Mike Butts
The Idaho Statesman

No wonder Boise mom Rachele Klein called a time out on her kids´ schedules last year.

Her three children, now ages 4 to 9, were going to school, running track, singing in choirs and taking lessons in golf, skiing, dance and piano. And in their spare time they would … well, they didn´t really have any spare time.

“They would get out of school and we were out the door to events from 4 o´clock until after dinner,” says the 35-year-old stay-at-home mother. “We´d eat in the car and do homework in the car. We were just going pell-mell through the day.”

Klein drastically cut down on her kids´ activities. And she and her children are the better for it. Her situation is a common one: over-scheduled children´s activities to the detriment of sanity and relaxation for the whole family.

“I think it´s the number one public health problem for families and kids in America,” says Alvin Rosenfeld, a child psychiatrist in New York and author of “The Over-Scheduled Child: Avoiding the Hyper-Parenting Trap.” He says the syndrome affects about 80 percent of the population. “There were always stage moms and pushy parents. But that a vast population of parents would be convinced that overachieving is the right way to raise kids is new.”

And it´s exactly the frame of mind the Kleins fell into. Rachele Klein says she and her husband, Karl, a Boise attorney, believed their children´s activities should all be structured and goal-oriented.

“We really bought into the whole thing of play with a purpose, you need to guide every activity,” Rachele says.

Rosenfeld believes some of the push to keep kids on the go and in structured activities all the time comes from industries wanting to sell child development products. He also blames the situation on overbearing parents.

“Parenting has become the most competitive adult sport in North America,” Rosenfeld says. “It´s not all for the bad. That parents are deeply concerned about them (their kids) is for the good. But it´s gone too far.”

The lost art of goofing off

South Junior High student Zach Lorenzana packs his days with activities and says he likes it that way.

The 14-year-old practices with a Mexican dance group and mariachi band Monday nights, is in a choir Tuesday nights, rehearses with an adult folk dance group Wednesday nights and takes private trumpet lessons Thursday nights. Throw in school, homework, church and performances for the Folklor Latino de Idaho group he´s in and you can see why he and his mother, Maria, decided to drop Zach´s soccer playing two years ago.

“About two weeks ago his schedule was making me crazy, and I thought he should take the night off,” says Maria Lorenzana, 35. “He said he didn´t need to. When his ride didn´t come, he fell asleep on the couch.”

Maria says all the activities Zach and his sister Veronika, 12, are involved in keep them from being bored and help them make friends. But when is enough too much?

Rosenfeld has written that overly busy kids put stress on families and hamper children´s ability to be creative.

“We need balance and time for a family to be a family, for parents and kids to just hang around, go fishing, take a walk, shoot hoops, watch television,” Rosenfeld says. “Anything that doesn´t require that (kids) perform and achieve, that just requires that you spend time together and enjoy each other.

“If you´re canceling Saturday night dinner with your spouse every week because of a 9 p.m. ice (rink) time for your kids, something is off.”

And when activities are built solely around development and improving skills, children can get the wrong idea.

“Kids get a subliminal message that if they continually have to improve to be adequate they must not be very good at all,” Rosenfeld says, “that they are valuable for what they can produce and not for who they are.”

Getting with the programs

Over-scheduling is surely not a problem for all families. Fairmont Junior High counselor Ron Stoor says kids who have nothing to do are more of a problem than over-scheduled kids. And he says kids can be busy in a healthy way.

But Stoor has seen his share of children who end up studying until midnight because they´re trying to do too much. He says some kids haven´t learned how to say no and want to please parents and others by taking on a variety of activities.

“It´s critical for everybody in the family just to stand back and say, ´It´s OK to let this activity go´ and have a balanced life,” he says. “Occasionally I´ll see a student come in and just be overwhelmed with everything and just be in tears.”

Corey Becia is another busy Boise junior high student. She´s editor and chief of the Riverglen Junior High School yearbook, she plays first chair clarinet in the band, she has three advanced classes and is on cross country and soccer teams.

“I don´t like coming home and having nothing to do,” says Corey, a 14-year-old ninth-grader.

Corey´s mother, Celeste, says Corey comes home after school for an hour, heads out for activities and comes back at 7:30 or 8 p.m. to start her homework.

“It gets to be barely manageable in the fall and spring,” Celeste says. “She wants to do it all. She wants to try everything.”

Celeste says her family has joined a neighborhood cooking co-op to help streamline their daily schedule.

When Rachele Klein cut back on her kids´ schedules, she had each one pick one activity outside of school that they wanted to do. Six-year-old Annika chose soccer and 9-year-old Taylor decided on choir.

“Now our kids play with other kids in the neighborhood, they ride their bikes and play on the trampoline. They do the things we did as kids,” Rachele says. And the family has dinner together four or five times a week.

But what did 4-year-old Garrett, the one the Kleins decided they didn´t really want to groom into the next Tiger Woods, chose as his one activity?

“He didn´t want to do anything except stay home and play with his toys,” Rachele says. “I think he was burned out at 3 1/2 , the poor little thing.”

To offer story ideas or comments, contact Mike Butts
mbutts@idahostatesman.com or 377-6429

Edition Date: 11-15-2003

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