With summer here I have seen (and received) a lot of questions from parents who are worried about their children regressing over the three months of no school. Having a daughter on the spectrum, I truly understand this fear. Our first summer of no school I got horrible anxiety over how to handle that much unstructured time while keeping her from regressing. For the most part though, there is nothing to be worried about because you can keep your child learning through play.
Children learn best through play and social interactions. Getting your child to engage in play is just a matter of finding what they enjoy and setting up the invitation. It doesn’t take expensive toys or even an expensive curriculum to teach your child. All it takes is your time.
Earlier this week both of the kiddos were begging to get the water balloons out for a water fight. Since we are learning about colors, I thought it might be fun to fill our water balloons with food dye in the primary colors to experiment with how the colors mix. We had an absolute blast with this and the set up was extremely easy.
Items Needed for Water Balloon Painting:
- Water Balloons
- Food Dye
- Water
- Easel Paper (or something else to target)
- A juice jug with spigot (to make filling easy)
Once everything is set up let your kids do their thing and encourage observations as they play.
Having fun while learning! What can beat that?
Other Learning Ideas for Water Balloon Painting:
- Sight Word or Letter Recognition: Use a sharpie to write words or letters on the easel paper. Have kids take turns throwing a water balloon at a specific word or letter.
- Math Skills: Use a sharpie to write out numbers on the easel paper. Call out a number or a math problem and have kids target the answer.
- Motor and Communication Skills: Use milk carton scoops to play a question/answer game of catch. Wear white shirts for an awesome keepsake!
- And Much More! You can very easily modify something like this to your child’s developmental level!