On Water Slides and Summer Slides

Imagine: You have spent nine months in a classroom doing intensive learning. You’ve been studying 4-5 days out of seven each week, and fine-tuning your foreign language skills. Then, June rolls around and you stop learning at that pace. Or at all. For three entire months. September comes, and you are lost on the first day of school and spend weeks playing catch up.

This is called the Summer Slide, when students take too much of a break from school. This not only occurs with younger students, but also college and older students! We think students should have fun in the summer time, but no exposure to foreign language can leave them struggling in the fall. Plus, language learning is fun!

We found a great article about how to avoid this summer slide from this site. Here is a selection of the best tips:

• “Don’t let them veg. The slide is worse for students who either don’t have access to or choose not to participate in summer activities.
• Look for online resources. Learning doesn’t have to stop just because the school building is locked. Online learning can not only help keep learners sharp, but can actually help them improve by the time they get back to school.
• Find immersion, if possible. Foreign language learners in the US might have trouble finding places where their target language is predominantly spoken, but ELL students can make an effort to spend some time away from their native-speaking family and converse in English—even if it’s just the grocery store.
• Construct a virtual field trip. Many students don’t have the means to travel over the summer. Take the time to make a virtual field trip for them using tools like Google Earth, Wikipedia, and YouTube. They can “travel” and get some immersion at the same time.”

A few sessions with Ready Languages would also be a big help – whether once monthly or weekly in August, online or in-person whatever! Individualized meetings to maintain and enhance child’s (or your) memory are essential to starting next year off right! Study now, reduce frustration later. And we promise, we’ll make it fun and worthwhile!