Summer is beginning, and you haven't made any activity plans for your gifted child. By the end of this month, you may be regretting that decision. Here are some suggestions for your consideration:

1. The first consideration should be to find paths to connect your child with other kids who share their interests. Most gifted kids care more about quality of friendships than quantity of options. To find a like-minded learner who shares one's learning passion is a gift and may well continue to provide ongoing opportunities for friendship into subsequent school years.

2. Ask your son or daughter which interest they would like to follow when free choice is available. For example, perhaps there is an artistic or musical inclination for which there never seems to be a time to explore during the regular school year. Use the Internet to find classes for kids just like yours. Call local colleges and universities to see if they offer summer learning experiences for advanced learners. Ask if those opportunities continue into the school year on weekends or after-school hours.

3. Check out programs offered by your public library, local museums or nature centers. In some cases, you might be able to "visit" these places on your home computer through "virtual tours."

4. Investigate Summer Institutes for the Gifted (SIG) programs in your area. Visit the SIG website at giftedstudy.org and Education Unlimited at educationunlimited.com.

5. If your child is in a gifted program during the school year, ask the teacher if he or she is able to provide contact information for program students to use to visit each other during school hiatus times and share learning opportunities.

6. Search your local TV schedule for offerings that may be available through National Geographic, Discovery, PBS, History and similar channels. Look for programs by Bill Nye the Science Guy and by Neil deGrasse Tyson, both of whom can bring the topics related to our universe accessible to you and your kids. Try to organize some opportunities for other gifted students to visit together in someone's home — with adult supervision of course — so the students can share these topic of interest with each other. Perhaps they can even meet to watch programs of interest you have recorded.

7. Arrange for you and your children to go together to a place of interest to them. If possible, arrange those experiences to be just for you and the child who is interested. Try to create similar experiences for your other kids — one at a time. Always keep in mind that the greatest gift you can give your children is your time sharing something of intense interest for them.

8. Finally, if you find you are too late to make these arrangements for this summer, make a calendar note to start searching early next year in January-March, when many of the summer programs are taking applications for participation.