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| The author said the summer break with her family went by quickly, and they didn't get much homework done. Courtesy Kris Ann Valdez |
When the school year ended, I had a plan — or at least, I thought I did.
My daughter, fresh out of first grade, comes from a long line of late readers. I told myself not to panic over her end-of-year reading scores, but I also knew that a little extra practice couldn’t hurt. Standing in her classroom on the last day of school, I looked her teacher in the eye and promised, “We’ll work on it this summer. I’ll make sure she gets the reading time she needs.”
Minutes later, I found myself having a similar conversation with my son’s sixth-grade teacher. After a year of slow but steady improvement in math, I was determined to keep his momentum going. “We’ll drill multiplication and division all summer,” I assured her, confident in my own follow-through.
The intentions were there. The sincerity was real. But summer has a way of rewriting even the best-laid plans.
The Way It Was Supposed to Go
In previous years, I ran summer break like a low-key boot camp for the mind. Each morning, the kids had a checklist to complete before they could earn their golden ticket: one hour of screen time. The rules were consistent — 15 minutes of reading, physical activity, outdoor time, a chore or two, practicing an instrument or foreign language, and a bit of math review.
It wasn’t rigid enough to feel oppressive, but it kept their academic muscles from going soft. So when I made my promises to their teachers, I meant them. This wasn’t my first rodeo. I knew the system worked.
But this year, the checklist never made it to the fridge. Somewhere between the final bell of June and the first popsicle of summer, we let it slide.
What We Did Instead
The absence of structure didn’t mean the absence of learning — it just took on a different shape.
I didn’t sit my daughter down for 15 minutes of formal reading each day, but our summer was still steeped in stories. I read aloud to her in the mornings, she devoured audiobooks in the afternoons, and she often watched her older brother spend hours curled up with a book — modeling the quiet joy of getting lost in a story.
We joined not one, but three summer reading programs through local bookstores and our library. We brought home towering stacks of nonfiction, diving into American history before our family trip to Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia. Together, we learned about Frederick Douglass, Lady Bird Johnson, and a dozen other historical figures who made the past feel alive.
And while my son’s math fact drills never happened, we wandered into another kind of numbers lesson. He opened his first savings account at our local credit union, learned how to keep track of deposits, and even got an introduction to basic stock trading. Real-world math, with real-world stakes.
A Different Kind of Growth
Without the checklist hanging over us, the tone of our summer shifted. The pressure to “earn” screen time faded, and I noticed something unexpected: my kids were choosing creativity and activity on their own. When they did ask for screen time, I felt more relaxed about saying yes — and more often than not, it became a shared experience. Instead of retreating into separate devices, we found ourselves watching movies together, often ‘90s classics from my own childhood.
Our days were full, but in a different way. We bounced through trampoline parks, played endless rounds of Settlers of Catan, and lingered in conversations that weren’t rushed by the ticking clock of a to-do list. There was laughter, there was connection, and there was the rare gift of simply being present.
Yes, a small part of me still feels a twinge of guilt for not keeping my promise to the teachers. I know that steady practice in reading and math is important. But then I think about my daughter using words like “quivering” in casual conversation, thanks to her audiobook adventures. I think about my son plowing through two entire book series and a stack of stand-alone novels. I think about both of them walking into the school year with a stronger grasp of history than many adults I know.
No Regrets — Well, Almost
If I could rewind the summer and do it all again, I’m not sure I’d change much. Maybe I’d sneak in those 15 minutes of core skill practice, but I wouldn’t trade the experiences we had — the travel, the shared stories, the board game battles, the afternoons that unfolded without a plan.
We learned, we laughed, and we made memories. And while I might carry a flicker of guilt into parent-teacher conferences this fall, I suspect I’m not the only parent who let the summer breathe a little more than planned.
Sometimes, the best education happens when you close the workbook and open the door to the world.
