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Busy children are happy
Filed under: Health & Safety: Babies, Media
I've heard rumblings recently about "overscheduled kids" - children whose parents drag them frantically from soccer practise to ballet lessons to karate and then to bookclub on one Saturday afternoon. I've also heard the sighs and heard the eyeballs and listened to the refrain "why can't we just let kids be kids?"But an American study now says that the hypothesis that a busy schedule causes a child stress might be unfounded.
On the contrary, the study said that children who participate in extra curricular activities had lowered rates of substance use, improved grades, and a better relationship with their parents. The study found that American children actually spend more time in front of the TV or in sedentary activities than they do in organized activity, which doesn't surprise me a whole lot.
The lead researcher of the study noted that the "real problem" is children who don't participate in organized activities at all.
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
8-14-2006 @ 7:25AM
Rug said...Youth are seen as taking part in a variety of activities because of the perceived pressure from parents and other adults to achieve and attain long-term educational and career goals.
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8-14-2006 @ 8:17AM
amber said...I don't really think that it's ANY extracurricular activities that's worrisome, I think it's overloading a child with them that's the issue here. For example, I really had to stop a moment when my aunt told me that my 10-year-old cousin had 5 camps this summer. What ever happened to getting summertime off?
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8-14-2006 @ 8:39AM
Marcia said...I think this depends on the child. My one little cousin has a different dance class every night of the week, she goes to competitions nearly every weekend, she joined the track team, and she is constantly fundraising for her dance costumes. She finally quit cheerleading this year, only to add one more dance class. The child has to do her homework in the dance studio and hardly ever sees any family. She's so exhausted, and I think part of it is her mom's fault. Her mother never participated in anything and was not in the "in crowd" so she always asks her daughter if she wants to take MORE CLASSES. She's passing her childhood up so fast, but her mom enjoys seeing her daughter be 'popular'.
It reminds me of some of the pageant moms the way she is pressured into doing so much.
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8-14-2006 @ 11:16AM
Brenda said...Everything in moderation, including moderation.
--(Quote attributed to many people)
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8-14-2006 @ 3:24PM
suburban misfit said...Overscheduling *is* a problem. Those kids have no down-time, no time to just be kids and play with their friends. Parents need to find a balance between activities and free time.
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8-14-2006 @ 6:16PM
ann adams said...I agree. There has to be a balance between none and too many. What that balance is depends on the individual child. My youngest was so weighed down with homework last year she had no time for anything else and was falling on her face by 7:30. We managed one after school church activity for her and her sisters and sometimes her homework wasn't completed on those days. I wrote a note saying "enough is enough".
I keep doing the arithmetic over and over. If the kids are supposed to be sleeping 10 hours a night, traveling to and from school, eating dinner, bathing, doing all that homework, and getting ready for the next school day, how do they find time for anything else.
The first thing to be sacrificed is their childhoold. The second thing to go is the sleep. At my house we kept the sleep and let go of anything extracurricular including playtime.
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