Summer homework ideas … in case you fear education regression

Mums Tips

Schooling

Published on Wednesday, 23 July 2014 19:00

Last Updated on 22 July 2014

Monica Costa

0 Comments

I spoke with a couple of primary teachers over the years and they all confirmed that during the Summer holidays children fall behind in their spellings, writing, reading and maths by the time they return for the new school year in September. Not surprisingly this is confirmed by a research that reveals that almost half of parents (47%) are “worried” about education regression during the long school holidays. So here we present Summer homework ideas and fun workbooks you can take on holidays to both keep children entertained and help them refresh their knowledge while having fun. 

I checked with the teachers and these workbooks are all recommended by the school because they support the curriculum learning and build skills at home. Piece of mind!!

These ones below are for KS2 but you can get the equivalent for KS1. The teacher also said that these workbooks could be used to do some extra practice at home throughout the school year.

Here they are:

Gold Stars: KS2 age 7-9 English

The English activity book is full of colourful challenges and gives children lots of chances to practice their spellings, grammar, writing and reading comprehension in a fun way. I have used the KS1 last year and my son loved it. Actually he was sometimes looking forward to ‘playing the English games’. RRP £3.99

 

Gold Stars: KS2 age 7-9 Maths

This book is packed with colourful maths activities and helps children gain basic skills in handling numbers, shapes and measures. RRP £3.99

The Gold Stars range is available nationwide from Sainsbury’s, WHSmith, Morrisons, Wilkinson and other good retailers.

Further stats from the Parragon study(that coincided with the launch of  the new Gold Stars series) about parents’ worries include:
·     Over one in four parents are already worrying about their children’s performance in exams next summer
·     Over a third of parents worry that other parents are investing more time and money in their children’s education this summer
·     A quarter fear their children will watch too much TV; a fifth worry about too many late summer nights
·     Almost half of parents admit to reducing or giving up on bedtime reading completely in the holidays
·     Parents will spend £1.6bn on educational pursuits this summer

However, many parents are actively planning pursuits to keep their child entertained and occupied as 93% have already planned activities. Nearly 29% are planning trips to sites of educational interest, whilst 16% will send their child to summer school.  A highly organised 7% of parents have planned activities for every week of the holidays.

The cost of these educational pursuits is on average £228 per child over the summer break. This rises in the capital with parents in London spending, on average, £319 per child during the summer. For the nation’s children, this works out at a total cost of £1.9bn for the six week period, approximately £40m per day. Almost a quarter of parents (23%) admit to feeling the pressure to spend a lot of money during the summer holidays.