Keeping Kids’ Math Skills Sharp All Summer Long

Did you know? Children are at risk over the summer months for losing the skills they’ve developed during the year – and the risk is greater for losing math skills than reading skills. Here are some fun things you can do to avoid this summer slump and give your child a leg up on math for the fall.

Kids are always on the lookout for ways to earn money during the summer months. You can hone their math skills by helping them set a goal for the total amount they want to earn, and make a chart or graph to track weekly progress. Encouraging them to budget an amount for saving as well as spending is another way to engage them with money math. Use these Cyberchase money videos and activities to help you get started!

Parents are asked these questions often, but how often do you turn them back to your child and share a brief math moment? If you say, About how far (how many, how much) do you think it is? and then suggest ways to estimate, you can help your child recognize those times when an answer that is ‘close enough’ is actually ‘good enough!’ Estimation (or making a thinking guess) is a useful math tool any time a precise answer isn’t necessary to solve a problem. Have fun playing with estimation with Glowla’s Estimation Contraption.

Number puzzles are a fun summer pastime, and you can make them up on the spot at a ball game. Take turns picking a player’s number and making up clues to see if the other person can figure out who it is. For example: “My player’s number is an even number. It’s more than 10, less than 15, and is a multiple of 3.” Watch “The Hacker’s Challenge” from Cyberchase to experiment with different numbers.

Summer is a great time to help kids develop good habits around physical activity. Help your child choose a type of activity they enjoy (swimming, riding bikes, hiking), and then set performance goals—bike or hike a certain distance in a given amount of time, or swim a set number of laps—to try to reach by the end of summer. The trick to success is to agree on a schedule, and use a chart or graph to keep track of progress after each session. Keeping track helps kids measure progress, keep them motivated, and even predict how long it will take to reach their goals. See how the CyberSquad sets goals for being active in “Fit to be Heroes.”

Everyone spends time waiting, whether it’s at the doctor’s office, in line at the supermarket, or sitting hungry at a restaurant. Before your child gets restless, here’s a fun and simple math game that helps build algebraic thinking skills while beating the boredom! Player A picks a number between 0 and 10 and says it out loud. Player B silently picks a secret rule (plus 3, for example, or minus 2), applies the rule to the number, and says the new number out loud. Keeping that new number in mind, player A says another number, player B silently applies the same rule, and gives player A the new number. The player continues until player A has enough information to guess the rule.

Help your child brush up on fractions, geometry, measurement and more this summer with games and activities on the Cyberchase website.