The act of learning does not stop when the school day ends; and it’s not only limited to the classroom too.
In fact, there is a wide variety of activities that you can conduct at home to spark your child’s curiosity. Using the wealth of information available on the internet together with a sprinkle of your imagination, you can keep your child entertained with fun learning activities that’ll engage them in learning about the world beyond the classroom. Some activities that you can do at home include:
1. Cooking up a Storm
Cooking and baking have long been proven to be a favourite learning activity for children and parents alike. The children get to enjoy eating the meal that they have made, and the parents get some extra help in the kitchen while keeping the kids entertained!
Cooking and baking has plenty to teach to children, from applying math and science when reading and executing recipes, to learning about chemical reactions – like how yeast makes bread rise. Children also get to practise their fine motor skills as they pour, stir, roll, beat and measure out ingredients. They also learn general skills such as time management, kitchen safety and meal preparation.
2. All the World’s a Stage
Stories are another tried and true method of imparting valuable life lessons to your child. Either in the form of physical books or e-books, reading is how children can quickly learn about the world around them.
You can go one step beyond and involve your child in storytelling and roleplaying activities to act out their favourite stories. Roleplaying and storytelling help to spark your child’s imagination and allows them to practise empathy and important communication and language skills. You can also involve music and sound effects in your storytelling sessions to help them to bring their ideas to life.
3. Learn through Play
Besides the repertoire of educational applications available online, you can engage your child in play through puzzles and games that test their physical and mental abilities. From assembling 200-piece puzzles, to card games like Sushi Go! and activity games like Jenga, there’s plenty of games available for all ages and abilities. Such games can help to engage and train kinaesthetic learners, and also helps your child to improve their hand-to-eye coordination, decision-making skills, and collaborative skills with peers.
4. DIY Activities and Worksheets
Learning at home doesn’t need to be very complicated either. You can engage your child in simple activities too, such as practising their handwriting to doing calligraphy, or to create their own DIY arts and crafts or projects. There are plenty of home science experiments that you can conduct with your child (e.g. taste challenges or experimenting with light and sound).
There are also plenty of fun worksheets that you can download off the internet, from picture worksheets to teach your child drawing and colouring skills, to experimenting with real-world problems, such as meal planning and simple budgeting. All of these activities help to engage your child in exploring their interests, while training a gamut of skills such as curiosity, memory retention, analytical and problem-solving skills, to helping them express their creativity and develop confidence in their abilities.
The most important part of creating fun learning activities at home is that it does not need to be expensive or elaborate. Simple activities like reading magazines or using flash cards all help engage your child in the act of learning. By making the process of learning as fun as possible, it helps your child to build upon the knowledge that they are learning in school, and encourages them to continue learning throughout their lives.