Summer fun with weekly themes for the kids

Summer is here!  I love this time of year, but with young ones the summer can get LONG and you can run out of ways to keep those little bundles of energy busy and happy.  So, last summer we picked a theme for each week and did art, crafts, stories and little outings that went along with our weekly theme.  Our themed learning and playing worked really well last summer and we all had a good time exploring different worlds together.  Sydney stayed engaged and pretty well-behaved and she looked forward to the new adventures each week would bring.  So, I’ve planned the same sort of thing for this summer and I thought I’d share some of our plans in case there are other moms out there with young ones home looking to add a little fun and a little structure to an otherwise long and open-ended summer.

We will be exploring the following themes this summer:  under the sea, on the farm, building and construction, fantasy land, on safari, Dr. Seuss, sports, food and cooking, and nature.

We started this week with “Under the Sea” and it has been fun.  It doesn’t really take much work at all to set up a theme for the week and follow it through.  Here’s what we did this week to give you an idea of how simple it can be:

1. Did under the sea artwork (coloring, stickers, stamps)
2. Pulled out all our ocean-related books and picked up a few extra at the library for our weekly reading
3. Pulled out any ocean-related toys and puzzles and put them in a special basket for the kids to use this week
4. We did a sea creature hunt (like an egg hunt but with Pierce’s sea creature bath toys) in the back yard.  This was a big hit.  We probably did it 10 or more times over two days, taking turns hiding them and so on.  The kids really enjoyed it.
5. Sydney did some work with a few ocean-related vocabulary words.  She had three words to look up in the dictionary, use in a sentence and illustrate.
6. At the end of the week I reward the kids with a themed movie afternoon if they have had good behavior.  This week we watched “Finding Nemo” and had popcorn (thanks to a neighbor who loaned us the movie!).

So, none of this really took much time or forethought on my part, but it gave the kids something new and interesting to look forward to.  I’m keeping their art and “work” in 3-ring binders so they can see all they’ve done throughout the summer.  Other things you could do for a theme week include: printing off word searches or coloring pages from free websites, doing some themed cooking or snacks, and of course, field trips are fun.  Some of the field trips we did last year were: visiting the aviation park at RDU to watch planes take off and land, visiting the NC Zoo, and visiting the aquarium at Fort Fisher.

I didn't really spend much money to plan our summer adventures.  I did pick up some sticker books at the craft stores to go with our themes and bought one or two small items (like a new puzzle for Pierce for our construction week).  Otherwise, it's just a matter of sorting through what you already have, visiting the library and making sure you have plenty of basic craft supplies on hand.

We certainly don't spend all day on our weekly theme, but for those few hours when you are inside and need a little structure and interest, the theme is a big help.  And switching out the books, puzzles, toys and games each week makes everything seem new and interesting for the kids.

I know we have a baby coming soon, but having a little bit of a plan and some ideas for fun activities already lined up has helped me to envision a summer with less whining and hopefully happier kids.

Sydney finished kindergarten!

Sydney on her last day of school - no uniforms that day!

Sydney finished kindergarten on Thursday of last week.  She really had a great year at St. Mary Magdalene, and we are so fortunate to be able to send her to such a wonderful school.  She loved her teachers and made some good friends.  With only two classes per grade, she’ll be sure to have some familiar faces in her first grade class next year.  Sydney was so sad to have her kindergarten year come to an end.  She cried for her last day of school, and I know she’ll miss her teachers and friends this summer.  

There were so many great things about St. Mary Magdalene, but one little thing in particular illustrates the type of environment she was in this year: every morning (every single morning), Sydney’s teacher assistant Mrs. Bishop would greet her as she walked in the room by saying, “Good morning, Sydney.  You are a gift from God.”  I loved this way of starting the day.  Imagine if all children were uplifted like that on a daily basis at school.  In fact, I remember when she was in public school it used to really annoy me how she was ignored or greeted in a harsh manner by her assistant when she walked in the room.  No eye contact, no smile, not using Sydney’s name.  That really bothered me.

As for the academics, Sydney learned SO much this year!  Before starting school, she could read simple books and now she can read just about any book you hand her (and will if you let her).  She could write all the letters back in August, although her penmanship was not great and most of her letters were written upper case.  She could spell a few simple words like “I,” “love,” “was,” and so on.  I scanned two samples of her writing from this year because the difference is so amazing.  Both were written independently with no spelling help (obviously!).  The first is from her first few weeks of school back in August and the last is something she wrote this weekend.  She LOVES to write and is enthusiastically embracing the idea of keeping a daily summer journal.

Funny true story!  Translation: "It was my nap time.  I saw a spider.  It was under my bean bag.  I told my mom.  My mom she killed the spider."  Yay, for mom the superhero!

This is Sydney's journal entry about her sleep over this weekend with Aunt Zia and Uncle Thomas.  Love the liberal use of exclamations and question marks!

We are looking forward to a fun summer at home with the new baby.  I have lots of little activities planned for Sydney and Pierce and we will hit the pool as often as we can.  I think she’ll be glad to be on summer vacation and will soon forget about missing all the fun in kindergarten.  I know mommy is THRILLED not to be making school lunches any more and to have a break from the driving and paperwork involved in school!  Yay for summer break!