Have you ever felt like managing the logistics of a third grader’s schedule is a full time job? Each day of the week is filled with activities: sports, gymnastics, theater, art classes, music lessons and - if there is no class - with playdates. We schedule our kids so they have fun things to do, and because we don’t feel safe letting them play unsupervised outside. We schedule them with so many activities in order to provide every opportunity to explore their talents. Sometimes we schedule them to fill the time when both parents are working. And then there’s the guilt - we schedule them because we’re concerned that if our children don’t have something planned for every moment, they won’t keep up.
But I am worried about what we are doing to kids when we overschedule them. I believe that jam packed schedules of gymnastics on Monday and piano on Tuesday, sports on Wednesday and rock climbing on Thursday, dance on Friday and scheduled playdates all weekend long add anxiety to our kids and curate a childhood experience that does not actually prepare them to be adults. Without down time, how will children learn to simply be with themselves? If they are never bored, when will they discover their own creativity and passions? When will they have time to quietly observe the world? And how will they manage as adults, when their work life or social life doesn’t stimulate them every moment of every day?
There is actually copious research showing how boredom
boosts
creativity, confidence, belonging, and grit, while also helping children form stronger relationships, develop deeper problem-solving skills, and regulate their own mental health. And yet, despite the overwhelming evidence, boredom has a
bad reputation
in our culture. When asked, most parents - regardless of income, class, or race - believe that “children who were bored after school should be enrolled in extracurricular activities, and that parents who were busy should stop their task and draw with their children if asked.”
Given the resounding research that boredom is very good for kids, how do we all take a collective deep breath and slow down this frenetic pace? How do we buck our own overscheduling tendencies to make space for open ended and unstructured time?
Before we can address helping children conquer boredom, we need to confront our own feelings around it. The phrase “I’m bored” is simultaneously annoying and accusatory. Embedded in those two little words are “why aren’t you entertaining me?” and “if you loved me, you would have something engaging planned for me.” When we hear those words, our first act must be to regulate ourselves, to remind ourselves that boredom is actually good for children, and to give your child a version of the “you’ll thank me later, this is harder for me than it is for you” talk we used to get as children.
This is one area that’s tough for me - I know all of the research on boredom and deeply believe that unstructured time is good for kids, but I easily get caught up in the guilt and the worry that my children will “fall behind” their peers. I wonder if I am ruining their chances to compete in the Olympics, perform on Broadway, or display their art at the Met - or just be really good at sports, star in the high school musical, or draw a great cartoon. Overcoming this guilt is not easy, especially in a city like Los Angeles where scheduling children is the norm.
Once we come to accept that boredom is good for kids, and once we reconcile our own feelings of guilt in “letting” our children be bored, we need to actively create times for them to just be. We need to give kids boxes, cotton balls, paper towel rolls, junk from around the house, and paint and let them create something on their own (and have them help clean up the mess!). We need to let them see what can happen with some paper, string, scissors and tape. And we need to accept that every single pillow and blanket in the house may be used when a fort is being built.
I want to be clear - this is not an either/or proposition. We can give our kids opportunities to be in structured classes
and
give our kids unstructured time for creating and daydreaming. In our house, our kids have one “have to” activity (in our case, they must take piano lessons), and they can choose one “want to” activity that gives them the opportunity to explore a passion and talent. But they still have several afternoons each week for free play. Simply scheduling
one
day each week when there are no activities and there is no schedule - a day to go to the park or to stare at clouds or to let children fill their time as they please - can help children benefit from boredom. As parents, we also need to model what it looks like to navigate boredom. It’s hard, but we must put down our phones and show that there are ways of entertaining ourselves that don’t involve being engaged by others.
So this winter break, when our kids are bouncing off the walls begging to “do something fun” (despite the fact that they had activities the day before and earlier that morning), let’s all join together and take a deep breath, find some junk we don’t care much about, and let our kids have an unstructured afternoon. Their childhood will thank you.
Warmly,
Erica
