Summer Learning

Planning for Summer Learning

A key to achieving outcomes for summer learning programs is effective planning.

• Establish the purpose and goals of summer programming by ensuring that there is a clearly articulated purpose for summer learning that connects to the school’s vision and mission.¹
• Establish goals for summer learning that are tied to learning and school-year metrics, such as fall assessments² or diagnostics.³
• Plan for sustainability to encourage consecutive summers of participation for students.⁴

Structuring Summer Learning

The structure for summer learning sets the stage for student outcomes.

• Summer learning has the largest effect on student achievement when it is five⁵ or six weeks⁶ in duration and four to eight hours a day.⁷
• Summer learning programs create the highest gains in achievement when there are small class sizes. Twenty students or less⁸ with as few as thirteen in grades K-3.⁹
• Identify ways to reduce barriers by providing, transportation, and meals free of charge to facilitate access for families with low incomes
• Provide flexibility for families through full and part day options, flexible drop off times, and regularity of attendance, especially when early planning was not available for families.¹⁰

Designing Instruction for Summer Learning

In order to achieve positive outcomes, instruction must be carefully designed.

• Use curricula that is evidence-based, aligned to school-year activities and students’ learning goals¹¹, and is experiential.¹²
• Maximize participation and increase engagement and time on task through hands-on activities, project-based learning, enrichment, and field trips.¹³
• Focus on success in the upcoming academic year by aligning activities to the upcoming grade in a few critical areas.¹⁴
• Support effective instruction through teacher professional development¹⁵and coaching¹⁶provided by administrators and/or coaches, and include any additional staff (paraprofessionals, tutors, mentors) who will be supporting instruction.¹⁷

Staffing Summer Learning

Ensuring qualified, trained, and motivated staff for summer learning is critical.

• Select highly qualified teachers and tutors for academic programming, and provide opportunities for effective personnel development.
• Teachers selected to deliver summer instruction have been found to be most effective when they are:
  • motivated
  • certified and highly effective during the school year.
  • teach a grade level that they teach during the school year, or the grade level immediately below.
• Tutors have been found to be most effective when having participated in effective professional development on the topics for which they will be providing professional development and receive ongoing support or coaching.¹⁸

Engaging Students and Families for Summer Learning

Summer learning can only be effective if the right students are targeted and families are effectively engaged.

• Target outreach to families and enroll students.
  • Determine which students summer programming will target, prioritizing demonstrated student needs, students from families with low-incomes, and students that do not typically access educational experiences during summer months.¹⁹
  • Target families for enrollment, providing:²⁰
    • clear dates which are communicated early,
    • an easy registration process,
    • clear enrollment deadline, and
    • clear attendance policies.
• Engage the community
  • Engage the whole community²¹ to provide culturally relevant enrichment activities and offer balanced summer programming and services, consider
    • libraries and museums
    • community mental health services
    • recreation departments
    • community early care and education programs
• Scale up existing programs that have demonstrated positive impact
• Engage students and families during each phase of planning, implementing, and evaluating summer programming.

References