Overscheduling Kids

[luvmysoldier]

Hi everyone!

I was wondering what everyone thinks about the problem of overschduling children's agendas?

I sometimes worry that my Dillan feels overwhelmed with his activity load. He is in school from 8-2:30 PM; has soccer on mon, wed and sat (1 hour); church youth group on tuesdays(1 hour); and church/sunday school on sundays (2.5 hrs).

I suppose my main concern is that he is only 6. His entire life will be filled with responsibility and I wonder if I am pushing too much on him too soon in his life. I guess I feel a little guilty because there is no turning back. His days of complete leisure are done with... he has officially started the wild ride of "busy life" and won't be able to get off until he retires. *sigh* Time sure does fly by quickly, doesn't it?

Anyhow, what does everyone think an appropriate activity load is for kids?

Thanks a million,

Mandy

 

[selune]

We keep a basically free schedule. We go to our school outings (a cyber charter school done at home but which has get togethers at least once a month). We go to community outings, and family thnigs, but we don't have sports or music lessons. One of the main reasons for us anyway is that we have 1 vehicle and to get my husband to work in the morning and then do the day with extra activities and then pick him up, I'd be running here and there and be a complete stress-ball. The way we have things, I have the car 1-4 times a month and don't have tons of stress. The kids are still involved in church and get together with friends, but we don't have a set schedule.

 

[Leanna]

But he still has Thursday and Friday night and most of Saturday free.... hmmmm. If he likes it I don't see any harm. Idle time is the devil's playground right? I think it sounds good to keep busy. I hope my kids will do sports or some good activities.

 

[bliz]

Is he happy? Does he enjoy all of his activities? Is he getting enough rest?

If it's all working fine and he is happy - not managing, not "handling it" but really thriving on it, then I don;t see anything wrong with it. But if there is stress in his life, then it is clearly too much and something's got to give.

To me, this looks like too much stuff going on. I'd drop the soccer. But my kids weren't fond of "organized" sports, and I'm not convinced there's much benifit in 6 year olds playing soccer other than just for fun... but that's me. You are the one in the best position to assess the schedule and how appropriate it is for your son.

 

[Busybee]

Our family is very much like Selune's. We also have one car (but praying the Lord will guide us in finding a second vehicle just for dh to drive to work). My daughter will be in school next fall (8-12pm), going to AWANA on Wednesdays, and church on Sunday the Lord willing.

At 6 years old, I think your son will let you know if he doesn't like something. If he does change his mind about doing something extracurricular then AT THAT POINT it would be your responsibility to support him in his decision to stop. That is as long as what he wants to discontinue isn't related to his Sunday church attendance . Knowledge of the Lord is more valuable than any thing else they could be involved in doing.

Sounds like he enjoys what he's doing though. Just be attentive to him and you'll know if he needs to give up something before he even voices it.

 

[brokenbananas]

I am so schedule oriented it's not even funny. It's hard not to run our household on a schedule and even keeping our kids on a schedule. But, we realize they are just kids.

Our daughter is 4 yrs old and goes to preschool 3 days/wk and to a sitter half days the other 2 days. On those days she has gym & swim classes in the afternoon, while her one year old brother tags along.

We do have free form play often, but we do keep bedtimes, wakeup times around certain times. We've found our kids do better on schedules that they can depend on. They seem happy this way. However, we try not to have tons of things scheduled beyond these things and church.

We think that kids can handle a certain amount of stress, but need to learn how to manage this as they get older. We try to make our home a safe haven, comfortable, fun, relaxing. You really have to see how your kids react to the activities & schedules. If they buck the system, then you need to figure out why. My daughter is a fairly orderly person, so schedules work well for her. My son, we don't know yet.

 

[selune]

When I say unscheduled, I don't mean bed at any time dinner when you get it, but no organized sports or music lessons right now. The kids are learning piano and foreign languages, just not going hither and thither. As for bed and such that is scheduled. We just have an amount of time from when Daddy gets home to bedtime that has dinner and whatever else the family want to do together (including walking, swimming, reading, games, movies...)

 

[Andry]

One of the things we need to keep in mind, perhaps more to the dads than to moms, is not to try and live vicariously through our kids for some of our ambitions that we didn't accomplish.

 

[HeatherJay]

Great point, andry. We do softball with our oldest during the spring. She's had gymnastics and tumbling classes in the past, but only for as long as it remains FUN for her. At the point when she starts to stress, it's time for a break. Her favorite thing at this point is playing outside with her friends and kittens...I don't think she's too eager to give that up.

 

[Busybee]

One of the things we need to keep in mind, perhaps more to the dads than to moms, is not to try and live vicariously through our kids for some of our ambitions that we didn't accomplish.

Very well said. It's very easy to fall into that kind of episode. The only things outside of church I intend on my daughter doing are those things she asks for. Unfortunately, the only other thing she wants to do is gymnastics and well, we don't have a real studio around here (the little class they do offer isn't worth the money in my opinion because I've seen from a few kids that go there what they do and I can teach her that myself lol).