Duck Academy: Making Learning Fun
Sometimes learning can seem like a chore for kids but it certainly doesn’t have to. A sneaky trick to get your child excited about learning is to disguise educational activities as playtime!By creating positive experiences around important educational topics, such as reading or spelling, children start to see those activities as enjoyable. These positive associations show children that learning can be, and IS, fun! This attitude builds life-long learners and children that truly want to succeed in school. A great example of this concept is Duck Academy.
Duck Academy
In 2013, the University of Oregon Alumni Association and United Way came together to create Duck Academy, a volunteer run afterschool program in the Bethel School District, to inspire the next generation of college students! Through homework help, inspirational speakers, and interactive activities called academies, volunteers from the Alumni Association address alarming statistics around literacy rates in Lane County and prepare 3rd-5th graders for college success.
"If you want to get smarts, learn different languages, and get a job, college is important!" - Duck Academy 3rd Grader
Why Duck Academy Works
This program focuses on playing and having fun while instilling the importance of a college education. Children get excited about the idea of going to college because they associate the fun they have at Duck Academy with college.
What you can do at home
Prepare your future college student by playing some of these education games from a session called “Beyond the Book” at Duck Academy and secretly show your child that, yes, learning is awesome!
Giant Scrabble
A life size version of the board game classic.
- Print or write one large letter per piece of paper. Include extra vowels and a few extra consonants.
- Start by laying out one long word on the floor to start.
- Children take turns adding words to the original word and beyond!
- Tip: we play this game informally and instead of focusing on the rules of scrabble just try to make as many words as possible!
Why it's helping: This activity strengthens vocabulary knowledge and spelling skills.
Paper Bag Stories
Imaginations come to life in this storytelling activity.
- Place several small toys or objects in a paper bag.
- Start telling a simple story.
- Take turns with children in choosing an object from the bag, holding it up and incorporating it into your story.
- Continue until all the objects have been used. You’ll probably have a very silly tall tale by the end!
Why it's helping: This activity encourages imaginative and creative storytelling.
Memory Match
You’ve probably played a version of this one before—line two rows of index cards with pairs of words written on each card. Children take turns picking two cards looking for a match. If you pick a match you keep the cards. At the end, the person with the most pairs wins.Here are some variations depending on the age of your children:
- Rhyming match: Instead of writing a pair of the same word, write pairs of words that rhyme.
- Word and picture match: Write a word and draw a picture of the word for its corresponding pair.
- Homonym match: Write pairs of words that sound the same but are different in meaning and spelling. (i.e. cent/scent, dear/deer)
Why it's helping: This activity helps your child practice word recognition and letter-sound knowledge.
These games require very few materials and a willingness to think outside of the box and use objects around the house to create literacy skill building moments. Get creative and allow your child to use his/her imagination to create new games and stories. By playing games like these and making reading fun, we can prepare children to succeed in school and beyond.