Sunday, September 29, 2002

BY PEGGY O'CROWLEY

STAR-LEDGER STAFF

It might seem odd to organize against too much organization, but a growing number of families are doing just that.

In a backlash of sorts against structured activities for children and too little time for families, folks are starting to cut back on the endless round of lessons and sports.

"People feel there's a desperate need for counter pressure to the idea that the way to raise kids right is to schedule them endlessly. We need to strengthen families, not to weaken them," said Alvin Rosenfeld, a child psychiatrist and co-author of "The Over-Scheduled Child: Avoiding the Hyper-Parenting Trap" (St. Martin's Griffin, $13.95).

Rosenfeld is starting an initiative he calls Family Night Once A Month to encourage and support families to spend at least one night a month doing nothing, or at least nothing that will go on a child's college application form.

Those who argue against enrolling children in activities that stretch from after school to bedtime have two concerns -- that such demands put too much pressure on children to perform, and that well-meaning parents rob their children of something they need even more than accomplishments: their families.

Since the 1970s, children have lost 12 hours a week in free time, including a 25 percent drop in playing and a 50 percent drop in unstructured activities, according to oft-cited research from the University of Michigan's Survey Research Center.

"Children would rather just have you," said Howard Grossman, vice president of family services for Family Counseling Service of the Children's Aid and Family Services in Bergen County. The program's Ready Set Relax! day in Ridgewood last March, in which families were urged to spend one night hanging out together, drew national attention -- and some derision that it took a year to plan.

But Grossman said it was valuable to raise awareness of how little time families have for each other and to encourage them to reassess their priorities. The group plans to hold another night of hanging out next winter, he said.

Besides cutting into family time, too much to do means kids don't have the freedom to daydream, to play and to interact with other kids without rules and regulations, said William J. Doherty, a Minnesota family therapist and co-author of "Putting Family First" (Henry Holt, $14).

Doherty and others started Putting Family First, a parents' initiative to encourage families to create more balance in their lives.

"If Einstein was in fourth grade today, he'd be on Ritalin," Rosenfeld said. "There's a real benefit to not stealing childhood from children. There's a benefit to letting them use their imaginations, letting them feel ownership of their lives, to have them struggle to figure out who they are. Their job is not to gratify their parents' dreams."

-- Peggy O'Crowley

Sunday, September 29, 2002

BY PEGGY O'CROWLEY

STAR-LEDGER STAFF

September is like a roller coaster: during the first weeks, the car starts to crawl -- and, as you oh-so-slowly move up the track, you realize it's too late to get out. Then WHOOSH!! you're hurtling into the dizzying round of school, homework, soccer practice, dance lessons, and PTA committees and it feels like IT'S NEVER GOING TO END!!!

Of course, it will end -- next June.

So take a deep breath and hold on tight. You can get through the next nine months, if you set up a system -- and the right priorities -- now, according to professional organizers, child and family mental health experts and educators (all parents themselves). In the process, you also can figure out if your family would prefer the merry-go-round or Ferris wheel instead of the high speed ups and downs of the ...

"Around this time, it's difficult," acknowledged Sajini Joshi of Summit, who serves as personal secretary and chauffeur for children Jyoti, 16, and Rohit, 10.

The Joshis are definitely a roller coaster family: As the school year begins, Joshi, an administrative assistant, creates an online calendar she keeps at work and home, and sends to her husband, Yash, the CEO of eComserver, an IT company.

Everyone's moves are color-coordinated ...

It's hectic, Joshi agreed, but the family likes it that way.

Setting your own family's priorities is the first step in taking control of your schedule, experts said. For most, that means basics like school and work, homework, family time, religious activities, with sports, lessons, clubs or community service in the second tier.

"You need to figure out what your family's priorities are. For us, eating dinner together was our one hard and fast rule. We might have had dinner at 3 p.m. or 10 p.m., but everyone ate together," said Linda Hodge, the president-elect of the National Parent Teacher Association and a Connecticut mother of three grown children.

Her other absolutes: time for homework and play, which she called "just as important as being on the soccer team or the quiz bowl."

Because time together is one of the first casualties of a busy family, experts suggest you schedule that in as you would a piano lesson. Alvin Rosenfeld, a child psychiatrist and author of "The Over-Scheduled Child: Avoiding the Hyper-Parenting Trap," is trying to start a national Family Night a Month, in which families spend one night each month hanging out together.

It's in the details

Once you have the basic must-dos down, create a detailed schedule for each child and start filling in the time slots, a chart that Julie Morgenstern, author of "Organizing From the Inside Out" and "Time Management From the Inside Out," calls a "time map" of a typical week, with each day divided into half-hour increments. Teenagers can do this themselves: Morgenstern and her 16-year-old daughter, Jessi Morgenstern-Colon, have just written "Organizing from the Inside Out for Teens."

Once you've filled in the obvious six hours for school and one to two hours for homework, depending on the age of the child, you can see how much time is left on evenings and weekends for the extras. Then comes the next decision: How busy does your child (and you, if you are going to be the chief schlepper) want to be?

Some parents and mental health experts are firmly in favor of the pendulum swinging away from having a child engaged in structured activity every waking minute. For them, restricting extras to one sport and one cultural activity (playing an instrument, for example) is enough.

Others believe it's a matter of knowing your child's capabilities and temperament.

"My oldest son wanted to do a million things, but his goal was to get into Harvard. In eighth grade, he called Harvard and asked what he needed to do. So, at one point in high school, he ran cross country, played rugby, was in the Reserve Officer Training Corps, the yearbook committee, the state PTA Board and worked with the Hawaii State Legislature," Hodge said. "My other son only wanted to do one or two things after school and that was okay, too."

The one rule she did have was to talk about each activity and why the child wanted to participate before deciding if it was acceptable. She let her older son do so much because of his commitment to a goal: He got early admission to Harvard on full scholarship.

"One of the reasons kids do so much is they want to be with their friends and if their friend is into everything, they want to be. It's kind of a self-perpetuating cycle, because the only way to be with kids to be in organized activities," said Bill Doherty, a University of Minnesota professor and author of "Putting Family First: Successful Strategies for Reclaiming Family Life in a Hurry-Up World" ($14, Henry Holt and Company).

Jyoti Joshi seems to be on overdrive. She takes tae kwon do lessons on Monday and Thursday evenings, piano lessons on Tuesdays, swims at the Y and has a job there teaching swimming to youngsters every Friday. On Sundays, she volunteers to care for young children at the lecture series her family attends. The junior at Union County Vocational Technical School also must do homework and study for school, including the advanced placement physics and calculus courses she's taking.

"It can get overwhelming sometimes, but I like everything I do," she insisted.

Once the activities and the commitment of time, including travel time, have been confirmed, add them to the time map. Whatever's left is what the child has for socializing, "down time," or working on special school projects. If there isn't any left over, or it's just too little before lights out, it might be time to pare down. That goes for the parent shuttle, too.

Be flexible, be prepared

The time map is a work in progress, Morgenstern said. Depending on a child's energy level at different times of the day, you may want to swap some slots around. For example, Morgenstern's daughter used to come home directly from school to do her homework. She actually ended up falling asleep for a while. So when Jessi asked to take another dance class, Morgenstern was skeptical.

"I said, 'Well, honey, you're not necessarily getting all your homework done, how are you going to add more to your schedule?' It was counterintuitive, but the effect was, she increased her productivity and her grades shot up," she said.

Once you've got a working time map, transfer everything to a large calendar with enough space to write in each child's activities in, yes, a different color code. You might feel this is a bit over the top, but you'll be organized.

Go over each day's events with young children the night before, so he or she will know what to expect and (cross your fingers) remember to bring what is needed for the activity. For instance, if your son will have soccer practice the next day, going directly from school to religious classes to soccer, he can stash his shin guards and cleats in his backpack the night before.

"I put every field trip on the calendar, every time I needed to send in $2 to class," Hodge said.

If you still find yourself driving your child's lunch to school because he forgot it, Hodge suggested making a daily list of items on the computer and giving each child a printout each morning. Then, child can check off each item as it goes into the back pack.

Some schedules, like homework, will expand or contract at times, and Morgenstern said that, too, can be accommodated on a planning calendar. She recommends that long-term assignments, like a research report, be broken into three to five steps, such as research and notes, first draft, second draft. Besides writing down due dates for each step, pencil in blocks of time to complete each task.

A space for everything

As every parent knows, the paperwork, materials and equipment for each child -- everything from hot lunch forms to paints sets to tap shoes or lacrosse sticks -- can accumulate into a nightmarish mess. Organization is key here, too.

Hodge recommends creating a file for each child, subdivided into categories for homework, other school papers, Girl Scouts projects or Hebrew school work. Each child also should have a dedicated space for everything they need for activities like ice skates for hockey, flute for music lessons, etc. The area where children do homework should be stocked with everything the child will need, so there's no time lost searching for a pen or marker.

Sometimes, however, all the organization in the world won't make up for overstressed children, cranky parents, or the simple fact that there are just 48 half-hour increments in the day.

Sometimes, it's necessary to reassess and reduce the load.

Sometimes, that's an easy call. Last year, Jessi Morgenstern-Colon's social life was evaporating, mostly because of the theater company she joined that held all-day Saturday rehearsal. "She couldn't go out with her friends Friday night because she had to be up so early Saturday and she was required to be in rehearsals all day," Morgenstern said. After dropping the theater troupe, she did not replace it with another activity, allowing herself one free day a week.

Sometimes, it's not so easy. Jyoti Joshi wants to add two more tae kwon do classes to her schedule to achieve a black belt before she goes to college (looking at schools is another project the family will undertake this year.) So her mother suggested she drop piano or teaching. "I love those things," Jyoti moaned.

Sometimes, the schedule itself will tell you, Hodge said. At a parent-teacher meeting for her middle son, she was asked, "What in the world goes on at your house on Wednesday nights? Your son is never prepared on Thursday mornings."

Hodge consulted the schedule and, sure enough, the whole house was out at meetings and activities until late in the evening. Immediately, the family scaled back to make Wednesday more sane.