The Summer of My Lost Learning.

                   If you are a language teacher, World or English,  then you have probably resorted at some point to using a variation on the popular theme of " what did you do  on your summer vacation?" for a student writing prompt. Let's face it, there so much organization to handle at the beginning of the school year, that this is a quick, easy, no brainer way to jumpstart our students into writing. It's a great way to personalize learning. It helps us to get to know our students better, both personally and  academically,while we are still struggling with putting the faces together with the names.  After reading a few of these writing assignments, we will learn a lot. We will probably be able to ascertain which students summer vacations were not exactly chock full of  growth experiences from those students who enjoyed many different enriching activities both personally and educationally. I found a blog which offers a variety of activities to help parents, teachers and students combat summer learning loss.  This blog "Updates on Thinkfinity" describes a site called a Summer Learning Microsite. I think pushing this site on kids is probably our best bet. Something tells me that there is probably not much we as educators can do to involve parents in their child's continuing education during the summer if the parent chooses otherwise. We, as teachers are not present during the summer. So for those children who do not have home guidance, but do have an interest in learning then maybe aiming this at our interested students might a way to go to combat summer learning loss. Check it out at: http://hickstro.org.