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I have read about this topic before and thought it seemed like a good problem to have. Now that my older child is approaching HS, I see where this can become an obstacle.

I have begun to wonder if my kids, like many we know are overscheduled and too busy. They are interested in so many different activities that I wonder if they should become more focused in their pursuit of honing their skills.

My daughter is in 7th grade. She is involved in speech club, girl scouts and peer tutoring. She plays the flute for band and takes piano lessons. She swims twice a week and wants to participate in school track again this spring. Throw in periodic school projects (currently science fair) and community theater with her moderately demanding courses where she maintains an A average and I wonder if she is too �well rounded�.

Take swimming for instance, she is very good. Her Y instructors tell me that she should be on a year round competitive swim team rather than the pre-competitive class she is in. This would require a much greater time (and money) commitment and would also be inconvenient as far a location. What do we give up to accommodate her talent development in this area? She isn�t great at track, but she enjoys participating with her school friends. That would be my answer, but I don�t think she will want to give it up. If she hopes to make the high school swim team (huge school � very competitive to make any group) she will need to focus her efforts!

She is one of two kids whose talents are somewhat parallel, but that luxury is beginning to dissolve. It�s much easier when they need to be driven to the same location (I know some of you have 3 or more children).

Any thoughts or advice would be appreciated.

This is a toughy. I tend to make these decisions for my kids based on what I think will benefit them most in the long run and will help them attain their own goals in life. Sometimes it is the unpopular decision I land on and at other times it hits the mark with my guys. I generally tend to choose those things that might financially benefit both my wallet and theirs eventually.

Also, she's taking two instruments right now. Is it possible to take a rest from one during the competitive season? I'd also look at the speech club and tutoring. Those are things she can be involved in all the way through high school in short periods of committment...at least that's the way it is here. Can she take a break from those for now to open up some time? Will the swimming opportunity broaden her friendship base? Will the swimming open up scholarship potentials down the road (that's a biggie for me...if there is a possibilit for an unusual kind of scholarship, I grab it....saves for both pockets).


One thing I do for both of my boys is make them take 1 session off for each activity. For example, Mite takes horseback riding as OT, but we took this 12 week session off and we took 12 weeks off of Rite's soccer. This gives us breather time. One evening a week was totally freed and now they are free to come straight home and get into some nice, healthy bouts of sibling rivalry!!! chuckle

just some ramblins...good luck to ya!!!

This is a toughy. I tend to make these decisions for my kids based on what I think will benefit them most in the long run and will help them attain their own goals in life. Sometimes it is the unpopular decision I land on and at other times it hits the mark with my guys. I generally tend to choose those things that might financially benefit both my wallet and theirs eventually.

Also, she's taking two instruments right now. Is it possible to take a rest from one during the competitive season? I'd also look at the speech club and tutoring. Those are things she can be involved in all the way through high school in short periods of committment...at least that's the way it is here. Can she take a break from those for now to open up some time? Will the swimming opportunity broaden her friendship base? Will the swimming open up scholarship potentials down the road (that's a biggie for me...if there is a possibilit for an unusual kind of scholarship, I grab it....saves for both pockets).


One thing I do for both of my boys is make them take 1 session off for each activity. For example, Mite takes horseback riding as OT, but we took this 12 week session off and we took 12 weeks off of Rite's soccer. This gives us breather time. One evening a week was totally freed and now they are free to come straight home and get into some nice, healthy bouts of sibling rivalry!!! chuckle

just some ramblins...good luck to ya!!!

When my kids were really young, I had the opinion that kids today were too overscheduled and that mine wouldn�t be. Somewhere along to line, that went out the window.
My daughter especially enjoys constant activities. She is extremely bored one week into summer vacation until the activities and vacation plans begin. She has her book bag packed (with required supplies for the next grade) before the end of June.
With the exception of track, she is pretty good at everything she is involved with. It is primarily an issue of a lack of down time. I think everyone in our family except her would like more. Even she gets frustrated when she can�t pursue things that interest her. She bought computer software for learning German and French, but hasn�t had the time for it.
I wouldn�t count on college scholarships for her talents. Just winning the competitive slots at the gigantic local HS that she says she wants to attend would be great. I would like for her to get into band and swim team. This in itself would be a relief (don�t the public HS cart their own teams around?).
BTW, I have heard that partial scholarships are common for band participants who play more obscure instruments such as oboe, French horn and tuba. This may be something for those of you with younger children to consider. This information came too late for my family. My girl plays flute and my boy plays trumpet. You can�t get more clich� than that.

According to Rite's soccer coach, Rite has a pretty good chance at a soccer scholarship at good schools because he's a "pretty good soccer player" and they have mediorce teams!! So, in other words, he has a better chance at a soccer scholarship at a good school because he's an excellent student and plays soccer "good", while an excellent soccer player would get a scholarship at an ok school with an excellent soccer program. I don't know how much of a scholarship it could mean, but it might make or break a choice for him when the time comes. We'll see.

I've heard the same about the obscure musical instruments.

I'm willing to look at anything that will give him something of an edge....except maybe the tuba!!!!8^)

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this topic Willa Gayle. I�m quite the novice when it comes to HS and college issues.

I planted the seed this morning with my daughter regarding whether track is a good idea or not. I pointed out that track meets are very time consuming and perhaps we should consider kicking the swimming up a notch or two instead.

As far as giving up an instrument, I would hate to suggest it to my husband. She has been playing flute for 31/2 years and piano for 2. She is good at both although I think that band would be more impressive on a college application than piano especially since she started relatively late. However, I insisted that we ship my parent�s old piano across the country a couple years ago. We probably paid twice what it was worth. Also, their piano teacher is excellent and (here�s the best part)- he comes to our home for lessons! She doesn�t even mind practicing. Although, again, there is usually not enough time for her to work at it as long as she would like.

Thanks again for your advice.

Diana

High school time will be very busy even for those who breeze through elementary and middle school. Honor/AP classes alone would consume a large amount of time. Then you have ECs and community services, the time for their friends, etc. It is a time to make tough decisions and life is all about choices.

I would suggest that your kid take the hardest classes that she can manage (maintain mostly A). On top of that, one sport activity and one art/music/band activity would be nice. A couple of academic related activities such as speech/debate, math club, writing competitions, science fair, academic decathlon, etc. would be helpful too. Then she also needs something for community service/leadership.

There is very little point doing many small things. But rather focus on a few thing that she really enjoy and do well on them. Colleges like to see commitments. So choose something she can do for multiple years.

I appreciate your response Chenchuan!

This makes sense. Picking only one from each category still makes for a �well rounded� yet more accomplished college candidate.

I think I will have to make one of those unpopular mom decisions and nix the track and field dreams.

Thanks.

Hey, thanks, this advice may help me sort out some overwhelmed bits of my own parenting life.
This isn't one of my biggest worries, but as you are speaking of multipotentiality...

Our oldest child(older teen)has just a few interests, which has frustrated me in the past. However, these are deep interests and therefore he has a pretty clear direction to travel.

Our middle child is interested in everything and well-rounded talent-wise. The third son is pretty much this way also, but just turned ten and it's not yet an issue.

The problem? Well, the problem is my own fear. I know that things will work out great for these guys, but I can't help projecting a bit of my own experience upon them. When I was at school I had a lot of interests. I wasn't PG, but I had a fear of settling into a career that I might hate and so I never focused on any particular interest - at least not for long. I felt envy for my friend who entered college knowing exactly what she wanted to be and left with a teaching degree. Mine was an inter-disciplinary degree that involved art and anthropology. I suppose that speaks for itself.

How important is a strong sense of direction? Is it perfectly fine to let chance bump one along through life? To let the lottery of teachers and others we meet profoundly influence us this way or that? That's pretty much what I've done- and I WILL say that I've led an interesting life so far! But is that what I want for my kids- not so sure. I just watched "An Inconvenient Truth" recently: I wonder if Al Gore would have become such a figure in our society if he hadn't had that one particular science teacher.

I realize this is a little on the philosophical side, and obviously chance is a part of life... but I wonder.. where to draw the line. How much to influence the children's decisions and how much to let them have their own. The problem, with PG kids, is that they are making some of these choices while they are still kids. A child can be both smart and wise, and yet still be a child.

One thing I've always done is to tell our boys that they can change their minds. Many people change their careers or have multiple careers. I feel that perhaps I wouldn't have had such a fear of commitment if I'd realized as a young person that this wasn't necessarily a life sentence.

I guess I would like for them to accomplish something tangible (undergrad degree) before they change direction. I definitely agree that careers should not be set in stone, but there should be some graduated progression for children with such high potential. Course changes are fine as long as they are not accompanied with a back-ward slide or stagnation.

I know that I am projecting as well. My parents were less authoritative than we are.