What's wrong with a kid being "overscheduled"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When my kids aren't in activities, they have 0 interest in playing with neighborhood kids or playdates with the nearby schoolmates. For one thing, they don't even know many of the neighborhood kids because they go to different schools or are homeschoolers, and the schoolmates who happen to live close are rude brats. My kids would rather play with each other at home, no interlopers.

This idea that overscheduling activities is ruining neighborhood free play is naive. There's lots of factors.

Mine were never social in our neighborhood either and the kids who kept coming over by knocking on the door were either neglected or parents looking for free babysitting and I put a stop to it pretty quickly. I don't want my kids running around the neighood unsupervised for many reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no such thing as underscheduled for a child who goes to school full time and gets good grades and takes a challenging courseload, and has extra curricular activities built into the school day or afterschool. I think oberscheduling has become more of a concern because elementary schools no longer provide organized sports or rigorous arts. So parents have to drive around town filling these needs. Maybe choose a private school that provides these things and you wont feel overscheduled.

This is the elementary school forum. Most kids are not picking the courseload. And PPs are literally complaining that kids spend their time afterschool doing structured extra curricular activities instead of playing in the neighborhood. I doubt those PPs would feel any differently if the after-school EC activities were organized through the school as opposed to through some other organization or company.

They want playmates for their kids so they critize others. ES turns into MS then HS and its very hard to pick things up later on. Most of the school ones were pretty bad, especially music.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So ppl's hs kids can't entertain themselves without screens or activities?

My HS kid plays 3 varsity sports. He has perfect grades and is studying for his SAT. He is on several academic clubs and competitions. He is gunning for Ivy+ schools.

He is not roaming around daydreaming. He has a full AP courseload.

My youngest child who is almost like an only child is not good at entertaining herself at all despite being the least scheduled of my three children.

Maybe you should focus on your youngest more?

Hosting a play date for her now. We may do too much for her. Or she constantly wants to be with people. She is very social.

That's not doing too much. Let her do activities, spend some 1-1 time with her...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no such thing as underscheduled for a child who goes to school full time and gets good grades and takes a challenging courseload, and has extra curricular activities built into the school day or afterschool. I think oberscheduling has become more of a concern because elementary schools no longer provide organized sports or rigorous arts. So parents have to drive around town filling these needs. Maybe choose a private school that provides these things and you wont feel overscheduled.

This is the elementary school forum. Most kids are not picking the courseload. And PPs are literally complaining that kids spend their time afterschool doing structured extra curricular activities instead of playing in the neighborhood. I doubt those PPs would feel any differently if the after-school EC activities were organized through the school as opposed to through some other organization or company.

You can pick a school with more challenging academics so that your child stays busy productively, instead of having to do a lot of busywork-equivalent activities. You also wouldn't feel the pressure to add stuff like tutoring, enrichment, and private instrument lessons on top of all the sports, because good private elementaries provide that. I'm just saying that free public school plus a bunch of activities can end up being more expensive that a very good private school.

We spend a lot on activities, camps, lessons and tutoring and its no where near the cost of private. And, if we did private we'd still need the activities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So ppl's hs kids can't entertain themselves without screens or activities?

My HS kid plays 3 varsity sports. He has perfect grades and is studying for his SAT. He is on several academic clubs and competitions. He is gunning for Ivy+ schools.

He is not roaming around daydreaming. He has a full AP courseload.

My youngest child who is almost like an only child is not good at entertaining herself at all despite being the least scheduled of my three children.

Maybe you should focus on your youngest more?

Hosting a play date for her now. We may do too much for her. Or she constantly wants to be with people. She is very social.

That's not doing too much. Let her do activities, spend some 1-1 time with her...

She has friends. She does dance, sports, Girl Scouts and plays an instrument. She does nothing competitively yet so it is still once per week. We do play with her. What she can’t do is play on her own. She does read a lot. She may read 2-3 books per day on some days. Perhaps it is because she is in an in between phase where she is outgrowing toys. Even when she was young though, she wanted someone to play with her with her toys.

[Anonymous]

You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

What is a hobby kid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

What is a hobby kid?

Your kid is your hobby. In this case, your hobby has hobbies, and it's manageable for you.

[Anonymous]

in my case I have 3 kids. Each kids is not overscheduled, they do 1-2 activities each but that’s about 5-6 activities I am driving them to. I am overscheduled, but each kid is not. They are of an age where I don’t have to take all of them with me all the time so they stay home and play with each other, do homework, whatever. But they aren’t available to run around the neighborhood or have playdates with other kids if I can’t be home or I can’t pick them up later due to a conflict. I don’t see any kids running around anyway in our neighborhood. It’s the parents stretched thin in cases like mine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

I have 3 kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:in my case I have 3 kids. Each kids is not overscheduled, they do 1-2 activities each but that’s about 5-6 activities I am driving them to. I am overscheduled, but each kid is not. They are of an age where I don’t have to take all of them with me all the time so they stay home and play with each other, do homework, whatever. But they aren’t available to run around the neighborhood or have playdates with other kids if I can’t be home or I can’t pick them up later due to a conflict. I don’t see any kids running around anyway in our neighborhood. It’s the parents stretched thin in cases like mine.

I think neighborhoods are different. I have friends who live walking distance to the school and they have impromptu play dates even though kids all do many activities. We used to live in a house where my son was in the same class and BFFs with the kids at the bus stop. They would play right after school and before sports or be on the same soccer or bade team and carpool.

We now live in an area where families are more affluent, attend different schools and not many young families because young families can’t afford to live here or would not pick this type of neighborhood as a starter home.

My friends who live in a townhouse hang out everyday at the local playground in their community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

I have 3 kids.

why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

I have 3 kids.

why?

I don't know why, but I actually Laughed Out Loud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You have a hobby kid. Good for you. If you had multiple kids, you would not be able to maintain this schedule.

What is a hobby kid?

Your kid is your hobby. In this case, your hobby has hobbies, and it's manageable for you.

Better a hobby kid than a hobby dog.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:in my case I have 3 kids. Each kids is not overscheduled, they do 1-2 activities each but that’s about 5-6 activities I am driving them to. I am overscheduled, but each kid is not. They are of an age where I don’t have to take all of them with me all the time so they stay home and play with each other, do homework, whatever. But they aren’t available to run around the neighborhood or have playdates with other kids if I can’t be home or I can’t pick them up later due to a conflict. I don’t see any kids running around anyway in our neighborhood. It’s the parents stretched thin in cases like mine.

I think neighborhoods are different. I have friends who live walking distance to the school and they have impromptu play dates even though kids all do many activities. We used to live in a house where my son was in the same class and BFFs with the kids at the bus stop. They would play right after school and before sports or be on the same soccer or bade team and carpool.

We now live in an area where families are more affluent, attend different schools and not many young families because young families can’t afford to live here or would not pick this type of neighborhood as a starter home.

My friends who live in a townhouse hang out everyday at the local playground in their community.

Our townhouse community is great for this. The kids aren't totally unscheduled, but nobody has the budget for too much, and the other kids are RIGHT THERE when they're around. My kid can look out the window and see if their friends are home. There's a contained and communal area for them to play in usually with at least some people around. I would recommend any young family look at townhomes.