Do-It-Yourself Summer Camp

Last year we finally got summer right.

We always spend most of July doing family trips and family reunions but before last year, June and August had typically ended up being either boring or stressful.

One year we tried just lounging at the pool and doing whatever came up. After a week or so, we were all pretty bored and frustrated and started scrambling for more playdates and day camps to join.  The next year,  I ran the kids around to a bunch of classes to keep them busy but I found all the classes to be mediocre at best and felt we were wasting our time and our money while stressing ourselves out with trying to get to certain places at certain times so much.  Then the following year, I actually conducted classes for the kids and all their friends. Doing our own tuition-based summer school with classes of 10-12 kids was SO fun but SO much work!

So last year, I decided NOT to take the kids to classes all over town and NOT to invite the whole neighborhood over for classes.  Instead, the kids and I came up with our own plan for the “Loosli Learning Adventures Camp” that lasted throughout June and the parts of July and August when we weren’t traveling.  Together, we brainstormed a list of things that would be good to do each day to keep our bodies and brains active and our house clean. Then we brainstormed a “bucket list” of fun activities we’d like to do together. We ended up with a good list of six “MUST-DO ACTIVITIES” that the kids agreed to complete individually each day (usually in the morning) and a list of ideas for exciting group activities (or “DAILY ADVENTURES”) that we’d chip away at (usually in the afternoon).

Following are some details on what we came up with:

“MUST-DO” DAILY ACTIVITIES:

Each  morning, we got up whenever we woke up (usually by around 7:30), had a leisurely breakfast that finished by around 8:30, and then did our individual activities for a couple hours until lunchtime (they did their stuff on their list and I got a couple hours of work done for Power of Moms – with a few interruptions here and there – but they became quite self-directed after the first few days). Here’s what we decided together would be on the kids’ required individual daily activities list:

• READING: Read for 20 minutes (some read for longer – that’s fine!)
• WRITING: Write a page in your journal (write about whatever you want, write a story, write about what happened yesterday, or pick a writing idea from a list of writing prompts we’ve got; younger children can work on learning to write letters)
• PHYSICAL EXERCISE: Do a physical activity (can be individual or do it as a group – ride bikes or scooters, play tag, go for a walk, play at the playground, jump rope, shoot hoops)
• PRACTICING: Work towards one of your summer goals by practicing a skill for 20 minutes (piano, basketball, guitar, typing – each child has their short list of skills they want to develop)
• HOME: Do a job from the job list (we have a list of 5-10 minute household jobs that need to be completed each week – i.e. dust the living room, weed one flower bed, vacuum the stairs, wipe down the kids’ bathroom sink)
• EXTRA: From the approved list of ideas we brainstormed together, pick an extra activity to do on your own or with siblings. Examples: work on Spanish (we’re loving the simple on-line free program Coffee Break Spanish – 15 minute lessons), do online reading or math games, play a board game with siblings, do extra reading or writing, paint or draw, etc.

My daughter felt like writing a book report for her writing point one day:

DAILY ADVENTURES:

One of our Power of Moms readers sent in a great idea for having specified days for different things. We used her idea to group our long “bucket list” of brainstormed activities into categories for fun family activities each day after the kids finished their “must-do’s”:

• Make-it Monday (building projects with K’nex and legos or the wood we have in the backyard for the kids to use in building forts, craft projects, art projects, a visit to the library to learn about artists and inventors and engineering – art and building and invention are big things in our family)
• Take a trip Tuesday (the park, a museum, a bike ride, a field trip to a historic place, a factory tour, a picnic, a friend’s house…We often invited other kids or other families along)
• Wet Wednesday (swim/go to a spash pad/play in the sprinklers, often with friends and neighbors)
• Thinking Thursday (research something from our “wondering list” – a list of things we’re wondering about. Last summer we had a great time finding out how to make yogurt, how cars are made, where baby carrots come from and how monster trucks work thanks to YouTube, Wikipedia and library trips)
• Friend Friday (everyone can have a friend over – nice to do it all at once and protect our family time during most of the rest of the week.  Plus we always have Family Movie Night on Fridays)
  

  a “Take a Trip Tuesday” with friends – went to the “Spiral Jetty” in the Great Salt Lake

A “Thinking Thursday” activity – they wanted to know how bread was made so we went to a local bakery

a “Wet Wednesday” – simple sprinkler time

I love being my kids’ teacher.  I mean all moms are their kids’ teachers in many ways – but it’s great to do it in a little more formal way sometimes.  I so admire moms who home school.  While I don’t know if it would be the right thing for us longterm,  I feel like summer’s the perfect time set up a special sort of summer “home school” where I can teach my kids about things I really value and love while we really enjoy each other’s company.

my kids working on their “wondering list”

QUESTION: What are your ideas for making summer fun, fulfilling, interesting and non-stressful?

CHALLENGE: Sit down with your kids to talk about what they’re excited about doing this summer and what they they think everyone should be doing to keep their brains and bodies and the house functioning well. Create your own family “learning adventures camp” if you want!

***If you’d like step-by-step instructions, printable charts, activity lists, photos, and everything you need to create and implement your own Learning Adventures Camp, click here for our “Do-it-Yourself Summer Camp Kit.”

** To see beautiful photos and great details about how one mom implemented these ideas, click HERE.

** To see how the Loosli Learning Camp went last year, check out Saren’s blog HERE.