Toronto - The summer has arrived with the longest day of the year today. With school summer break just days away, most preschoolers will also get a chance to spend more time with their parents and family. It’s the perfect time for parents to start thinking about how they will keep their youngsters happy, entertained and occupied. Invest in Kids, a national charity supporting the healthy development of children under five, has released the Comfort, Play & Teach™ Summer Activity Guide to help families with young children plan their time together throughout the nine weeks of summer break.
“Summertime is a great opportunity for parents and children to spend some quality time together. As with any break or holiday, it’s important to pace ourselves, to maintain a healthy balance, so that neither the parents nor the kids feel overwhelmed with too much of the same thing, or bored with not enough things to do,” says Chaya Kulkarni, child development and parenting expert at Invest in Kids.
And, to achieve that balance for both the parents and the kids, Invest in Kids’ Comfort, Play & Teach™ Summer Activity Guide offers ninety activities that families can mix and match to create their very own calendar of summer break fun, appropriate to the age of their child and to their own situation. Here are several tips for parents on how to pace themselves and their kids through the summer and how the Comfort, Play & Teach™ Summer Activity Guide will help them do that:
Summer schedule and routines
The schedule during breaks and holidays may be a little different, but children still need to have their routines. Maintaining a regular bedtime, mealtime and activity schedule is important during the summer as during any other time of the year. This way, children are better prepared for what to expect and have an easier time dealing with a later transition to their fall schedule.
The Comfort, Play & Teach™ Summer Activity Guide offers parents a range of activities to choose from, whether it is for only an hour or spending a day away from home: Crafts, Excursions, Reading, Websites, Videos/DVDs, Cooking, Science & Nature, Music & Movement, Dramatic Play, and Games/Physical Activities.
Outdoor vs. Indoor activities & Active vs. Quiet time With the beautiful weather most of the time, traveling, sightseeing, excursions, nature walks and outdoor physical games seem like an easy and natural thing to do. It’s a great way for kids to explore new places, learn new things, and meet new people. To escape the sun for a few hours, or on a rainy summer afternoon, reading, watching an interesting DVD/video, listening to the music or exploring a new website together, are all fun and educational alternatives that both parents and kids will enjoy. Indoor activities are also a simple way to schedule some downtime.
Group vs. Individual activities
Some parents worry that when their preschooler is spending more time at home that he or she will miss out on socialization with other children of his or her age. Whether indoors or outdoors, many activities parents will find in the Comfort, Play & Teach™ Summer Activity Guide are easy to turn into playgroups or play dates with your child’s friends, babysitters, grandparents and other family members.
For a complete calendar of the Comfort, Play & Teach Summer Activities, visit www.investinkids.ca. Parents and their preschoolers can select, download and/or print activities they would like to do by this summer’s themes: Noticing Nature; Beating the Heat; Awesome Art Adventures; Fantastic Food; Puppets, Rhymes and Story Time; Indoor/Outdoor Games Galore; Dazzling Dinosaurs; and Spectacular Outer Space. For each theme, they will find ten different types of activities, all based on the Invest in Kids’ Comfort, Play & Teach™: An Approach to Positive Parenting. This research-based framework is built on everyday moments that are already part of a parent’s daily routine and shows the relationship between a parent’s behaviour and a child’s development.
