True or false: You only use 10% of your brain.

If you guessed false, you’re right! It’s a common misconception that humans only use 10% of your brain. The truth is that you use all of your brain, even when you’re sleeping.

When kids are learning, their brains are creating new neural pathways. The more learning activities your kids practice, the better and stronger their brains will be!

However, if you want your kids to keep learning new things, you have to find ways to make education fun. To help you out we’ve created this short but complete guide all about inspiring your kids to feed their brains new things!

Read on to learn how to make learning at home a delight for you, and your kids.

1. Education Fun Before School Begins

It’s never too early to help your young one start learning at home. If you have a child that’s below the age of 4, there are all sorts of fun activities you can use to help prepare them for the classroom and life.

For example, to help 2 and 3-year-olds practice their motor skills, while also learning colors, try the color matching game. All you need is 5 different colored foam sheets, and 5 plastic clips that are the same color.

We find that local dollar stores tend to have both of these items, super cheap. Next, cut the foam sheets into small rectangles, about 4 inches long. Finally, help your child learn how to match each colored clip to the same colored foam rectangle.

2. Motivating Elementary Aged Kids to Learn

Moving on, let’s look at the best ways of teaching numbers and math to elementary-aged kids. For starters, it’s helpful if you have at home learning sessions that are separate from their daily homework assignments. We find that games are one of the best ways to help kids learn math without getting bored.

Here are a few math-based games you can try out:

• Online interactive math games
• free kindergarten math worksheets
• Various dice games
• Math facts with bingo or trivia

One of our favorite at-home math games is the measuring cup water race! However, make sure you play that game outside because it can get messy, fast. Finally, adding prizes in games is another great way to help motivate your kids to try their best.

3.Helping Middle Schoolers Excel

As you get ready to start teaching different subjects to your middle school-aged children, remember that they crave hands-on learning experiences. Instead of talking to your kids about different concepts, show them what the lessons are all about. We find that arts and crafts make for wonderful hands-on and visual education tools, that middle schoolers can get excited about.

For instance, using different colored paints, you can teach your kids about monochromatic colors. By middle school, a lot of kids are already aware that mixing 2 different colors can create secondary colors. However, what they don’t know is how many fun variations there are out there for secondary colors.

Task your kids with the job of creating different shades, by altering how much they of each different color they mix. Using a large square chart, have your kids fill in each square every time they achieve a new color creation!

4. Technology Tips and Tricks

Next, you can also use technology at home to help prepare your kids for school, as well as the real world. You can start by looking up various stem activities that relate to your child’s age group. STEM activities incorporate science, technology, engineering, and math concepts to help solve different problems.

Logical sequence games, patterns, electrical engineering, and more are all different types of STEM-based games. Next, we suggest you take a moment to learn more about progressive education, and how the role technology plays in everyday life.

5. Exciting Science Experiments

Moving on, you can also make education fun by doing simple science experiments. For instance, you can teach your kids about chemical reactions using the orange experiment.

All you need is 1 orange and ½ teaspoon of baking soda. Cut the orange into 8 sections, and dip 1 slice into the baking soda. Have your kids take a bite, and watch their amazement as the orange slice starts to bubble in their mouth. The lesson here is that when bases and acids mix, you get chemical reactions!

You can then take things 1 step further by explaining to your kids how citrus fruits have citric acid, and baking soda is a base. When you mix citric acid with the baking soda base you get carbon dioxide bubbles, which is the same thing that makes soda fun and fizzy.

6. Go on a Field Trip

Are you trying to get your kids interested in history? Then it’s time to go on a historical field trip! Do a quick online search for historical sites in your area. Next, take your kids on a visit and let them read the different educational plaques set up for visitors.

Historical parks, museums, and old building tours are all great field trip options. When you get home, ask your child to write a short journal entry about what they learned on their trip. It’s also helpful if you write a short journal entry as well. Finally, have a sharing session where you each read your journal entries and discuss your favorite parts of the trip.

7. Don’t Overdo It

Last but not least, don’t overdo it when it comes to helping your kids learn. One of the biggest mistakes parents make is overscheduling their child’s lives. From soccer to music lessons, it’s easy to overwhelm your kids in the learning arena. Instead, keep things simple by only doing 1-2 educational activities a week outside of their regular schooling and homework routine.

Inspire Your Kids to Keep Learning

Making education fun means inspiring your kids to feed their brains! Before you know it your kids will start becoming passionate about different subjects as they begin exploring the world around them. Remember to take into account your child’s age, as you set your expectations for different activities.

Go ahead and pick 1 educational game or experiment right now that you’ll do with your kids this weekend. For more ways to help your kids thrive, check out the rest of this site.