Extracurricular Activities vs. Home Sweet Home

Practically everywhere I turn, I listen to moms express their need to feel balanced and relaxed.  And one of the leading causes of a life that is “out of balance” is too many extracurricular activities.  While sometimes it is the parent’s schedule, more often than not, it is the children’s schedule.  Why, as moms, do we feel such a need to over schedule our children in extracurricular activities?

Most of the time, parents have good intentions when they enroll their children in sports activities, church youth groups, scouts or music lessons.  They want their children to experience what they feel is a “rich and happy” childhood.  There is no doubt that extracurricular activities can be enriching to a child’s life.  They help children develop skills, enjoy social relationships in a structured environment, and possibly tap into their gifts and talents.

Some parents feel the pressure to keep up with the Jones’s or other social pressures.  Somehow we believe our children will fall behind other children.  I met with a new client yesterday whose family is struggling with finding balance due to the demands of too many extracurricular activities.  She shared with me that her husband was very concerned with what all the other children in the area were doing, and worried that his daughters would not stay up with the competition if they didn’t participate in all these activities.

Other parents enroll their children in many extracurricular activities because as children, their parents either couldn’t or wouldn’t allow them to participate in after school activities.  So they are trying to make up with their children what they lacked when they were boys and girls.

Have we gone overboard and lost perspective on the harmful effects of too many extracurricular activities?  According to child psychologists, too many extracurricular activities in a child’s life make them prone to stress, anxiety and issues with sleep.  My suggestion to moms is to limit a child’s activities to one per semester or season.  The reason I advise this is because when the schedule is too full, there is no room for the important things that take place in the home.

Children need time to play in a natural and creative way.  They need to learn to read, write, draw, imagine, build and fantasize.  Children need time to interact with the neighborhood kids playing a fun game of freeze tag, hide ‘n go seek, or made up games like “wall ball”.  Today we stayed home all day and my five year old colored, made endless police car models from a pile of legos, and created a city in the playroom with tracks and cardboard boxes.  When we over schedule our children, they lose the opportunity to get creative in their play.

One of the best arguments for keeping extracurricular activities to a minimum is to allow plenty of time for family relationships.  How many times per week does the family sit down at the table together for dinner?  When was the last time your family played games together?  Children, more than anything in the world, need to feel loved and feeling loved comes from nurturing family relationships.  Family relationships are not taking place when we rush our kids out the door, grab fast food, and sit on the sidelines as they participate in an activity.  There needs to be time to create a peaceful home environment, relax with our children and enjoy our time together.

According to Alvin Rosenfeld, M.D., the leading expert on overscheduled children, “parents need to relax.  Slow down.  Activities are fine, but don’t go over the top.  Focus on building meaningful relationships with your children, not being their chauffeur.”