Enriching Education: At-Home Activities for Education Week

  

This week is American Education Week (Nov. 15 to 19), and I’m writing to suggest a story on holiday-themed learning activities that are fun to do with your kids over Thanksgiving and the Christmas holidays.

 

Brainly, the world’s largest online learning community, has come up with 6 activities that celebrate learning with a holiday twist:

Holiday Cooking. Measuring ingredients is a great way to sharpen kids’ math skills by cooking your favorite hearty foods. They can use their skills to mix the ingredients, learn proportions, and have fun doing it!

 

’Tis the Season for Festive Reading. Gather around and get cozy reading holiday classics. Don’t let the December holidays disrupt learning, try this list of 11 Favorite Holiday Books for Kids. 

 

Snowflake Geometry. This fun activity of folding, cutting, and shaping snowflakes gives students the opportunity to practice identifying geometric concepts and understanding symmetry.

 

Discover the History of the Holidays. There are seven December holidays and fun ways to introduce kids to each one’s rich heritage, traditions, and cultures. Discover where Santa Claus came from, why they call Hanukkah the ‘Festival of Lights’, and learn about Kwanzaa’s ‘Feast of Faith’. Here is a link for How to Teach Kids About Diverse Winter Holidays.

 

Quality Learning Time Together. The holiday break is the perfect time for parents and kids to sit down together without the hustle and bustle of everyday routines and spend time learning together. Online platforms like Brainly and Coursehero are great ways to keep your mind sharp over the holidays, practice what’s being learned in school, and have fun in the process. Some platforms, like Brainly, offer special parental accounts which allow you to track your young student’s progress.

 

Gingerbread House Engineering. This design project is perfect for the holidays so kids can build, test, and evaluate their own creations and is adaptable to many grade levels. Try these Engineering Challenges created by real-life teachers!

For more on this, Brainly’s Parenting Expert, Patrick Quinn, can explain why this week and beyond it’s important for the entire family to engage in learning activities — especially after pandemic-related school disruptions.