and rainy mornings. I’m not super into that sort of thing, BUT, we discovered that we can enjoy Rubiks-like puzzles while throwing in a little mother/son competition with the game Rubik’s Race.

The point of the game is to manipulate your game board to match the little shaker the fastest. I love it because it’s a fun way for us to hang out together. He loves it because, well, he loves competition, Rubiks cubes, and beating his poor momma. We highly recommend this fun way to flex problem-solving skills!

Science

Invention kits are my weakness. What’s better than a pile full of odds and ends, with only time to limit all of the creations waiting to be made? Probably nothing (well, maybe a really good book).

I recently stumbled upon Creativity for Kids’ new Spark!Lab Smithsonian Inventive kits. The idea behind the kits is to engage kids in the same process as professional inventors. It’s modeled off the Draper Spark!Lab at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C. Kids are challenged to invent all kinds of stuff with these kits: shoes, money, a board game, etc.

We are trying out the Inventors Studio, which includes a ton of materials and an inventor’s notebook that walks kids through the inventing process. Inventors have to think and research and sketch and build and tweak– it’s not just a one-and-done kind of thing. Talking about the inventing process was really good for the kids. I think they still have the expectation that they will come up with an amazing idea after 3 minutes, build it, and ta-da! Perseverance is a huge challenge for many kids (and adults).

The girls worked together to build a treehouse. There were a lot of ideas flying around, maybe a few hurt feelings when some ideas were rejected, but in the end, they got the cooperation thing worked out. Not perfectly, but at least one idea from each person was used. Thank you, Jake, for facilitating that process.

We also have our eye on a few experiments we’d like to try out:

Ada especially wants to learn about the body, so I’ve been collecting books, videos, etc. that she can explore in her free time.

Usborne’s See Inside Your Body is a durable, informational book that is a huge hit for kids… especially because of one feature on page .
We’ll make some playdoh models of the brain and neurons and talk about what the different parts do.
Make a pool noodle model of the spinal cord.
If you can get over the simple graphics, these videos by KidsHealth (How the Body Works series) are packed full of content that is delivered in bite-size chunks.

Finally, space has been an interest this summer, so we checked out a stack of space books from the library to dive into, and found a creative make-the-planets printable from Playful Learning.

Coding & Typing

Learning to code is like learning to write these days. It’s going to be an important skill for our kids to learn as they grow up and contribute to the world. One of our absolute favorite ways to code is using Bitsbox. It’s the only subscription box that I’ve bought with my own money because it’s 150% worth it to our family. I’ve written some about it– you can find me gush about it here as well as here.

This summer Asante and Aly have been spending 30 minutes each, a few days a week, practicing. I love that they are learning some code and how all that works, while having fun and practicing their typing skills in a non-boring way.

Check out this really fun fireworks app we created!