Kids & Extra-Curricular Activities

The beginning of school brings on the start of busy weekday nights filled with sports, clubs, try-outs, religious education, super speed-eating dinners, and nights without baths. It also brings the parental question of: Do we sign kids up for soccer, or dance, or both? Or none of the above? Should we let the kids try something new? Like gymnastics, 4-H, or theater?

My kids are still young, so they are definitely in the “let’s just try it phase” when it comes to participating in certain extra-curricular activities. However, it is becoming evident that my third grader is getting a bit old for this reasoning. We gotta start narrowing down her interests for the sake of sanity and sleep. This new line of thinking makes me sad because she is only eight-years-old. I don’t like the pressure of the two of us having to decide if dance is her thing forever, or if singing vocals and tumbling would be a better fit. My husband and I are also at a loss when it comes to narrowing down all of our kid’s athletic ambitions. Fall sports brings on soccer, golf, football, volleyball, and even cross country running. How does one choose?

The current youth sporting trend of picking only one athletic endeavor and sticking with it for eternity goes against every single thing I know from my childhood. I lived in a small town, and if you had a wiff of athletic ability then you played all of the “ball” sports and ran track. It was more common to participate in everything, than the new normal of participating in only one activity that mandates all of the seasons.

My friend Travis has his doctorate and is a writer of the blog Dad Strong. He spends a lot of time educating others on fitness and staying healthy. He wrote a great article that addressed the importance of being a multi-sport player. Travis’s articles focused in on baseball and how it has become a year round sport with school, legion, and club play. This can end up hurting kids due to “early specialization”. The article discusses how there are kids needing elbow surgery in junior high for an injury that should not occur until deep into one’s professional sports career. That is crazy scary!

According to Travis, “ Kids need about 3-4 months of a sport and then 8-9 months away from it ideally playing other sports or picking up basic movement skills with a quality strength coach or gymnastics coach.”

Extra-curricular activities are the ultimate balancing act for parents. I agree wholeheartedly with Travis that too much of one sport can be a bad thing, especially when it comes to a healthy life and the burn-out factor. Plus the financial requirements of playing a sport all year round can be very expensive due to tournament fees, club dues, travel requirements, and mini-camps. Specializing your kid in one activity is demanding, but I also acknowledge that having your children in everything is equally difficult.

On top of all of the worries I have just mentioned, I also overthink if my own bias will impact my kiddos and their activities. For example, I played youth soccer, but in all my elementary school seasons I maybe scored one goal. I just don’t know much about the game and I can still hear my folks explaining to my brothers and I that we only play Fall soccer, because the Spring weather is just too unpredictable in the Midwest. (As a child this irritated me, but as I parent I think my folks were absolute geniuses. Nothing says misery, like a cold March day with frigid winds and wet preschoolers sitting on the soccer field because they are too cold to run.)

My oldest has dappled in soccer, and my middle-child has one pee-wee 3-on-3 season under her belt; from the looks of it neither of them are the next Pelé . However, they are young and we have not really given the sport much of a try. My husband and I just cannot wrap our heads around soccer, and all of the defense work involved. We also do not understand why kids refuse to kick the ball hard, I mean COME ON!…Send it down the field already (am I right?). It is very tempting to say ‘See ya later” soccer, especially before my youngest even gets the chance to tie on a pair of cleats. However, there are two things holding me back:

REASONS TO STICK WITH SOCCER (AT LEAST FOR A LITTLE WHILE LONGER)

1. I have a distant cousin who played soccer at the University of Minnesota and Stanford. She is a soccer stud and was a goal scoring leader in college, plus a Pac-12 All-Academic first team her senior year. So, what if genetically some of that talent has trickled down to one of my offspring, but I am too blind to see it ? I mean, I don’t want to deny them a chance at Stanford, right?
2. Soccer means running around a lot and being active, which is never a bad thing. We started indoor soccer for the first time last year (en lieu of playing outdoors). We did this mostly because indoor soccer fell during the quieter months of January and February. Playing soccer indoors was amazing! No out of bounds (except the bleachers) and my daughter ran around like a chicken with her head cut off, while actually attacking the soccer ball and learning some footwork skills. (Indoor play meant there were no distracting winds or dandelions.) She was sweaty and tired after playing, and I loved it!

It is not just athletic extra-curriculars that cause my household stress. I was getting worried this summer thinking about how my girls could juggle dance class, because both were wanting to try gymnastics (Thanks a lot Simone Biles and the US Olympics). They already have religion class on Wednesdays, musical practice a few nights a week, and my oldest wants to be in 4-H. Therefore something had to give, at least in the short term. My five-year-old told me to relax because taking one year off of dance was not a big deal. She said, “If I really miss it this year, I will go back next year.” She was right. Thankfully my children are smarter and occasionally calmer than me.

Who knows where soccer, dance, or any other activity will actually end up in my kid’s yearbook of life. There is no stamp date on finding your passion, and sometimes it takes missing an activity to know that you really loved it in the first place.

How do you and your kids balance school, life, and extra-curricular activities? Let us know your time management secrets by leaving a comment on our site, or a post on Family Footnote’s Facebook page.