We usually do summer school in our homeschool. Let’s face it, despite my best attempts and well laid plans, distracting and unhelpful things come up! We are so consistently and perpetually running “behind”, that for us, it’s actually not running behind. Ever since our first year of summer school in 2020, my kiddos actually look forward to summer school. That’s right, they like it! Want to know my secret? It’s a simple token economy. The kiddos earn fake money for doing summer school work and I set up a store in the closet where they can buy stuff with the fake money. They love it and it works because it’s only for summer. If it was any longer, I doubt that I could sustain the system. But for about 8 weeks it’s totally doable.
The first year we had “sun coins”, last year we had “pineapple points”, and this year we’ve got “watermelon wages”. Each summer, I make some cute fake money. I find an image to go with the theme, print it out multiple times, cut out the pieces, and laminate them for durability.
The summer school store is stocked with snacks, books, games, DVDs, crafts, and small toys. I purchase things ahead of time from thrift stores, the Dollar Tree, Walmart and Target. I’ll probably need to do a little re-stocking mid-summer.
The kiddos can also buy extra treats like movie nights, video game play time, living room camp outs, popsicles, etc. I put a limit on purchases so they can’t just buy all the snacks in one day or movie nights every day for an entire week.
Besides our fun summer school program we are working on the “extreme book nerd challenge” at our library and we’ll sign up for the library’s summer reading program when it starts June 6th. We got The Good and the Beautiful Summer Reading Program too. We’re excited that LitWits is offering 3 Zoom workshops this summer for “My Side of the Mountain”, “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”, and “The Hobbit”. To top off our book-filled summer, we set up a Mobile Sharing Library in our front yard for the neighborhood to enjoy.
We also have a few camping trips planned (Yellowstone, Tetons, and Glacier National Parks) so stay tuned for those…
☀️ What are you looking forward to this summer?
☀️ What’s on your summer reading list?
heavens to betty 
Okay. I am going to have to give you the “Mom of the Year” award – again! I am sure your kids love, love, love this! This summer, we have trips planned to Michigan, Grand Tetons and Yellowstone. We will have to compare dates for GT and Yellowstone. And we have a few smaller trips close to home, too. I look forward to riding our e-bikes – here, there and everywhere. I love summer! And I love watermelon, too!
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You are too kind, as usual! We did Yellowstone last weekend (it snowed) and Tetons is coming up in June. I think you should have the better weather in August! 😂
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What a fun idea! I did something similar for chores when my daughter was little. Now that she’s a teen it doesn’t work as well. Haha! It sounds like you’re going to have a fun summer!
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My oldest (age 12) prefers cash incentives!! 🤨🙄
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Here”s to a Fun Watermelon Wages Summer School” and awesome summer reading.
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Looks fun! Doing things with a good attitude is key. Just curious, do you have a summer routine/rhythm you follow? My younger kid has finished all their stuff for the year…the other still has math, handwriting and reading to finish. We’ll do as much as we can in the next two weeks before daddy is done for the summer but I expect we’ll be doing reading lessons through the summer. Thankfully everyone likes reading around here so it’s not a problem.
We have a trip to Denver, Colorado planned…hoping to do a little fossil digging on the way. And a backpacking trip to Marble Mountains Wilderness area 🙂
My kids will be reading with the Good and the Beautiful and our library reading program. I don’t have a reading list for me yet…haven’t been able to read much the last several months though so I’m looking forward to having that time again.
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Our summer routine is very similar to our regular school routine but the incentive part is totally different. We do seatwork (devotional, math, spelling, writing, etc workbooks) after breakfast. When you’re done with whatever workbooks are assigned that day, you get free play time before lunch. More free play time while I clean up lunch and then a group activity (science/history/art/etc). Free play and tidying up before dinner. After dinner, showers/brush teeth, then storytime (devotional, poem, picture book and a chapter or two from the current chapter book) then off to bed!
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Such a fun idea! I have fond memories of participating in the summer reading program at the library.
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