Commitment?

Let's talk commitment, as long as no one tries to commit me after this discussion.

Specifically, let's talk about parent commitment. How many of you folks sign your kid up for two or three teams during a given season? Do you think it is OK to do this, and if so, why?

Living in central MD, I see every day the "me" and "mine" attitude of parents with regards to their children participating on sport's teams. As long as their son or daughter is OK, the heck with everyone else.

For example, we have some friends who have a daughter who is signed up for everything (lax, swimming, basketball, s****r, dance, choir, drama, etc...). She is pretty good at all of them, but lacks any sort of ability to comprehend what it means to be part of a team. Mom and dad have plenty of money, so paying for all this stuff is nothing to them. The coaches on these various teams (I am not one of them) have expressed frustration with mom and dad that "little girl" isn't at all the practices or games, and therefore doesn't know what to do in certain situations, therefore hindering the development of the other players and the team as a whole. My friends, the parents, have told me that because this is rec stuff, and not travel, that they should be allowed to come and go as they please. I try to explain to them that their decisions affect more than their family, but they don't see it that way. Does anyone else agree with my position?

Can it be this hard to tell "little girl" to choose this activity or that activity, but because their may be conflicts, she can't do both?

I believe this issue is growing more and more wide spread and it really concerns me that folks don't consider the whole anymore, but are way more concerned with their individual slice of the pie!

2/11/062:00 PM

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Original Post

KmomNH100+ posts

You're not off base at all. I know parents like the ones you mentioned and I don't think its in the child's best interest. Sadly though, the parents seem to think it is. Some kid's parents are so focused on their kids' "success" or other people's perception of that "success" that they've scheduled their kids into so much stuff the kids don't know anything else. They have school, music lessons, trips to learning centers to help max out thier grades, private athletic instruction, multiple team and club activities, etc. The parents believe they are equipping their kids to get into the best colleges and to be prepared for the harsh, competetive real world. I just don't see it.

When my son was younger, we ( meaning both of us) played outside in the rain and the mud. He drove his trucks in the dirt while I planted tomatoes in the garden. He hung upside down from the monkey bars, rode his bike off makeshift jumps and once held an earthworm in his mouth for a minute to collect on a $20 bet. (I found out about that one later.)

At 12 he played for a Cal Ripken team, an AAU team, and the 12 yr old Cal Ripken All-stars. Three sets of coaches, all with thier own way of wanting things done and all with their own practice and game schedules. We decided that was too much to ask any kid to deal with, so at 13 he played only AAU. At 14, he played AAU and the HS freshman team (as an 8th grader), and at 15, he played Babe Ruth and HS, but that's it.

When he has down time, even though he's now 16, I expect him to be a kid. I expect him to relax with his friends, go snowboarding, see a movie, or just lay around. He's looking for a part-time job, so that will add one more thing to his schedule and he'll have to adjust to it, but that's about it.

There were parents on one the teams he played for that used to brag about their son being on 5 baseball teams at the same time. I don't think that was fair to their son (even if it was his idea), or to all of those teams. You know somebody somewhere was being short-changed. I may be way out of line, but I think life's too short to take a kid's childhood away. Kid's need time to just be kids.

2/11/064:39 PM

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