Summer is going too fast already. We’re already in the middle of the second week (public schools around here end late). I let the kids use the first full week of summer afternoons to rest their brains. They’ve been doing a lot of reading, playing with Legos, and enjoying the long 4th of July weekend.

Now it’s time to regain some momentum for doing math work. It will only get harder if I wait any longer. We have only eight full weeks of summer left for developing computational automaticity and number sense. The only way to develop these strengths is through practice.

Even though I know how important it is for the kids to do this work now, while they have the time, I do feel the cultural lure to give my kids some kind of idealized carefree summer. When I need to remind myself of the reasons why it’s important to remain disciplined about giving the kids summer work, I read what Vern Williams has to say about the philosophies that inform public school curricula.

Mr. Williams writes that he does his “very best to shield [his] students from the effects of educational fads, political correctness and anti intellectualism that we experience everyday in public schools. “ While I’m grateful that each of my children has had a few teachers of Mr. Williams’s ilk, I’m afraid that there aren’t enough to go around.