For some people, the idea of homeschooling is an overwhelming prospect in and of itself, forget extracurricular activities. I’ve even heard parents try to downplay extracurriculars as unimportant. They are either too expensive, too time-consuming or too annoying. (I’ve heard this latter excuse used for why parents don’t want to invest in music lessons. The idea of having to listen to their child practice an instrument is apparently too much for them.) It seems that playing outside and doing playdates with other families during the school day is enough. I must respectfully disagree. I’m of the opinion that structured extracurricular activities are very important and should be prioritised by homeschool families. In this post, I’m going to defend why I think extracurriculars are important and how I balance a rigorous academic homeschool with multiple extracurricular activities.
Why Extracurriculars Should be a Priority
I hate to even bring this up because it feels so ridiculous, but one of the most popular concerns among public school parents is the almighty “socialisation” issue. When do kids get to be around other kids if they’re at home all day? Well, my kids are NOT at home all day. In fact, we’re out of the house 7 days a week because of extracurricular activities. That being said, this is NOT why I prioritise extracurricular activities. I have boiled down my top 4 reasons for choosing to invest time and money in extracurriculars:
- Learning Skills (that take a long time to master)
- Making Exercise Fun (and a life-long habit)
- Discovering Hobbies and Interests
- Setting & Working Towards Goals
Learning Skills
It might be comforting to hear “It’s never too late to learn ____”, but let’s face it. For some things, there is indeed a better time to start. Some skills take many, many years of practice to master, so the earlier you start, the better. I believe music is one of these skills. Mastering the art of playing an instrument well takes many years of practice. Especially if you want your children to have musical opportunities later, laying a solid foundation at a young age is very important.
Making Exercise Fun
Another reason I believe extracurricular activities are important is because I think kids should be introduced to the idea that exercise is fun. It doesn’t have to be a miserable thing associated with weight loss and physical insecurity. Activities like dance, martial arts or sports require quite a bit of physical activity. Working hard, getting your heart-rate up in an age-appropriate activity where you’re working towards a goal (a recital or a belt test) is incredibly important for kids to grow up having positive associations with exercise. It is also a great way to explain why healthy eating is important when the inevitable conversation comes up about why they have to eat their vegetables. I like to explain that eating nutritious food will help them have strong bodies to do the things they enjoy doing.
Discovering Interests
Letting children get involved in extracurricular activities is also a great way to introduce all kinds of new interests and possible hobbies that they can continue to pursue as they get older. You never know when a childhood interest will develop into a lifelong passion. The more children are exposed to, the larger their world becomes.
Setting & Working Towards Goals
Another positive about getting children involved in extracurricular activities is that they can learn from an early age how to set goals for themselves and work towards them. For our family, music is very much an academic subject in the sense that I, as the teacher, set most of the goals and expectations. When it comes to things like taekwondo however, my daughter has specifically said she wants to earn a black belt. And she knows what kind of commitment that requires. For example, it means going to class even when you don’t feel like it. She is still young, so yes, I do have to remind her of her own goals and how she can accomplish them. But we’re laying the foundation for smart goal setting.
How to Balance Serious Academics with Extracurriculars
Let’s assume I convinced you that you should sign your kids up for that activity they’ve been asking about. But what about school? If you’re like me, you’re homeschooling because your child’s education is your top priority. How are you going to get Latin done if you’re on the soccer field? How do you balance homeschool with these extracurricular activities you now see as just as important?
My number one recommendation for fitting it all in is to be organised and focus on productivity. I’ve said this in many blog posts already, but school should be limited to a certain time of day. There should be a definite start time and end time. And when school is done, the rest of the day shouldn’t be a free-for-all. I don’t mean your child’s day should be planned down to the minute, but yours probably should. If you check out my free Productivity Tips pdf linked below, you’ll see that I time-block my days and use alarms religiously. (And you can check out this blog post.) I know what I should be doing and where I need to be all the time. I even have timers set for things like when to start making dinner. If this sounds insanely stressful, let me say that having a time for everything is actually quite liberating – you know everything can and will get done. And when you have time to relax, you can relax knowing that everything is covered.
When to Quit
Saying yes to all the things is not the best use of anyone’s time. My children didn’t start off with lots of activities. We started with one thing and added on from there, depending on what they enjoy and how much activity they like. I know some kids would rather just stay home and read (I was that kid!) or have a hard time finding something they enjoy doing. Finding an extracurricular activity that checks the boxes for you and interests your child is not always going to be easy. I just want to say that it is worth the effort. And it IS a lot of effort. The driving. The practicing at home. The events – the competitions, the games, the tournaments, the recitals – usually involve a lot more than just getting your kid somewhere on time.
So how do you know when it’s too much? When it comes to my kids, especially my oldest, we’ve had to have the conversation about when quitting is ok. Sometimes, activities get difficult. You’re not good at something right away and it’s just not fun anymore. The most recent example of this for us has been Irish Dance. I made it clear that as soon as my daughter does not enjoy performing, does not enjoy the costumes and the music, then we can stop. However, we don’t stop something because it is difficult. When the complaining mid-year starts, I let her know that we will revisit the issue after St Patrick’s Day (basically the Super Bowl of Irish dance). It’s a very long weekend of dancing and it’s usually a high for my daughter. She’s exhausted, but she says it’s a lot of fun. This is a good time to talk about goals and pushing through the difficult to get to the fun.
When to Rest
As a former classroom teacher, I like to stick to a traditional academic year. Anything else just feels too unnatural for me. But one reason I like to stick to a traditional year and not do year-round school is that it is very nice to have summer to look forward to when the school year is literally crammed with school and extracurricular activities. So even on the tough days, you know you only have to take things a semester at a time. Don’t get me wrong, we still do things during the summer. I still have expectations for light studying and we do things like camps and workshops for certain extracurriculars. But it’s a much more relaxed schedule. It’s a great way to decompress and reassess what we actually like doing and what deserves space in our calendar. So I’m all about taking breaks when appropriate and constantly reassessing why we’re doing something and if it’s still serving us.
What did I miss? Do you have any other tips for balancing homeschool and extracurricular activities? What activities does your family invest in and why?
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