If your child is like most kids, he’s more than happy to retire his math textbooks to the attic as soon as summer hits. After an entire school year of long division and solving for x, the only thing he looks forward to in the next few months is hanging out with his friends and other summer shenanigans.

While a break from studying is definitely a welcome change of pace, the length of time kids stay out of school can actually handicap them when school starts in the fall. According to the John Hopkins School of Education, kids lose as much as two months of computational skills over the summer. Additionally, a survey of about 500 teachers found that 66% of the respondents spent three to six weeks re-teaching materials from the previous school year just to make up for this so-called “summer slide.”

Falling behind

Of course, the farther behind a student performs in math during the school year, the bigger the impact the summer slide will have on them when school officially starts. Why do children fall behind on such an important subject—one that they need if they wish to pursue any career in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) track?

While teachers definitely try their best to make students love math, the reality is that different students have different aptitudes and ways of understanding a given topic. As such, children who struggle with math may need a little more extra attention not just to help them understand a given math topic, but also to build the confidence to tackle other mathematical concepts.

This is why in recent years, more and more parents are signing up their kids for math summer camps that seek to halt the summer slide by providing crucial and customized training for kids who struggle in math.

A summer math program such as Mathnasium, for instance, begins by assessing a students’ current skills in math, which is then used as a basis for crafting customized learning plans given by highly trained instructors.

Looking to the future

STEM-related careers have seen massive growth, according to Canada 2067. For instance, employment in the health sector grew by 35% between 2001 and 2011, while it grew by 20% for jobs in the natural and applied sciences.

If you wish to give your children an advantage, consider getting them a math tutor and enroll them in a summer learning camp. Not only will it better prepare them for the coming school year, but they will also be better equipped for the future.

Sources:
Why Summer Learning Deserves a Front-Row Seat in the Education Reform Arena, JHU.com
Summer Learning Loss Study: Can ‘Summer Slide’ Be Prevented?, HuffingtonPost.com