LearningRx recommends vacation toys to keep brains active over summer

THE WOODLANDS, Texas -- Now that kids are home for the summer, The Woodlands LearningRx is recommending several activities parents can use to keep their children entertained – while building cognitive skills.

Kim Bellini, owner and director of The Woodlands LearningRx, said summertime provides an opportunity for kids to enjoy some informal learning and stretch their minds through play.

“Teachers typically spend four to six weeks in the fall re-teaching what students have forgotten due to the ‘summer slide,’” she said. “That’s why it’s important that parents put a plan together that can help kids strengthen cognitive skills over the summer.”

Bellini said the good news is the process can be fun. She said even simple toys can help strengthen attention, auditory and visual processing, memory and processing speed.”

Bellini’s top choices for vacation toys include:
- Treasure Hunt: A jar containing cards depicting treasure hunt items. Helps build vocabulary and observation skills. Set a time limit to increase processing speed.

- Mini Morphs: Mix-and-match, snap-together toys allow kids to combine legs, fins, wings, heads, arms and bodies to create silly mixed breeds. Stimulates creative thinking and visual processing.

- Balance Benders: Puzzle books with logic problems. Develops deductive thinking and pre-algebra skills.

- Spoon Racers and Beanbots: Interchangeable construction systems encourage creative thinking and motor skills.

- Yamodo: A travel game for the whole family where players draw and define the made-up word on each card. Builds sound analysis, reading skills, visual processing and creative thinking.

- What Zit: Six brightly colored blocks are strung together for elastic so a child can create countless shapes. Strengthens visual processing.

- Scribble & Doodle: An activity pad that comes with 50 preprinted pages and 25 blank pages, as well as eight finger crayons. Simple sentences help teach reading skills.

- Rubbabu Education Balls: Colorful bouncy balls offering different tactile lessons. Depending on the ball and how you use it, this toy can build phonemic awareness, reading skills, sound blending, and more.

- Scramble Squares: Puzzles that build problem-solving skills, working memory and visual processing.

- Dweebies: Card game that reinforces math probability skills, matching skills and strategy.

The Woodlands LearningRx is located at 4840 West Panther Creek, Suite 205 in The Woodlands. Trainers work with students of all ages to enhance their ability to learn, read and succeed at a broad range of academic and work-related challenges. The center also offers programs for adults and seniors who want to improve their cognitive skills.