Summer makes for a different kind of learning environment. For children, it’s an opportunity to throw themselves behind something that interests them. For parents, it’s a unique time of year when you can witness your child’s personality really blossom. Around the world, kids enrolled in summer courses are learning skills they will keep with them and further develop for potentially decades to come.

Here are the 14 best summer courses for children that can help develop your child:

1. Sports Courses

Ask physically active kids what they want to do during summer and it’s get the heck outside! Summertime sports like baseball, football, ball hockey, basketball, and others are offered in summer courses. Learn new skills. Practice for when the season begins later in the year. Social distancing included, there are still ways a child can hone their skillset while we’re waiting for reopening.

2. Coding Courses

A great summer course for children is coding. More children are being registered in coding than ever. Although they are designed for older children, courses in Python, Java, Minecraft, Adobe, and others introduce children into the key skills needed to do things like code a website, build an app, or at an extreme end, develop a robotics product.

3. Music Courses

Music summer courses for children can be focused around learning an instrument, learning songwriting, or exploring other cultures’ instruments and ways of making music. Young children with an interest in self-expression through art or music may find a lot to sing, dance, and play here.

4. Magic Courses

For aspiring magicians, a summer course in magic can teach them technique, form, and performance. Magic may seem like a trivial skill but the course is a chance to promote respect among individuals, inclusivity, positivity, supporting others, and builds confidence. To a child, magic’s fun. For the years to follow, a course like this could prove to be fundamental in letting them feel confident.

5. Science Courses

Science summer courses for children can lean from coding to physics, chemistry, and biology. Think of it sort of like an ‘arts and crafts for science’. See and perform experiments in person. Being introduced to the basic tenants of physics and chemistry, it can be an introduction to lifelong learning.

6. Theatre Courses

Theatre summer courses for children can be a great chance to expose them to acting, dance, and various forms of self-expression. Theatre is a very collaborative process as well which can teach communication, teamwork, compromise, and more.

7. Animation Courses

A form of movie-making, learn how to do animation. Create a story with gripping animations and transitions using languages like Javascript. Recreate simple games and sequences, and simulate basic scenes like a sunrise. This is another way to facilitate an introduction to coding. A child who can code is set.

8. Languages Courses

In this day and age, we have a lot of multicultural families and multi-lingual families. If you’re interested in having your child pick up a second language like Spanish or French, there are summer language courses. The great thing about courses like these are that most can be arranged online so that social distancing isn’t an issue.

9. Creative Writing Courses

Creative writing and similar writing courses focus on easy simple ways to tell stories. For children, they learn about basic vocabulary, paragraph formation, and grammar. Mixed in with the occasional reading assignment and it turns out to be almost like a book-club for kids.

10. Swim Courses

Swimming is an important skill that every person should have. If your child isn’t the strongest swimmer or doesn’t know how yet, a swim instruction summer course can give them the confidence to get in the water and conquer the unknown.

11. Math Enrichment Courses

It’s not the flashiest summer course, but for children who want to improve on their mathematical abilities, they can do so with academic enrichment courses. Learn basic math skills, geometry concepts, problem-solving, percentages, fractions, and more.

12. Outdoor Leadership Courses

There’s a lot to learn about nature. Outdoor leadership courses can teach a child about the environment at a local level. Learn about plants and animals. Learn about the impact that humans have had on changes in the environment. For kids who like to get out in nature, an outdoors leadership course gets them to examine their surroundings from a different perspective.

13. Arts, Drawing, and Cartooning

Art courses like drawing, cartooning, fashion, architecture, sculpting, and animation are all beautiful ways to spend a summer. If your child has an artful eye or is interested in taking their interest in arts further, a course like this can refine and focus certain skills while exposing them to various sources of art.

14. Parent-and-Child Cooking Courses

Cooking and baking are a very important skill to have in any day and age. For your child, partnering with them in a baking class or cooking class can teach them about how to make their favourite foods, learn about dishes from other cultures, and help keep your relationship with them strong. Although not every child will be excited to cook, some will and it’s a great chance to give them some responsibility in helping you cook meals at home and/or to prepare dishes for themselves.