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Looking at recent articles and research, it seems that opinions are mixed on if the summer slide is real or if it just feels that way because of the children that start school with learning gaps already in place (Staake, 2024).
I believe the summer slide affects some students more than others. I teach in a Title 1 school with a large multilingual learner population. I definitely see the effects summer has on retention of student learning, especially in homes where English is not spoken. These students take more time to recall reading skills upon return to school in the fall. Furthermore, according to Staake (2024) most research suggests that two groups of students experience a higher rate of learning loss over the summer: students in the lower elementary grades and students who come from low-income families.
With this in mind, I wanted to provide you with some simple ideas to send home to parents to prevent the summer slide.
Ideas to Prevent Summer Slide
1. Encourage parents to sign up for the Summer Reading Program at your local library. Some districts automatically enroll students in the library’s Summer Reading Program! If so, you’ve got a head start. Just advertise this! If not, be sure to send home a flyer about it. Summer Reading Programs have awesome prizes and educational events held all summer long!
2. Send home a one pager of educational websites/apps for students to use during the summer. That way at least some of their screen time will be devoted to learning! Click here for a list of more than 80 websites for elementary students from Bored Teachers to get you started.
3. Send a calendar with an activity for each day of the summer. This one takes a little more time to create, but once it’s done, you only have to update it each year. I did this when I taught preschool. I included activities that covered all subjects and free events happening around the area. Some activity ideas you can use: write letters/words with sidewalk chalk, sort your toys by size/color, follow and cook a recipe with a parent, take a bike ride, and practice writing your name in different colors. Free events might include events held at parks, farmer’s markets, car shows, sand sculpture contest at the beach, and library events.
4. Share a list of summer camps. Many parents work during the summer and need child care. Other parents want to provide enrichment for their child. Be sure to include summer camps of all different interests. And most importantly, send out the list well before registration begins. Camps tend to fill up quickly. Some camps to include would be ones held at the local YMCA, a camp held through the city park program, music camps, karate camps, art camps through local businesses, etc.
5. Send home a challenge for students to complete over the summer. Offer a reward when they bring back the completed challenge at the beginning of the next school year. Check out this post from We Are Teachers that includes some fabulous challenges, along with a few summer reading programs to join! For prizes, try to get a local business to donate something for your students. A bonus of this idea is that your previous years’ students will show up to see you some time during the first week of school to collect their prize!
Conclusion
Whether you choose one idea to send home to parents to prevent summer slide or all of them is up to you! I wanted to share ideas that don’t take up too much time to create or too much paper to print 😉. And isn’t too much of a hassle for parents.
You won’t find me being the one sending home a Bridge workbook or work packet to complete over the summer. My kids have had them sent home to complete over the summer because their district made teachers send them home. Did we touch them? Maybe once. I feel that was a huge waste of district funds. Hopefully your district doesn’t do that.
Because even though I believe parents should have their children do a little bit of learning over the summer I, also, believe summer is a time for a break for everyone! Not just teachers. Students need a break, too. They need time with family, time outdoors, time to be kids!
If you enjoyed this post and are looking for end of the year gifts, check out my post 10 Gifts for Students for the End of the Year! Comment below which idea you chose to share with parents or feel free to share one of your own!