Trading the "Summer Slide" Panic for a Love of Literacy

As the school year wraps up and the chaotic magic of summer begins, a familiar thought usually creeps into my mind: “How far behind are my kids?”

If you are anything like me, it doesn’t take much to fall down a rabbit hole of worry, obsessing over checklists and wondering exactly what needs to be done to catch them up to grade level before September.

But after taking a deep breath and having some honest conversations, I realized something important: I’ve been focusing on the wrong thing.

Do I want my girls reading at grade level? Of course I do! But is a test score or a reading level more important than my daughters actually enjoying stories? Absolutely not.

So, this summer, I am rewriting our family goals. We aren’t just chasing benchmarks; our ultimate goal this summer is to fall in love with reading.

Will we still practice the reading basics? Yes, absolutely. But our daily emphasis is shifting. We are going to prioritize finding stories that spark joy, reading together as a family, and naturally weaving literacy into our everyday lives.

If you want to trade the summer anxiety for some reading joy, here are five ways we are supporting our girls in learning to love reading this season.

Create a Routine

• Have a designated reading time

• Create a cozy reading spot

• Make it fun!

• Play audiobooks in the background

Make it a Shared Experience

• Read a recipe together

• Talk with each other about what you’re reading

• Ask questions about what they’re reading

Audiobooks

• Allows access to books beyond their reading level

• Develops comprehension and vocabulary

• Builds a love for stories

• Listen in the car

• Listen while you play or draw

• Listen to an audiobook as a family

Interactive Literacy Games

• Get the entire family involved

• Make reading fun

• Game ideas: Scrabble, Apples to Apples, Bananagrams, Zingo, Fidget Games

• I Spy Sounds – “I spy something that starts with ___sound”

• Word Hop Scotch – write words in each square and read them as you hop

Pair Books with Experiences

• Read a book and then watch the movie

• Draw a picture of the story you read

• Read a book about animals and then go to the zoo

• Read a book about food and then try to make that food

Happy Reading!