Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Behaviour/development

Talk to others about child development and behaviour stages here. You can find more information on our development calendar.

Flip

1 2 3 4

Original poster

Ha childhood been cancelled?

95 replies

DrNortherner · 22/05/2008 11:48

Something Professor Winston said got me thinking. Nowadays kids spend very little time just playing. They are ferried around from one activity to another. Sports clubs and extra tuition are eating into our kids spare time.

Think about when we were kids, we had so much more time to do what we wanted, and more freedom to play unsupervised.

Today kids are getting to 10/11 without ever going anywhere alone (at this age I would be playing out most of the day). Instead we structure their time. We tell them Monday is swimming, Tues is ballet, Weds is maths tuition etc. Plus homework and busy mums and dads is leading to a much more stressful childhood.

I say abandon most of the clubs and activities and let our kids be kids.

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

OrmIrian · 22/05/2008 12:58

My DCs do both. I allow them to be 'feral' for a period of time but they also have quite strict rules to limit that freedom. They have some activities to which I have to ferry them but not every night (not even every week). I think the 'feral' bit is incredibly helpful in helping them to become independent and confident. Not child-snatchers that bother us btw, but adults who don't like seeing children out and about alone, regardless of what they are doing and how they are behaving.

Fennel · 22/05/2008 12:59

You can draw a neat parallel between the Commodification of Women's bodies via Control Pants and the Commodification of Childhood via the excess of structure actitivies. Both are symptoms of late postmodernist capitalism....

WilfSell · 22/05/2008 13:00

I'm more worried about cars than childsnatchers TBH but am lucky to live somewhere where kids can play out easily.

Fennel · 22/05/2008 13:00

My children are, I gather, feral and undisciplined in their ballet and music classes, where does that place them? Is that good or bad?

WilfSell · 22/05/2008 13:01

Fennel

get back to your marking...

Othersideofthechannel · 22/05/2008 13:08

I did loads of after school activities (4 times a week) when I was a child. But then apart from Sunday lunch and occasional visit to GPs, weekends were completely unstructered so plenty of time for climbing trees, disappearing for hours at a time as long as we were back in time for meals etc

Anna, I'm looking forward to September so DCs can have more chilling/mooching around time. They definitely need it.(But then DH always goes rowing on Sat am)

annoyingdevil · 22/05/2008 13:32

I live on a working class estate (sorry to use the 'C' word) and the kids are out playing on the street from dawn until dask. Trouble is my pfb wants to play with them and she's only just three

PrettyCandles · 22/05/2008 13:38

I deliberately don't have lots of after-school activities for my lot, for precisely this reason. Also to save my sanity and the baby's sanity - it's just not fair on the baby to be ferried about after his brother and sister all the time, and be unable to run around and enjoy himself while they are in their activity.

The other day I let 7yo ds1 and 5yo dd stay on their own in the park near our house for the first time while I continued on home with the baby, and returned to them about 20min later. They loved the sense of responsibility and freedom.

totalmisfit · 22/05/2008 13:48

all my dd wants to do these days is watch 'Ceebeeeebies! Teebeee! watch!' i miss the days when she was happy for hours with her head in a book (between about 12-18 months believe it or not) now shes 2.2 and has lost all imagination... how quickly they become delinquents nowadays

cory · 22/05/2008 16:31

I had beautiful plans about dd and ds going off to the park together; they'd be well old enough. And now she's in a wheelchair which he can't push.
You know, I saw some drunken teenage girls staggering along the road the other day, on my way into town. And I cried because that won't be dd. It's not that I want her to be drunk and delinquent and pregnant at 14. It's the thought that she won't get a choice.
Sorry, I know this is feeble and self-pitying. But I'd love to be one of these mums with feral and unstructured children.

VoluptuaGoodshag · 22/05/2008 16:46

I think there are too many structured activities nowadays. I never had anything like that but nor did I have a nursery or playgroup. I am happy that my DD (4) and DS(3) go to playgroup/nursery 5 mornings a week. Apart from DD having a swimming lesson once a week, that's it. We stopped ballet as she was bored. I have the telly on most of the afternoon but they take it or leave it. I find that they get bored by it then go off and footer by themselves. They watch it more later in the week as they are knackered.

I have a niece and nephew aged 6+8 and they do about 4 activities a week. When we babysat for them recently, they were bored after 10 mins because we had nothing organised for them.

Anna8888 · 22/05/2008 17:21

Othersideofthechannel - have your DCs been doing Saturday morning school every week?

TantieTowie · 22/05/2008 18:25

I think the freedom of the 70s is much overhyped.

When I was at primary school in said decade, I played out a lot, played on the cotton bales at the local mill, walked a mile to school etc etc BUT I also was made to go to Brownies, church choir rehearsals, Sunday school and my single dad's school play rehearsals (the highlight was when the big boys and girls took me to the shop to get sweets).

I particularly remember resenting Brownies because it was at the same time as Charlie's Angels.

I think all of the above, feral and otherwise, was in the name of getting me out of the house or otherwise occupied while my dad marked.

Having said that now I have a 16m DS I hope I have the nerve to let him play out in our local park when he's older. But I imagine I will draw the line at letting him skateboard down our curving, steep road in the dark, as the local kids do now.

One theory I did find quite interesting was that apparently what we're not doing is allowing our kids to take risks - which means they're less likely to do that in later life as well.

HonoriaGlossop · 22/05/2008 18:50

cory, you're not feeble at all. Of course you feel that way, we all want our children to have all the opportunities in the world (though of course we hope they won't take them ALL up when some of them involve teen drunkenness etc!)

Your ds may not be able to push your dd to get to the park together as you envisaged but maybe you'll just have to wait a bit longer than you thought? I bet they will be off out other places together as teenagers....

Othersideofthechannel · 23/05/2008 05:50

Anyone else like TantieTowie made to do stuff when they would rather have been pottering about at home? I opted for all my activities in the 70s. Luckily most were withing walking distance of home.

Yes, Anna, DC have school every Saturday, except for one Saturday off a month. The school insists on attendence. Bit of a pain when it comes to visiting family at weekends.

FairyMum · 23/05/2008 06:52

I was a child in the 70s and loads more activities than my children. Probably 5 a week + often stuff organised at weekends. I also played out in the street, so thinking back I wonder how I ever had the time to see my parents. I was definatly a very busy child (by choice). My children spend a lot more time just chilling out than I did.

Anna8888 · 23/05/2008 08:35

Othersideofthechannel - so the end of Saturday morning school will be a big relief to you

We (very fortunately) have barely been subjected to it - the boys' primary school only had 6 Saturday morning sessions per school year (and slightly shorter holidays) and my daughter's school has always had Wednesday not Saturday sessions.

Anna8888 · 23/05/2008 08:37

I definitely had a lot of freedom as a child and particularly as a teenager. But I lived in a very, very safe country.

I've definitely been one of life's risk takers, too.

Othersideofthechannel · 23/05/2008 08:58

Yes, Anna, it will be good for DCs to have one less morning a week where we all have to be out of the house by 8.15. At least one of them is so tired by Saturday that I have to drag him/her out of bed.

I will miss out on my 3 hours to myself but it's for the greater good.

Anna8888 · 23/05/2008 09:03

We will have another problem next year, though - both the boys will be at collège, and in all probability will have at least two 8am starts a week, probably on different days... and since when they are with us they need a lift to school, I can see days when one boy has to be at school at 8 am, my daughter has to be at school at 9 am (at least that is regular) and other boy at 10 am... oh joy

Othersideofthechannel · 23/05/2008 09:03

Do you think freedom/risk taking is linked? I had alot of freedom as a child but I am not a risk taker.

When I was 17 my mum lent me her car to drive two friends to London ( over an hour a way) to see Prince at Wembley.

I am not sure that I could that be laidback!

Anna8888 · 23/05/2008 09:05

Yes, I do think that freedom and risk taking are linked. I had a lot of freedom as a teenager and got used to looking after myself in all kinds of situations, and finding it quite normal to do new and different things. That definitely stood me in good stead for taking lots of opportunities when I was young - travelling to exotic locations on my own, upping sticks and moving countries etc.

My current life is extraordinarily staid by my own standards (though has its own challenges).

Fullmoonfiend · 23/05/2008 09:08

do you know, my ds 1 is 10 and I am forever trying to persuade him to play out by himself. He won't, he is too scared...
Of what? Mostly bad traffic, bigger kids who might beat him upo/steal his bike etc.
One of the reasons we like going to festivals is that dsses see that as 3/4 days of 'freedom' where they can be free range.

windygalestoday · 23/05/2008 09:19

several years ago my 2 eldest ds went to chess club,after school football,church on saturday - middle ds got poorly with this blood thing and we were forced to educate him at home and re evaluate our lifestyle - out went extra curricular activities and we just did stuff together as he felt well......when eldest ds was in year 8 he had friends over and a new skate park and footy pitch had been built locally s ds2 wanted to go i had to accompany them ....i thought ds1 nd his mates would be mortified and made it clear i was there really for ds3 and ds2 if he became unwell but they loved it and even now in year 10 if ds1 is going up to the park with his mates they will invite me and ds3 too......i do think kids enjoy adult supervision to a degree.

DaisySteiner · 23/05/2008 09:27

I live in a very affluent middle-class area and most of the children I know do LOTS of activities - I know of several children aged about 7 who do something every single night after school and so just aren't available to go for tea at friend's houses which I think is quite sad.

Apart from the fact that we are not very affluent and just can't afford to do as much, my children just don't want to be doing so many activities. Often when we've tried to persuade them to go to a club they've moaned that if they do that they don't have time to play before tea and bed, so they all do a couple of things and can play at home on the other days. Seems to be a happy medium for us!

Flip

1 2 3 4