How many clubs is enough?

In an ever more demanding schedule, children nowadays have a wealth of pre, during and after school clubs at their fingertips.

On the one hand this seems amazing and we comment aren’t they lucky being able to try so many things, possibly reminiscing of more basic options in our own childhood.

However, how do you know what the right amount is and when is it too much?

As a Mum of three and with all, as of September, now in the school system, I’ve got an array of options.

At our school the children typically don’t have school clubs to attend whilst in Reception, but once they hit Year 1 it opens up - football, karate, drama, multi sports. Our school even has a music band club they can go to during the school day now (well if you can get a space). They also created a half termly rotated arts and crafts club after school for Reception this year too (which my eldest, now in Year 2, was very envious about!) 

I can remember going to Brownies when little and I think at school a Keyboard club (the music kind), as well as swimming lessons, but otherwise apart from a very short-lived time at Ballet I didn’t really do too much. I did actually go horseriding for a few years until I got to ‘big school’ and decided I’d rather spend my Saturdays meeting friends to go the shops and cinema! 

Now though children can start from so little - baby football, baby ballet and so on. 

My eldest is pretty confident compared to the twins, but she too often needs a little while to get settled at places and I don’t drive, so some options to us can be limited at times

When I just had the one I took her everywhere when little -  Baby Sensory, every local playgroup, baby swimming, music and movement, rhymes at the library and all sorts. Knowing how shy I was when little I wanted my child to be outgoing and confident. 

Where the twins came along afterwards and we were bringing up three under 2 at one point, it wasn’t possible to go to quite so many groups. I’m not shy if this is why the twins are a lot more withdrawn than their big sister, or  if lockdown and Covid hit them harder but there’s a big difference.

Since starting school I’ve now found myself trying to find some activities to interest them and possibly boost their confidence and independence. 

Some people I know, their children are doing something every day and they find fitting in homework and other jobs really hard and stressful. There are others where they want their children to do more but they didn’t get their little one on the never ending waiting lists on time. 

Once my eldest started year 1 we started her on groups - she began trying karate before school, swimming lessons to try regain her confidence and skills and continued with her dance, drama and singing club she was already enjoying. 

Once the twins were in school and seemingly very anti doing anything without me or my other half there, we introduced them to the dance and drama club with their sister at first to get settled. They still are pretty anti swimming lessons as they don’t want to go in the pool without me. 

As previously mentioned some clubs entail your child being placed on a waiting list - sometimes needing to be on this for more than a year or from birth! One such list our girls have been on is Rainbows, ever since lockdown in fact. 

So two weeks ago when I received a late night email confirming they finally had a place and together I really was happy. 

That is until my son confirmed he wanted to try a boxing class and I looked at our new schedule. 

Of the 5 weekdays, we now have some sort of club after school for 4 days and on the other day there’s a club in the morning. 

I feel we’ve gone from not enough clubs to now potentially too many. 

How do you know how many is the right amount though?

And also at what age should the children pick the activity and potentially develop a proper hobby or skill? 

Do some children need or enjoy more activities than others? Are we going to end up with confident, happy children or tired out little ones? 

We seem to have a nice mix for our eldest - swimming, karate, Rainbows and her dance/drama/singing club. The twins now do arts and crafts club (just a few weeks at a time), one does boxing and the other does Rainbows and they both attend the same dance/drama/singing club. 

Now we have some sort of system in place to get to and from these sessions, we’ve got to factor in homework, reading, spelling and times table practice…

What works for you? Has anyone found the happy balance or are we all just ‘winging it’ like most parenthood seems to be?…