Keep Kids on Track During the Holidays (in One Hour!)

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For many students, school breaks are an opportunity to relax, socialize, and sleep in. However, for parents, the time off from school may cause concern about how children will be filling their days.

School breaks can be very disruptive to a family’s schedule—filling the hours is often a source of worry for parents. While most families welcome the holiday breaks as an opportunity to spend quality time together, the disruption to the normal routine can cause children to get off-track. The academic consequences for spending an entire holiday in extreme brain-break mode are not good.

In as little as a couple of weeks, students can lose their learning momentum and slip behind in school. That’s why it’s important for families to incorporate academic-style activities into their holiday break planning.

This doesn’t mean hitting the books for hours on end—it’s the holidays after all! Students of all ages can keep their minds sharp and have fun by participating in a little structured learning time, whether it is to simply by reading or by playing board games.

While some students may not have any assigned work, many students will be assigned some sort of schoolwork over the holidays. Homework can be easily forgotten this during the holiday excitement—that’s why families should plan on having a “learning hour”—one hour a day to chip away at schoolwork, to review notes, and to maintain learning momentum.

The hour set aside for learning doesn’t have to be all about schoolwork—kids can work on special projects such as a holiday scrapbook, or crossword puzzles—anything to keep them mentally engaged. By keeping the learning hour short, sweet, and fun, maintaining academic momentum can become as much a part of holiday break activities as sleeping in and visiting with family.