Reply to "I lived the happiest childhood a child could possibly know”

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Reply to ""I lived the happiest childhood a child could possibly know”"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]It is bizarre how posters here are unaware of the benefits and needs of unstructured play for kids and keep justifying their childrens scheduled activities. The reality is everyone is in a rat race. Parents sign kids up for activities because of FOMO.. because their child will be left behind. That is the ugly truth. We are all in such a competitive race that we forget that just because Larlo likes piano it doesn’t mean Maya should also do piano.. and we keep signing them up and then we lie and justify that our kids love their activities. Very few kids love their activities so much that they want to go to one every freaking day. Keep fooling yourselves..[/quote]

This is the type of thing I have a problem with.  Folks like OP are on such a quest to give their kids free play, opportunity to roam, get messy, etc. that they make up this false narrative about structured activities like this -- they eschew and disparage them all.  They think no kids actually enjoys any amount of them; they think there is no benefit in any of them and it's just about FOMO instead.  Baloney!

An ES kid who does like one rec sport and plays an instrument is not over scheduled, but folks like OP would have you believe they are.  There are well-documented mental, social, and emotional benefits to those activities just like free play\.  Folks like OP seem to have no concept of how many hours are in a day and how many days are in a week.  It's this bizarre all or nothing proposition with them.

My 10 yr old DD loves her rec soccer team and LOVES LOVES LOVES the musical theatre program she is a part of.  She still has plenty of time to bike ride with her neighborhood friends, play with her sister in the backyard, hang out with friends, etc...  Most ES kids don't get that much homework (she doesn't at her school) so there really is plenty of time.  She is benefiting from all of it and a happy kid.  [/quote]

You have a comprehension problem. No one is saying one or 2 activities mean overscheduling. A lot of kids have an activity every single day or even more than one activity per day. And no one is saying that some kids don’t love their activities. But most dont[/quote]

The post I quoted said that the "ugly truth" is that parents sign their kids up for activities because of FOMO.  And you think "most" kids don't love activities.  These are narratives you have both made up.  Ok, I bet most kids don't like math tutoring, sure.  But I'm talking about team sports and theatre programs.  My DD and her teammates/cast mates DO love it![/quote]

In DC a lot of parents do sign their kids up for activities out of FOMO. That doesn't mean every activity is about that or that no kid should ever do an activity. But if you parent in this area, surely you've encountered the competitive scheduling of activities. You see it on this website a lot where people don't filter it at all, but I've seen it in person too. One person will say their daughter takes ballet and another person will say "oh mines' in ballet AND tap and we start gymnastics in January." And then someone else will chime in that their kid has no time for ballet because they just started travel soccer and it's four days a week plus they do year round swim and have language classes on Sunday. And so on and so on. I am resolute to stay out of it, but even I will sometimes walk away from exchanges like that thinking "oh no should we be doing year round swim? if we don't and DD wants to do swim team, will this ruin her chances?"

I've also encountered it outside DC. I have family and friends in Pennsylvania and Colorado and both live in very sport-focused areas where it's common for elementary kids to do travel sports and language and play an instrument and do scouts or similar on top of it.

A lot of it has to do with competitiveness for both private K-12 and college, and the fear that if their kid doesn't do all these things, they won't be competitive for admissions. And it also has to do with parents who have a lot of disposable income and using it try and give their kids everything, and in the process depriving their kids of things like "free time" and "being alone" and "relaxing." It's definitely a real phenomenon.[/quote]

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