Every summer we have done the swimming lesson, vacation, Girl Scout camp typical summer. This year we will do volunteer work as well, but I am looking at our younger one differently now that we got the results from all the tests and have discovered that she is gifted. Do I pull together online math classes? She's years and years ahead in reading - what do I do with that? Is it a good idea to have a lazy summer? I would like to hear what others have done.
Currently we do a bit Khan Academy and Aleks for math.
I don't have anything set up for language arts.
I would want fun stuff - nothing dry!!
DD just turned 9. She LOVES photography so I am trying to find someone for photography lessons as well.

Fencing is a good "thinking" sport. Like chess, but a great physical exercise. Men and women are equals. There are centers that teach children as young as six and also host national and international competitions. Some offer summer camps, which are really a week or two of lessons.

http://manhattanfencing.com/content/what-fencing

I get a lot of "I don't know." when I ask her what she wants - except for swimming and photo. lessons. Those she is excited about. She's pretty down on school right now so she is feeling negative about learning (bored and feeling like nothing is changing -we are working on that). School is not challenging her, and I don't want to fall down on the job either when she's out of school.

My younger son needs to be physically, mentally and socially fulfilled over the summer.

We do swim team, summer library program, visits with family, play dates, roller skating lessons, cooking with his dad, yard work, and games.

I insist on quiet hour after lunch each day...reading, napping, writing or playing silently in your own room are the only activities allowed during the hour. No electronics.

I would love for him to do some math too but he never gets around to it. I think I am going to see if he will go for daily typing/keyboard practice.

I also know he wants to work on learning to play the guitar.

I'd guide on their interests. Mainstream threaded academics would be the last thing I'd do for a learning discouraged kid. If something piques their passion and interest then run with it, one can be deep and intellectually engaged in photography or almost anythng.

This is such a great question. I think Laura V. (Davidson affiliated) may have blogged the question recently, so you might want to go to her Gifted Exchange blog, too.

My spouse raved about a past Nikon photography class, but, of course those were the old days of photography, before digital. But, a huge emphasis on light / dark almost like a cinematography class for a black and white feature.

We always have continuity of activities based on what we love and are gifted at innately. We are specifically role modeling a family environment, but explain that was our choice and our child is free to just be.

If there is some hole in the education (and you re trying to be as well rounded as possible or maybe give exposure to many areas in case that exposure ignites a currently unknown interest), then try to get as close to that area or topic as possible because the best exposure will be very appealing. A watered-down, not so great experience might not be anywhere in the ballpark of meeting the sensitivities of a gifted child. So, if your child loves insects, it is definitely worth it to go to the museums for natural history. The child will love it there if they have an exhibit on insects.

Online programing is fantastic especially if you are in a very hot geographic area at the time and want the children out of the sun for part of the day.

Since you have a gifted reader, we can recommend going to the libraries everywhere you travel. Some of the universities in the areas where you travel are open in the summertime with access maybe to their museum collections. Gifted kids love that!

At this point I think what I might be stating is that summer is a great time to be yourself without having to worry about 'looking cool' in front of any / all peers. It can be a huge relief to the children to just be themselves.

Also, gifted kids are constantly learning anyway. If you take a nature hike, you might not even get that far, because the child stops every ten feet to observe. That's normal for a gifted child, but you may not be able to do that with a group that wants to get to the top of the hike, while the gifted child wants to spend time examining an ant.

Whatever has worked successfully for your family in the past that you continue each year can be such a happy tradition and that will resound positively with the gifted person, which is such a wonderful feeling. Say something as simple as making, heating and eating S'mores to a gifted person is this rich experience of the senses and they will never forget those memories or you. That's great for summertime. Happy summer (in advance)!

One thing we did was to create a summer reading list or course based on local "fancy" private school syllabi a couple of years ahead. So, if she's going into 4th grade, maybe 6th or 7th (or 8th or 9th! :-)) grade reading list. The syllabi are often public and online, and this approach has two virtues: (1) the syllabi often suggest great books to read, and (2) pursuing this kind of structure might (for my dcs, it did) generate some cred beyond "Mom says I should read this." My dc's aren't all that competitive in life, but academically they are, and so they got a bit of a kick from knowing that they were easily knocking off "fancy" (:-)) private school stuff many years ahead. You could either just have her read the list or possibly start her on some essays as well -- it's not too hard to come up with compare/contrast or character-analysis that can easily be done in a 5-paragraph format. It's a good discipline to start to pull ideas together into a thesis and use evidence, although I know 9 is young.

Just a thought!

Agreed. Kids need to develop hobbies and interests which they can return to over the course of their lives for comfort and stress management/relief. Swimming and photo lessons sound like great summer plans for a 9-year-old to suggest.

Math and reading are encountered everywhere. A parent could begin locating books with swimming and/or photography in the theme, as possible summer reading material to offer in support of their child's expressed interests.

Meaningful photography lessons for a gifted child may go well beyond the typical children's introductory class. If sufficient depth and detail may be found in an adult class at a camera shop or community college, the parent may need to sign up as well and accompany the child. Even if not a shared interest, the time spent together in support of a child's fledgling hobby can be highly rewarding.

http://www.hcssim.org/

This could be good for kids who like math. Not sure if it's too late to apply.

Here's a longer list.
http://www.ams.org/programs/students/high-school/emp-mathcamps

That is a great list and one I have looked at before. DD16 has applied for a selective program on the list - and the best part is the program is free. Don't know how many apply and won't find out until end of May of she was accepted.

Most programs on the list are for older kids, at least very advanced MS, more likely HS.

My kids prefer not to do much school over the summer, though DD16 took Chemistry at a local private school last summer to fit in other courses during the school year. They have done short programs - a week or two long - but mainly stick to sports over the summer.

When we do homeschool for fun (not through our charter homeschool days) we tend to use themes. One summer we did a world tour, "visiting" a bunch of countries/continents. Last year we did Shakespeare. This year we're thinking of a time travel tour. That way we can pull in whatever topics we really like but it's part of a fun experience that lights a fire and gives us some structure. DD has always liked themes like this, and it also motivates me to do the fun ideas TODAY instead of relaxing to the point of getting all blah as we say. I don't like sitting around. But my kids are still young enough to need me around all day.

We're also starting a drama club with friends. And we might do a class with a great drama teacher, too.

We're going to take a break from dance to try gymnastics.

My rising 6th grader will take classes again (5 weeks) at our local community college. They have accelerated classes for gifted children. Swim team every day, viola lessons once a week. Staying home a few weeks, and boy scout camp! I'm going on that too.
My rising 4th grader will do STEM camps at our local university, swim team, some tennis lessons, hang out. Picking are slimmer for him but I'm hoping next summer he can get into the community college program. Summer always just flies by for us!

Agreed! My kids will usually tell me what they want to do in the summer, then we look for camps/courses in these areas. DD9 so far has signed up for a math camp, a science camp, a theatre camp, a music camp, and a couple of leisure/sports camps, and she will keep dancing in the summer as well. DS13 signed up a music camp, and most likely will do an online AP course in economics, and then he will sign up to do some local volunteering work.

I think what parents really need to pay attention to is whether the *level* of the camp will fit with the kids. I call the camps before we sign up and let them know what we are looking for and ask how they accommodate students who are way above their age peers' levels. Some people will be quite happy to let me know that they look forward to having such kids and they have ways to challenge them. Others will give you standard answers such as "we encourage team work and social interactions so all kids will do age appropriate activities" etc. Then you know which camp not to sign up for!

DS6 is only getting a week off from school. He'll spend that week with his grandparents.

Then school starts again and he'll be in a new 1st-6th grade mixed classroom. The summer session is more relaxed with less emphasis on written work and a lot of field trips. I would feel bad he attends all year but today he was whining that he didn't get to go to school. At least right now, he really likes it.

For four weeks he'll attend school in the AM and Lindamood Bell in the afternoon.

Then he has some post Lindamood Bell testing with the Eides.

We'll probably try to get all the accommodations, etc. ironed out for the fall but I don't see that being a big deal. I would like to my son involved in this more than we have allowed him to be in the past.

There will probably be a few camping trips and we'll spend our weekends at the beach.

DS15 has typically had a balance of camps, free time and family vacation.

This year the only thing we know for sure is sleepaway wilderness/backpacking camp for 2 weeks in the beginning of August. He comes home from this camp so happy, it's two week of no electronics and I think it's extremely good for him. Then two weeks of marching band camp when he gets back.

His break is short this year so we only have another month to fill. He will probably take a 3 week writing course that I talked with this week, it's only a 2 1/2 hours a day with no homework so it leaves lots of goof off time. During that that he will probably take online drivers-ed, and a weekend behind the wheel training so that he can get his drivers permit at the end of August.

And then we will probably fit in a week of visiting with family.

The problem I found was my son grew bored of camps designed for 6-12 year olds at much younger than 12. Science camps sounded fun on paper, but in reality they tended to do the same science "kit" experiments over and over. It can help to look for camps designed for gifted kids if you have any in your area or ones that are also have programs for older kids.

Our area doesn' have camps for GT kids at this age. I know what you mean about the science camps, I think that that will be what we get. But these are short camps so at least there will be some sort of novelty effect for a few days. :-)

Fully entire vacation can not be lazy. Need to be repeated periodically passed in school lessons. As a result, the brain is not degraded.

You might consider some math that she won't encounter elsewhere. We're doing some Beast Academy-- or do some fun math apps (they have seriously enhanced my son's math calculation skills).
Agree about staying away from mainstream education in the summer.
I think if your daughter is happy with her summer, you may not want to rock the boat too much-- as I said, math as game online is a stealth way to improve skills with it seeming like school.
My son swims and I'm also thinking of photography for him next summer. Swimming and especially a swim team is an amazing sport- my DS has learned a lot about tenacity on swim team. He also liked chess camp- and nothing with enhance self control like chess. A lot of life skills learned across a chess board.

I'm looking for a good science camp for girls, with an emphasis on chemistry and physics if possible. Those are the areas that dd12 loves. I see that Education Unlimited has some science camps for girls that look interesting. Does anyone have any experience or recommendations, either Education Unlimited or others? TIA!

I can't give you a specific recommendation on something that's available all over, but our state university holds middle school science camps that my kids have loved - I think you'll find the same at other universities and colleges, especially schools that are strong in math/science.

My ds has also attended CTY's summer science camps and loved them.

Another possibility are local science camps funded by private industry - there are a few of those in our area too - some in cooperation with a local college, others private.

One thing I found when my kids became middle school age is that local and state camp information wasn't advertised the way younger-age camps were - so I had to do some digging and networking to find out what was actually available. Networking here is great - but you might find something really great through local networking too

polarbear

Have you looked at camps for gifted kids usually held at universities? At that age my son attended a gifted camp held at a local university. He took a class in 'physics' and 'chemistry'. The classes were run by junior faculty and graduate students and labs were held in university labs. It was a good experience. I can PM the information about his camp if you want, although I don't seen the specific classes he took on offer this year.

It really depends on where you are located. Another place to check is a local science museum?

I'll second the JHU-CTY camps. My DD15 has gone the last two years and is going back again this summer. She had a blast both in and out of class.

Best of luck,
--S.F.