To see what is happening at DeLong, Northstar or South middle schools, visit one of their sites, via the Eau Claire Area School District Web site.

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Overprogramming affects health, social life of children

Hear how Eau Claire mother Julie Carr prevents her two kids, Erin and Sam, from burning hour. Erin Carr, 11, is involved in dance, one of her many activities. Sam Carr plays T-ball, along with soccer, in Eau Claire. (Submitted photos)

When 44-year-old Julie Carr was a child, life was carefree and unstructured. She had “all kinds of time to play and have fun,” as she puts it.

“When I was growing up we went to Sunday School – that was something different than regular school – and maybe had piano lessons,” she said. “That was it, at that age.”

Just one generation later, Carr’s son and daughter have shown her firsthand how life has changed for kids growing up in the 21^st century.

“Now they start in preschool going to dance lessons and music lessons and sports,” she said, noting how competitive kids are becoming at such a young age.

The trend Carr has seen in just one generation of change is part of the nation’s children who have become overprogrammed – schedules packed with sports teams, extracurricular organizations, volunteer work, Advanced Placement classes and other activities.

Whether it’s the children choosing to be very involved, or the parents pushing for success, overprogrammed children are having an impact on Americans’ lifestyles. Studies show a major decline in children’s free time and participation in family and religious time. Changes in sleeping, eating and exercise habits are forcing some children to a feeling of “burn out” before they reach high school. All of these factors leave some experts and parents wondering what the push for success is actually doing to America’s children, both physically and socially.

How involved are these children?

Overall free time for children ages 3 to 12 has declined by 12 hours a week, according to a study conducted in 1981 and 1997 by the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan.

The study also found that play time has decreased by three hours a week and unstructured outdoor activities such as walking, hiking or camping has fallen by 50 percent.

Author Nicole Wise has studied this topic and co-authored the book “Hyper-Parenting: Are You Hurting Your Child by Trying Too Hard?” with Alvin Rosenfeld, M.D.

“I think family life, and it’s not just in the fast moving East and West Coast communities … is so busy, and so structured and scheduled that you just go, go, go,” she said.

So what is replacing all this free time?

From 1981 to 1997, children’s time in structured sports has doubled from two hours and 20 minutes each week to five hours and 17 minutes a week, according to the University of Michigan study. The amount of study time also has increased by almost 50 percent during the same time period.

Becoming involved

Deciding how involved in school and other activities a young child should be in is often left up to the parents’ discretion.

Some experts say that parents pressure their children into being involved, while many other parents support the things their child wants to do.

Wise, now a single mother of four kids, said it is really important that every child has something that they feel good about.

“Nobody is great at everything and nobody stinks at everything,” she said. “As parents, we need to find those things and encourage it – so I think that’s a tremendous opportunity.”

Wise said some parents become too focused on getting their children involved – often in activities their kids may not even enjoy.

“I know so many people who are convinced to raise their kids learning another language … but those kids never end up speaking the language,” she said.

Steve Gobler of Eau Claire said his daughters are involved in “just about anything they can get their hands on.” His daughters decide what they do in their free time, he said.

“We just kind of stand behind and give them something to try,” he said, “and if that’s what they like to do, we support it.” 

While many parents do leave the level of involvement up to their children, Wise cautions that kids don’t necessarily know what’s best for them.

“Sometimes as parents we have to say, ‘No, you’re stressed, you’re cranky all the time,’ ” she said. “We, as a generation of parents, are far more concerned than the previous generation that we are happy, but life’s not all about being happy, sometimes it’s mom and dad’s job to say, ‘No’.”

Gobler said his daughters are pretty good about creating their own schedule. Still, there have been a couple times when he or his wife, Brenda, have had to say, ‘No,’ to additional activities.

“They seem to know their limits,” he said. “We’ve had to tell them, ‘No,’ but not to anything like (an entire sports season).”

Carr said she’s made a conscious effort to limit her daughter’s activities. Erin, a sixth-grader at South Middle School, is involved in soccer, dance, theater and church groups, among others.

“I wanted to be in Destination Imagination, but (my mom) said I had to quit dance,” Erin said. “So I did, and then I did DI.”

Julie Carr said her daughter was too young to be gone every night of the week, but said Erin was fine with limiting her participation.

“As a parent I have to monitor that, because I don’t think the kids really realize that yet … even adults a lot of times don’t realize they’re overbooked, but especially kids,” Julie Carr said. “As a parent I have to really watch that because I’m very concerned about that.”

With high school sports becoming more competitive, the decision to join sports earlier can be tempting.

When Kathie Neevel’s 9-year-old daughter Keeley had the opportunity to start year-round practices for her soccer team, the family initially thought the idea seemed great. Coaches would offer a practice once a week, which Kathie and her husband, Steve, thought would be great to keep their daughter in shape and improve her skills.

After discussing the opportunity, the Neevels realized their daughter was busy enough the way it was.

“Now what are we thinking? No, no, no. She’s in hockey, piano and church,” Kathie Neevel said. “She doesn’t need to do this too.”

While many children may be making the decision to get involved on their own, Wise said today’s society is so focused on “raising success” that it leads people to the type of thinking that is so pervasive today.

“You need to go to the right preschool so that you get into the right elementary school,” she said.

Living in Connecticut, Wise said she sees parents on the East Coast who are on waiting lists for certain preschools before their child is even born.

Burning out

When it comes to busy young athletes, the Gobler’s 11-year-old daughter Mackenzie is no stranger to the situation.

Bouncing between three different sports – soccer, basketball and gymnastics – she said she still finds free time to have fun with her friends.

Out of all of her activities, the sixth-grader said gymnastics is the most time consuming. After two-hour practices held three nights a week at the YMCA, her gymnastics meets are usually held out of town on the weekends, she said.

Her competitions take her as far away as Michigan to as close as Chippewa Falls, she said.

She said she loves the sport and hopes to continue competing into high school, but said there are times when she does get worn down.

“I’ll skip practice when I’m too tired or when I don’t feel good,” Mackenzie said. “But I don’t skip it because I don’t want to go.”

Her father said he’s confident in his daughter’s ability to know her own limits, but still ensures that she “eases back a little bit” when needed.

But not all families are the same. The important lesson for parents to remember is that everything may not be going as well as it seems for their children on the outside, Wise said.

“Parents need to be in tune to what’s going on beyond the surface,” she said, noting many children do enjoy being busy with art, flute lessons, sports and other activities.

“But is the kid exhibiting signs of anxiety, stress headaches, trouble sleeping, freaking out? … Those are the sort of signs you need to say there’s too much pressure,” she said.

When a child exhibits these warning signs, it may be a signal that the child is getting burned out on activities, said Dave Van de Loo, a pediatrician and sports medicine specialist at Luther Midelfort.

“The individual who has a lot of opportunity at a young age and pushes to a high level … may decide not to continue because they no longer desire to put up with the intensity or they’ve done enough of it,” he said.

Health effects

After attending a long day of classes, doing homework, going to meetings and sports practices, it may seem like there’s not enough hours in the day for many kids.

While many parents may focus on getting their youngest kids to bed first, that theory may not always be true.

Children between the ages of 11 to 14 require more sleep each night than elementary-aged children, Van de Loo said.

“As they go through their growth spurts,” he said, “they require more sleep than they did in their elementary age.”

In the Carr household, a routine is set to ensure their children get enough sleep.

“We have a set bedtime,” Julie Carr said. “Samuel, he needs to be to bed by 8:30, and Erin by 9 (p.m.).”

The Neevel household is much the same, as Kathie said her kids don’t get sick often, possibly due to the amount of sleep they get.

“We really watch their sleep patterns,” she said. “We make sure they’re in bed by 8:30 at night.”

Both her kids, Shane and Keeley, get anywhere from eight to 10 hours of sleep a night, she said. “We’re pretty strict on that, especially on school nights.”

Reduced sleep isn’t the only concern for overprogrammed children, some experts say. Sometimes it’s the actual activity itself.

Van de Loo said he’s aware of some studies that show a potential stunting of growth for gymnasts who work at a high level of activity in the sport. However, if a stunting of growth were to occur, it would only happen in the “elite of the elite,” Van de Loo said.

Steve Gobler, whose daughters are involved in gymnastics, said he isn’t very concerned about the health risks involved with the sport at this point. 

“The gymnastics part of it is almost a phase they’re going through,” he said. “It is tough on their bodies, but until we have a problem, we’ll let it go.”

“There are very few instances where a long-term problem occurs as a result of high-intensity sports,” Van de Loo said. “The biggest risk is probably burn out. It’s not that kids are getting injured as young athletes, they’re burning out.”

Other sports where image is important, such as diving or dance, often have subtle recommendations for controlling weight to ensure success, he said.

“But if coaches, parents, whoever else is involved, places demands on them that would be placed only on adults – physically, psychologically or emotionally – that’s where the kids get into trouble,” he said.

Van de Loo said he sees a number of athletes with eating disorders, but they’re not coming out of one particular program or sport.

There are subtle pressures to both lose and gain weight to improve success, whether it is overeating to be a better football lineman or under eating for a weight category in wrestling, he said.

“I would be naïve to say there isn’t some of that going on,” he said.

Reduced family time

With more pressures on children to find success in all their endeavors, studies show family time is one of the first things to be sacrificed.

Repeated annual surveys of American families found a 33 percent decrease over three decades in families who say they definitely have dinner regularly as a whole family.  Only one-third of U.S. families said they “usually have their evening meal together on a daily basis,” according to a 1995 Kentucky Fried Chicken Family Dinner Survey.

While playing the role of “soccer mom,” Kathie Neevel said she does her best to have family meals, but when they’re on the run, they have a tendency to pick up sub sandwiches.

“We probably go out to eat more than we should,” she said, “but my kids aren’t really fast food kids.”

But the food eaten together at the dinner table isn’t the only reason for gathering, Wise said. It’s the communication.

“We live in a too-fast-of-a-pace world … when you get home at 6 (p.m.), you think ‘how quickly can I get something in their stomach’,” Wise said.

Household conversations have dropped by 100 percent, meaning that in 1997 the average American family never sat down as a family and simply talked as the only activity, according to the University of Michigan study. In 1997, children averaged about 45 minutes a week in conversation with anyone in the family, when that was the primary activity.

“The conversations that our families use to have around the dinner table, people now have them in their cars or via e-mail,” Wise said.

Despite the busyness of today’s children, Wise said, there are benefits to the lifestyle, such as learning to work as a team, handling defeat in sports and developing a mental focus.

No matter how busy the lifestyle is, she said, parents need to be aware of how much pressure is being put on their kids, and to make sure they have unstructured time and discussions with them.

“While there is benefit to all the things that our kids get to do,” Wise said, “they lose the opportunity to be the author of their own lives.”