Is Your Child Involved In Extra-Curricular Activities?

I think there has to be a balance. I also think you have to listen to your child if they tell you they are getting burned out. You also need to be able to read the signs that a kid is over extended. My middle daughter willbe doing something after school M-F April-June. She only goes to school 2 1/2 hours a day. She wants to be in these classes & I think it is healthy for her at this point. It is only an hour a day & her sister is still in school at that time.

Well my son was ADHD, so yes, for me, it kept him out of trouble and tired. He did not have time to watch TV and did not know there was such a thing as video games until was 13, well he knew about them, but was too tired to care that he did not have them. He learne to follow rules, stand in line and listen outside of the school environment. If you have good coaches and the kids are active, this is better then kids being home watching TV. It is tough on Mom & Dad but it is better then what a lot of kids are doing.

Yes this is to much for the child and the parent. I was thrilled when I finally got my son interested in something other than coming home and playing video games. He got involved with Drama and Chorus. The two of them kept him just busy enough. A few nights each week he had practice with one or the other. Then the performances were spread out so he only performed twice a month. If he had been more involved I would have been run ragged. He is now involved with Drama, Dance, and Singing. He is older and is in another country making movies and entertainng. I am sure if I had not let him get involved with something he would still be sitting his room playing a video game. LOL

If you keep a kid too busy to get into trouble you create trouble for him later on. It best to deal with any problems they might develope while theya re young so that they don't ruin a perfectly good adulthood. I think peple enroll their kids in activites with the mistaken notion that all the competition is good for them. It is not. What I have seen hapen is alot of kids grwoing up to run places like Enron, It creates little sociopaths that will do just about anything to appear successful. It is better to keep those extra activities to one, maybe two, so that the child can learn how to deal with idle time in a constructive manner so that their adulthood has more quality.

yes it is very important that your child should enjoy some extra curricular activity for overall developement

The only one in my household that is into something right now is one of my daughters . I believe that if this is something the child is interested in doing and wants to do it of there choice then it will help keep your child out of trouble while teaching them something that they are interested in . The problem I have with this stuff in my area is that everything is so expensive and I can't afford to put my children in the different curricular activities that they would like to be in . I feel that for stuff like this it should be made available to everyone in a reasonable price range .

I think the everyday schedule is a bit much. Trying to do the practice every day along with school work, it doesn't give him much time to just relax. I know my neice, who I help raise, is 12 and she has Volleyball once a week practice and a game on Saturday. During the week when she gets home she has time to do her work, play with her friends, do things around the house without a problem. For most kids they need a balance between being kept busy and being run ragged.