As a teacher I know firsthand what can happen when children are overwhelmed with after-school activities, particularly sports. Don’t get me wrong, sports is a good thing, a very good thing. But what has happened over the past 20 years since I hung up my size nine Bauers and traded my cleats for a guitar? Sports are different. Parents are different. Kids are different. The factors going into each is so multi-faceted that it would require me to write multiple blog entries, just to keep you awake. I’ll try to do an abridged version. Wish me luck…

My memories of sports as a kid was waking up early Saturday morning for hockey practice. My father, occasionally my mother, would get a coffee and I would fall out of bed and put on my hockey equipment and head to the rink. After practice I would head home and forget about it until my game later in the week. The game was fun, practice, not so much. Our games were in three ten-minute periods. For the most part we changed lines evenly, things rarely getting out of control. Hockey was a lot of fun, not the serious business it seems to be now. I played hockey in the winter and baseball, and later soccer, in the summer. My commitment, even when I played all-star baseball, was two days per week at the most.

The first thing I want you to consider is your first hockey stick. Actually, consider every stick you ever owned as a kid. If you’re my age (30-something), likely you spent no more than $30 on a stick and it was likely wooden. I really don’t remember seeing a stick that wasn’t wooden until I picked the game back up as a twenty-something. Compare that to today. It is quite typical for kids to use sticks costing upwards of $100. Even $200 sticks are common. Whatever people want to spend money on is their business, not mine, but having the “it” stick is a great source of discussion amongst children. Actually, children are often judged by the type of stick they have, and that’s where I just can’t relate. Bobby Orr used a solid wood stick and he turned out pretty well, right? Let’s move on.

I find both kids and parents have become much more serious about sports in general. Consider how many sports clinics, camps, classes, tournaments and schools have popped up over the past decade. It seems there are so many and they are all competing for our money. I find it quite common for kids to have activities on four or five days of the week. With this increase in scheduling, when can they just “play” outside? Do kids have time to play street hockey? Wait, do kids actually play street hockey? What about shooting hoops? Does anyone have a basketball net anymore? How can they organize a game when most of their friends are busy with other organized activities? And, from a teacher’s perspective, when can they do homework?

It is easy for us to put our sons and daughters in extra-curricular activities because we are inundated with possibilities, each with its own set of promises. We see something in our kids, something which makes them special, and our first instinct is to hone that skill by signing them up for further lessons and instruction. Admittedly, I fell into this trap. My son has already completed a soccer camp before his second birthday. Why? He had fun, I think. He still talks about “Soccer Tots”. It was a good program, and I have no complaints about it specifically.

Ultimately, parents are pulling the strings. On an increasing basis, kids are being over-scheduled. When they are young, and other commitments are minimal, it is more manageable. The problem is when they reach adolesence, and have more responsibilities to school, that it can become dangerous. Again, sports is a very good thing. I am not suggesting that they should be removed from a child’s life, however, I think we as parents need to consider the possibility of over-scheduling our children.

…and that is the last word.