Summertime: Education Doesn't End When School Does

One of the biggest misconceptions in education is that learning rests solely on the shoulders of the school district. Whether a child attends public school, private school, charter school, or homeschool, parents and guardians remain the most influential educators in their child's life. A teacher may spend several hours a day with a student, while parents and guardians spend years influencing their children through conversations, habits, values, morals, experiences and networks. Meanwhile, the Texas Education Freedom Account program (better known as school vouchers) has sparked controversial conversations surrounding school choice. Or does it open the door to a broader discussion about the role parents and guardians play in child's education?

Parents don't necessarily have to remove their children from public school to be more active in their education. Something as simple as reading together for twenty minutes each evening can strengthen literacy skills. According to the National Institute of Health (NIH), reading twenty minutes a day to a child exposes them to 1.8 million words per year while helping language and communication skills. Museums, libraries, historical sites, and local attractions can help bring the classroom to life alongside the people the children value most. There are many life skills to teach, such as budgeting a grocery trip, gardening, and cooking. All of which involves basic reading and math skills.

Learning opportunities are everywhere and extend far beyond the classroom walls.

Many successful students can point to an adult who invested in their education and encouraged learning. This archetype doesn't rely on what school the child attended, but how engaged an influential force was in helping the child to explore their curiosity.

The issue is not whether parents and guardians should replace teachers, but rather if parents recognize how powerful their roles are in shaping their children's education.

There are practical ways to help you on your journey as a parent or guardian looking to get more involved in your child's education.

Five Simple Ways Parents can Take Charge of Their Children's Education

1. Read Together Every Day

One of the simplest and most effective things a guardian can do is read to their child. Reading builds vocabulary, strengthens comprehension (where the child understands what is being read), improves communication skills, develops curiosity, and most importantly, strengthens bonds. This creates a positive association with learning and can be accomplished with minimal efforts. For littles, it can be discussing a picture in a book before bed, reading through a chapter book with older elementary students, or even reading road signs and store signs throughout moments in your day.

Children who see reading as a valued activity at home are more likely to become lifelong readers and learners.

2. Ask About Learning, Not Grades.

Many parents and guardians tend to ask, "What grade did you get?" when a more powerful question would be, "What did you learn today?" or "Can you teach it to me? I'd love for you to show me."

When the focus is on grades, the importance is assumed to be about performance rather than understanding. Teachers are doing their best, but they are also bound by state exams and preparation. Parents, however, can focus on understanding at a one-to-one level. Here is where you can stand in the gap to help your child overcome learning obstacles or genuinely encourage value in the learning process.

Simple conversations on the way home from school, at the dinner table, or during bedtime routines can reveal what excites your child, what challenges they face, and where the child could use additional support.

3. Turn Everyday Activities into Learning Opportunities

Education does not stop once the school bell rings and the child leaves the school campus. Everyday life brings education and from these ordinary tasks there can be lessons implemented to hone in life skills, reading, and math skills.

A trip to H-E-B can become a lesson in budgeting by involving your children in planning for meals, prices, and seeing it all play out at the store. Cooking can involve practical use of fractions through measurements. Gardening can introduce science concepts while road trips can become history lessons. Children learn best when they can connect knowledge to real life.

You can create countless opportunities to make those connections each and every day.

4. Build a Culture of Curiosity at Home

We are all naturally curious creations, and children are the exaggerated version of this. As a child grows, so does their natural ability to want to understand the world around them. Schools have moments to explore some of the world, but at home, children are exposed to much more where their imagination can take flight.

Questions like: Why is the moon round? How do plants grow? What makes an airplane fly? How did San Antonio become a city? Instead of providing the answers, parents can lean into this curiosity. Run small science experiments, take the child to the library and read about it to find the answers, write a short story about what you found, or even make storybook puppets to act it out.

Curiosity is the foundation of education. I'm sure Isaac Newton may have been very curious as to why an apple fell from the tree to ask about the idea of gravity. At home, you can create a welcoming environment for questions and model what it takes to learn about such things.

Learning can be exciting rather than a task to be completed.

5. Teach Life Skills Along with Academics

Schools play a major role in teaching academic subjects, but parents are in a unique position to teach about life. This is a subject we cannot give to the education system.

Financial literacy, work ethic, communication skills, problem-solving, emotional regulation, time management, serving others, being humble, being courageous, and developing good character are all skills developed at home. A child who learns how to manage money, resolve conflict, and deal with others respectfully is receiving parts of education that extend outside of the classroom. A child growing into an adult can have all the knowledge, but with no life skills, may struggle. A good example is Temple Grandin. She faced many challenges related to learning and life skills. However, with strong support both at school and at home, she became a world-renowned scientist.

These lessons help prepare children not just for a state exam, but for adulthood.

The Bigger Picture

Programs like the Texas Education Freedom Account may create avenues for families, but they also serve as a reminder that education is not something that occurs exclusively within a school building. The most powerful educational tool a child has is an engaged adult who is willing to guide, encourage, and participate in the learning process. Regardless of where a child attends school, parents and guardians should intentionally participate in their child's learning to have a lasting impact that reaches far beyond graduation.

What is one small step you can take this week to become more involved in your child's education? If you would like to learn more about TEFA, please visit the site here: https://educationfreedom.texas.gov/