Discover top-rated summer curriculum books and activity guides to keep kids engaged and learning all summer long. Let’s review the Summer Bridge Program and SPECTRUM Workbooks, offering fun, hands-on activities across subjects such as reading, math, science, and art.
Perfect for parents seeking educational and entertaining resources for their children during the summer break.
Disclosure: This post contains Amazon affiliate links.
Summer Curriculum Books Reviews
Summer break is quickly approaching. We know that kids have the potential to make learning gains over the summer if provided with an enriching home or childcare environment. It is so important to make sure that learning happens in the summer months.
Here at The Educators’ Spin On It we try to incorporate fun, hands-on learning activities, field trips, and the more traditional academics into our daily summer routines.
If you are looking for inspiration, there are some great summer programs out there to help your child continue learning throughout the summer months.
Here are just a few that we have collected, purchased, and/or had the opportunity to review.
SUMMER Bridge Program
The publishing company Carson-Dellosa also puts out a summer program that has been a favorite of mine as a teacher for many years. One of the main components is a workbook for kids, but don’t worry – not all worksheets are bad.
In fact, a little each day can keep skills up to speed. I really like that the book is set up into 3 different months with one page (front and back) of mixed skills for the kids to do. My daughter was ecstatic about the entire thing and begged to start right away. I explained that she was only allowed to do one page every day and this limitation has made it all the more exciting (gotta love 5 year olds!).
Every morning she has woken up and completed her page during breakfast. Because she is a reader and likes a challenge, I ordered the 1st grade going into 2nd package. This right at her independent level, meaning that she can read 95-100% of the words independently.
It is important to know if your child would benefit more for the current grade, a grade higher (enrichment) or a grade lower (extra support). If you are not sure, you could always ask their current teacher for a recommendation!
This morning, she did a little work with time, long vowel sounds, reading comprehension (matching a sentence to the correct picture) and read a fact about how long glass takes to decompose. This led into a discussion about composting and recycling. Other days there are little fitness challenges that encourage kids to complete a fitness task.
I really like how the workbook is visually easy to read, colorful, and highly motivating. It isn’t overwhelming, but also covers a vast amount of academic content.
As a parent, I also appreciate the addition of character development. Although we talk about it as a family, it is important to highlight special words like flexibility and what it means in our house. Our children have very limited screen time, but an online companion also comes with the purchase of each book.
The second main part to this program is a set of 2 activity card bundles. In the past 5 days, I have spent over 7 hours listening to her read jokes and facts out loud to me. One of these packs will be traveling with us on the airplane. These flip cards would also be great entertainment for when the family goes out to restaurants!
The Summer Learning Bridge Group has really done a superb job making a summer academic review program that is easy and affordable for us parents to use!
SPECTRUM Workbook Series
Although both my daughter and I really enjoy the Summer Bridge Program, I really want her to have more practice reading for an academic purpose. She usually reads books of her choice at least 1 hour every day and is becoming quite a well versed, fluent reader.
A trip to the local teacher store (these are great for parents too) led me to the Spectrum Workbooks. The picture is a link to the same one I purchased on Amazon, they have all the grade levels available there too. (I just like shopping locally when I can!)
I went in looking for first grade reading material that was organized in a visually clear manner. I mainly was looking for a reading specific book so that we could focus on reading comprehension, phonics, and fluency in on-grade level text.
Although I went in for one book, I ended up getting three; the Reading, Language Arts, and Math one as well.
The writing book used dotted lines in both red and blue which is very visually overwhelming for my daughter who struggles to see well daily, so I didn’t purchase that one! These are very basic and not as “fun” looking, but exactly what I was looking for.
Summer Workbooks for Kids on Amazon
There were a few others that I would also consider when looking for a quick Summer Workbooks to have one hand with your child this summer. All are written by brands I’ve learned to love and trust over the years raising 3 kids and in teaching. Highlights, Brain Quest and Evan-Moor… be sure to take a look!
DIY Summer Camp Activity Ideas for Home
Download our Ultimate Summer Activity Bundle for 3 months of summer fun!
Explore these Summer Fun STEM Camp Ideas at Home.
Join our Virtual Book Club for Kids Summer Camp! Perfect for Preschoolers and Toddlers.
Discover the best Summer Science Experiments for hands-on fun this summer.
You can also try this idea for Spelling and Vocabulary Practice for Summer Learning.
Take your child on a global adventure with learning to cook Around the World in 12 Dishes!
Explore our top picks of the Best Summer Books for Kids to expand your summer reading.
Summer Pinterest Activities
Here’s are our favorite Summer Reading and Writing Activity Boards
Plus we’re always looking for great ideas for Summer Activities. Follow us all summer long as we PIN Summer Activities
How do you plan to help your children learn over the summer?
You may also enjoy these activities for your child this summer…
