Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #373 Am I Doing Enough for my Children?

Transcript

#373 Am I Doing Enough for my Children? · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: time poor parent who just wants answers now.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: But you know, what I do remember about my childhood.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: What was so important was the connections that I made
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: and the friendships that I developed.
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  Speaker 1: And now here's the stars of our show, my mom
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: and dad.
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  Speaker 3: So we had a conversation with the kids over the
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: weekend and discovered that they have been keeping secrets from
• 0:27
  Speaker 3: us all their lives. We were starting to talk about
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: fun memories that we had and next thing, you know,
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  Speaker 3: those memories turned into confessions. What are you giggling about
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: over there? You're just chuckling away to yourself.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I got in trouble because I never checked under
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: the covers. So his dad came into the room. He
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  Speaker 2: would always check under the covers, but when mom did,
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  Speaker 2: she just checked under the pillow.
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  Speaker 3: Don't know how this came up, but the kids were
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  Speaker 3: basically while we were sharing memories, and they were like,
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  Speaker 3: you remember when we would always go to bed and
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: we'd hide a torch.
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  Speaker 2: Well, it was back in the day. See, that's how
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  Speaker 2: they talked about It was like it was the olden
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  Speaker 2: days before we had knowledge.
• 1:00
  Speaker 4: Jeez, because the kids the biggest.
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  Speaker 2: Concern was hiding the tour.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  Speaker 3: And so then what they basically said was we were
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  Speaker 3: always breathing a big sigh of relief when Mom came
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  Speaker 3: in to check on us, because she'd just sort of
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  Speaker 3: check under our pillow and make sure that we were
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  Speaker 3: going to bed, whereas Dad used to pull the blankets
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  Speaker 3: back to make sure there was nothing underneath the covers.
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  Speaker 3: And guess what, I always found the torch, I always
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  Speaker 3: found the screens. I always found whatever they had smuggled,
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: the contra band that was under the blankets. And they
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  Speaker 3: were just stoked that you were.
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  Speaker 2: Well they did they think I didn't know, and I'm
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  Speaker 2: just a funny.
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  Speaker 4: Part you didn't know. Come on. They basically were saying
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  Speaker 4: that you're a negligent parent.
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  Speaker 2: Oh no, they actually were saying, I was the cool parent.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: A few people you were listening.
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  Speaker 4: I was the controlling one, is it?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah yeah.
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  Speaker 2: But the funniest one was our other one of our
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  Speaker 2: daughters said, I didn't even bother doing that. If I
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: wanted to read, I just sat on the toilet, even
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  Speaker 2: if I didn't.
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  Speaker 4: Need to go.
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  Speaker 3: Hang out in the toilet for forty five minutes reading
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  Speaker 3: so I didn't have to go to bed and didn't
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  Speaker 3: have to do any chores, not even not even doing anything,
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  Speaker 3: just reading.
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  Speaker 4: I love that they read. They've always loved reading.
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  Speaker 3: This is the podcast for families who know that kids
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: are really hard work, but g they're awesome. I'm Justin
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: and I'm Kylie and with the parents of six daughters.
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  Speaker 3: I'm the founder of Happy Families dot com dot you.
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  Speaker 3: Every Tuesday, we answer your parenting questions.
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  Speaker 4: You can email them to.
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  Speaker 3: Us podcasts at happy Families dot com dot au. We
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  Speaker 3: can't answer them all, but what we'd like to do
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: is sift through them and find ones that we think
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  Speaker 3: are going to be highly relevant to as many people
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  Speaker 3: as possible. And I think missus Happy Families that we
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  Speaker 3: found one today.
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  Speaker 2: Amy and Sean are parents to three young girls, five
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  Speaker 2: almost to three year old and a three month old.
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  Speaker 4: Awesome. I wonder if they're going to go for six.
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  Speaker 2: I'n't got three more to go.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, halfway there.
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  Speaker 2: They moved to regional Victoria a little while ago, and
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: although they absolutely love their regional lifestyle, there's very limited
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  Speaker 2: opportunities for extracurricular activities.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, and Victoria's lockdowns would have only made that worse.
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  Speaker 2: So their question is what is the research saying about
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  Speaker 2: children and extracurriculum activities. I feel so guilty that they
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: aren't enrolled in something like swimming or Jimburu or whatever.
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  Speaker 2: My eldest is in kinder three times per week, my
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: second is in childcare one day per week, and my
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  Speaker 2: littlest love is still with me full time.
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  Speaker 4: Well she's three months, so that makes sense.
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  Speaker 2: But other than that, they are with me and don't
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  Speaker 2: engage in any activities. Is this going to affect them
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  Speaker 2: in any way? Should I be looking to get them
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  Speaker 2: involved in one activity each This would mean a significant
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  Speaker 2: drive or commitment on a weekly basis. Thoughts and advice
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  Speaker 2: would be much appreciated.
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  Speaker 3: So I love this question, and what I love is
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  Speaker 3: how much Amy and Sean obviously care about their kids,
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: who want to give them the best start.
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  Speaker 4: But I've also got a highlight.
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  Speaker 3: This is something that I think is really endemic and
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  Speaker 3: parenting in Australia at the moment, and I don't think
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  Speaker 3: it's healthy. And that is this constant pressure, this constant
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: worry am I doing enough for my kids? And you
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: can hear that there, like we're talking five to three
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  Speaker 3: and newborn, and do we need to have them enrolled
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  Speaker 3: in stuff? Do we have to be doing heaps of
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  Speaker 3: stuff all over the place or anything at all? And
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: so it's an important question that we dive in to.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: I've got lots to say about this one.
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  Speaker 3: Well why don't you go first, because so have I.
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  Speaker 2: I think, just like you said justin there's this desire
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: to give our children everything that we missed out on.
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  Speaker 2: So I grew up in a home where we didn't
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  Speaker 2: have a lot of financial security, and I didn't get
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: to do a lot of activities.
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  Speaker 3: Do you do any like you didn't learn musical instrument,
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  Speaker 3: you didn't have swimming lessons.
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  Speaker 2: I played netball for a short period of time, right,
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  Speaker 2: But outside of that, I don't remember doing anything else.
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  Speaker 3: So basically, you made it to adulthood as a fully functioning, capable, talented,
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  Speaker 3: remarkable human and never did any extracurricular activities at all. No, Okay,
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  Speaker 3: So I think that kind of answers the question right there.
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  Speaker 2: But I watched. I watched as I got older, and
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  Speaker 2: obviously there was less financial pressures on my parents that
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: my younger sister's got to do things that I never did. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: and you had a variety of opportunities available to.
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  Speaker 4: You, A plethora, you might even say.
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: Yes, a plethora, right, Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: So I mean I didn't actually take advantage of them.
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  Speaker 3: My parents paid for piano lessons and they literally had
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: to drag me to my piano teacher's door, and I
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: refused to play.
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  Speaker 2: I'm curious, though, when you were put into all of
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: these extracurricular activities. Were they things that you'd asked to
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  Speaker 2: do or did mum decide for you?
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  Speaker 4: Boom, That's exactly it.
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  Speaker 3: So when I was a kid, I played soccer and cricket,
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  Speaker 3: but when I got older and was a teenager, I
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: just wanted to surf, and they had me going to
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: swimming lessons and they had me doing music and whatever else.
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  Speaker 2: Did you want to swim? I mean you were really
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  Speaker 2: good at it?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I was very very good at swimming, but
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  Speaker 3: I hated it. I just want to be surfing with
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  Speaker 3: my mates. I wasn't interested in it. I had no
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: discipline or anything like that. And so that's getting a
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: little bit beyond our conversation because that's talking about teenagers
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: who are being resistant rebellious. But I guess the main
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  Speaker 3: thing is you turned out wonderfully in spite of the
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  Speaker 3: fact that you didn't have loads of extracurricul active in fact,
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  Speaker 3: any extracurricular activities in your life other than your church involvement,
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  Speaker 3: which was free.
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  Speaker 4: That was pretty much all you did.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: But you know what I do remember about my childhood
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: that I think is just perfect for Amy and Sean.
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  Speaker 2: What was so important was the connections that I made
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  Speaker 2: and the friendships that I developed because every afternoon after
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: school I would hang out with my friends, yeah, and
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  Speaker 2: we would play in my cubby house, or would play
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: in their backyard on their trampoline or their swing set,
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  Speaker 2: and we just played. And I think that as parents,
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  Speaker 2: we honestly do not put enough emphasis on our children
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  Speaker 2: just being able to free range and play and explore
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  Speaker 2: their environment.
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  Speaker 3: So there's a handful of questions that need to be
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  Speaker 3: answered here in responding to Amy and Sean. I think
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  Speaker 3: the first one is when do we start?
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  Speaker 2: Okay, So my answer to that is delay, delay, delay.
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  Speaker 3: Well, yes and yes and yes, except I'm also I'm
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  Speaker 3: going to put this out there if you've got the
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  Speaker 3: and I guess the second question is how many do
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  Speaker 3: you do once you get started? I think that if
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: you've got the time resources and you've got the financial
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  Speaker 3: resource corses that things. I mean, we live in Australia.
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: I think swimming lessons from the earliest age possible, that's
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  Speaker 3: an extracurricular activity. But I think that it's worth it,
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: and we've always done that in our home. We've really
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: emphasized that and I think that that has been a
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: really important thing to do.
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  Speaker 2: I probably don't see it as an extracurricular because it
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  Speaker 2: as actually something that's almost a mandate in our house.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, so you see that as an essential rather than
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  Speaker 3: let's go and do swimming lessons as an extracurriculation.
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  Speaker 2: So as a result, our kids from the time they
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  Speaker 2: were six months old, I was in the pool with
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  Speaker 2: them and we were doing formalized lessons.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, outside of swimming lessons, though, we need to talk
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  Speaker 3: about when we start, because, like you said, that's kind
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  Speaker 3: of just a compulsory activity that everyone does so that
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  Speaker 3: they're safe. So we're going to come back after the
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  Speaker 3: break and here's what we're going to answer for your
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  Speaker 3: Amy and Sewan.
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  Speaker 4: We're going to say how.
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  Speaker 3: Ol the kids should be when they start extracurricular activities
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  Speaker 3: and why what little research we have on this topic
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  Speaker 3: and what it can tell us how many activities the
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  Speaker 3: kids should be doing?
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  Speaker 4: How do we choose the activities?
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  Speaker 3: Which kind of taps in with what you were saying
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  Speaker 3: before about how I hated swimming and everything else I
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: was being asked to do. What do you do when
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: you've got lots of kids who all want to do
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  Speaker 3: different things and you're stretched and what do children really
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  Speaker 3: truly need?
• 8:06
  Speaker 4: Right after break?
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: It's their Happy Families podcast.
• 8:10
  Speaker 5: Are Screens Creating Tension at home? Tweens, teens? And Screens?
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: Is a webinar to guide families to healthy, safe super
• 8:17
  Speaker 5: screen solutions. Bye today at happyfamilies dot com, dot au
• 8:22
  Speaker 5: slash shop.
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: It's the Happy Families podcast, the podcast for the time
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: poor parent who just wants answers now, And today we're
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: answering Amy and Sean's dilemma on when do we start extracurriculous?
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: How many should we do? And is my child missing
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: out if they don't get to do them?
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  Speaker 4: Okay? Question one? When do we start?
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: Does a five year old and a three year old,
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  Speaker 3: let alone the newborn need to be doing extracurricular activities? Missus,
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: Happy Families, No, No, except for.
• 8:46
  Speaker 4: Swimming in our home.
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  Speaker 3: Except for swimming that's mandatory, everyone swims from the earliest
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  Speaker 3: possible age.
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  Speaker 4: But other than that note, As.
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  Speaker 2: A mum of multiple children, over the years, I've realized
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: that the longer I can delay all of those structured activities,
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: the happier my child is.
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: Explain that I've got some feelings about it as well,
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  Speaker 3: But you explain why you would say the kids are
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: happier if they're doing less structured activity when they go to.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: School in the morning. Generally speaking, for most of us,
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: getting up in the morning and getting our kids to
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: school is a rushed process.
• 9:17
  Speaker 4: It doesn't need to be, but yes, and then they.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: Go to school and they never actually ever get to
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: finish anything because they hurried through the program at school.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: I'm halfway through my drawing, but no, no, no, We've
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: only got forty minutes to do this, and now we've
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: got to move on to the next activity. So our
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: children are constantly pushed through their day. And then they
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: get home and most of the time, our kids just
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: want to be kids. They just want to live their
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: life the way they want to live it, whether it
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: be building with their lego or climbing a tree. Out
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: in the backyard or hanging out with their friends. But no, no, no, no,
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: We've got to go and do this, and we race
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: them out the door again, and then were racing the
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: door so we can have dinner and have bus and
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: then race to bed. Their day is so full and
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: we don't give them time to just be And so
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: over the years I've looked at the things that we've
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: tried to do with our children, I've just noticed that
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: the more time I can just allow them the autonomy
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: to make choice around what they do with their afternoons,
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  Speaker 2: the happier everybody.
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: Is, as so long as they're not staring at screens,
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: because they're totally such a waste of an afternoon. When
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: we look at child development, what we know is that
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: kids are much better off free ranging. They're better off
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: playing in a backyard, playing with lego, doing open ended activities,
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: hanging out with a friend in the park. They're much
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: better off doing that kind of stuff than being involved
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: in structured activities from a young age. It's true that
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: they can develop skills and they can get really good
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: at stuff really young, but they don't need to at
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: that age. And the research shows that the ones who
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: get ahead early, don't necessarily fall in love with what
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: they're doing, and they don't necessarily end up any better
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: off in the long run. In fact, sometimes they end
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: up worse off. So my two cents worth, don't get
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: your kids involved in any kind of structured activities outside
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: of swimming, lessons or maybe if we really need the
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: time and space yourself, put them in one little thing
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: to keep them going and till at least the age
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: of eight, maybe even ten. And also watch out for
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: competitive environments. In my book Nine Ways to a Resilient Child,
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: I spent considerable time explaining why our kids don't need
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: to be involved in competition and why it's bad for
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: their resilience while they're children. And there's a whole lot
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: of evidence that I cite as to why kids shouldn't
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: be competing, especially below the age of a round about ten, twelve,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: maybe even as much as fourteen. Competition's bad for kids,
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: so extracurricular you don't need to worry about it in
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: those early years, like I said, except for swimming.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Start spend time developing relationships with neighbors, with school friends, build.
• 11:43
  Speaker 4: Up the village.
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: That's your favorite thing, right, It totally is okay. The
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: second question that we need to answer is how many
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: extracurricular activities do we do?
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: You know, I thought we had this a really great
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: system when we had our three eldest children and still
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: had our three little babies. I was like, okay, if
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: everybody just does two because one of them swimming, yep.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: So I had all of the always in swimming and
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: they were allowed to do one other activity. All of
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: a sudden, I've got six children doing two things. Let's
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: do the math twelve activities, and my days were just
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: I was run off my feet trying to get them
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: from A to B.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: And then we'd also have the thing where we'd be
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: calling people and be like, so can we book in
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: this child at this time and have this child also
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: at that time and that child at this time so
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: that we could. And the kids had to do exactly
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: the same activities as their siblings because there was just
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: no way of doing it all otherwise.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Well, and I couldn't possibly be in four places at once,
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: let alone six.
• 12:41
  Speaker 4: And then they would winge and wine. They'd but I
• 12:43
  Speaker 4: don't want to do that.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: You're all going to play netball this season.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: I don't like net bull well, your sister does, and
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: she's playing it, so you're playing it as well. So
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: how many activities do you do? I think that the
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: correct answer for this one is it depends on how
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: much dosh you've got, and it depends on how much
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: time you've got, and I.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: Think it depends on your child you're going to have.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: You know, in any given family, you're going to have
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: different personalities and different likes and interests and.
• 13:13
  Speaker 4: Different capacity for expending energy.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and so you're going to have one child who
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: might want to be doing four different things and they're
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: like running with it and absolutely loving it and thriving,
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: and yet another child, one activity is more than they
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: can cope with.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: Okay, So consider your time, consider your dollars, and consider
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: a child and their capacity. The next question that I
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: think we need to help Amy and Sean with around
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: this is how do you choose what the kids are
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: going to do once they're eight to ten years old
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: and they're big enough for extracurricular activities other than swimming.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: Well, I love this answer because we get to give
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: our children an opportunity to choose.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeap, So we've tried getting the kids to do
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: what we want them to do because it's what we do.
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: The best example of that is cycling. I love cycling.
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: Everyone knows that I love to ride my pushbike. And
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: our kids was like, yeah, I want to ride with you, dad, that's.
• 14:02
  Speaker 4: Going to be awesome.
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: And so she was really good at it, well she
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: was for three weeks. We went out and bought her
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: a kid's bike, but it was kids.
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: She had her own crash.
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: She had the likera, the shoes, the shoes, the cleats,
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: the helmet. And when I say we had to buy
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: her a bike, it was a special bike that is
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: for the velodrome, so it's fixed gear, no breaks, all
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: that sort of stuff, and.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: She couldn't use it anywhere else.
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you can only ride that bike on the velodrome.
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: And it just wasn't actually the best idea because we
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: spent money that we didn't have.
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: We were poor, poor, poor students.
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: We spent about one thousand bucks setting her up, and
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: within three or four weeks she had decided this is
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: not for me. I don't like it. I wish we
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: hadn't done this. I don't want to do it anymore.
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: And I tried to.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: Force her to compete as a what ten or twelve
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: year old for another couple of weeks and it was
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: just awful. So the kids need to choose for themselves.
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: Just because you were a football star or a netball
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: star doesn't mean that they're going to be Let them
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: choose for themselves.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: I know that as our children have grown and they've
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: started to make decisions and they've you know, I want
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: to do this, and then next term it's like, I
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: don't want to do that anymore. I want to do this.
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: And it used to frustrate me a lot because I'm like, hey,
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: on a sec I've just had to buy you this
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: uniform and now you're saying you don't want to do this,
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: and now you're going to play this over here. And
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: you would say, just let them have experiences. And we've
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: been fortunate enough that it hasn't hasn't had a huge
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: impact on us for them to be able to do that.
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: And as I've changed my mindset and not got frustrated
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: with the fact that they haven't stuck to something but
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: acknowledge that they're actually just exploring their skill sets and
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: what feels good to them. What I've loved watching is
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: seeing them evolve.
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and this is what the research shows, don't get
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: them into anything too early. Once they get to about
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: eight or ten, let them start to sample things and
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: do a bit of this and a bit of that.
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: When they get to about twelve or fourteen, that's when
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: you start to say, well, how are you enjoying these things?
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: And what else can you try. So we've got daughters
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: now who have tried multiple musical instruments, and by doing that,
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: they've discovered what they really love. And now that they're
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: chosen what they really love, we never tell them to
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: practice because they know what they love and they just
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: go and do it because they love it. And they've
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: tried the other things and they don't love those, but
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: they do love this and they do it. It's the
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: same with their sport. It's the same with whatever activities
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: they're doing. As they've had the opportunities to choose once
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: they're old enough, and as they've had a broad sampling
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: rather than early specialization, they're actually leaps and bounds ahead.
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: Not that it's about competition, because it's not, but they
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: just they thrive with it because they love it.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: Well, they're driven themselves. They've got that internal motivation exactly.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: That's right, one of our daughters. She tried an instrument
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: at thirteen, played it for a year, hated her teacher.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: Her teacher just scared the living daylights at her and
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: just squashed any desire she had to play. She's come back,
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: what seven years later, and she is back at lessons.
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: That's right, Yeah, yeah, yeah, she's like a grown up now.
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: But she's paying for weekly lessons so that she can
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: play that instrument and she's loving it.
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: And I just love that. I love that we gave
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: her exposure and at that point in time it just
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: didn't work for her, but she's gone back to it
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: because it's something that really brings her lots of joy.
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: Okay, we need to wrap this up.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: So the summary is your kids definitely need to learn
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: to swim if you're in an area where swimming is important.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Other than that, though, they don't need extracurricular activities until
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: they're at least eight.
• 17:15
  Speaker 4: Try to keep them non competitive.
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: Use your wisdom in terms of how much money you
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: spend and how much time you allocate. What they really
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: need more than anything is time and free play and
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: unstructured play and outside time and friends and a broad
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: range of experiences. Once they're ready to get stuck into
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: extracurricular activities so that they can work out what they
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: really love and get stuck into that. From a round
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: about the age of I don't know, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, and.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: In relation to those broad experiences, I don't think they
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: have to come through structured, paid activities. Take your kids
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: for bike rides as a family. Do they like extending themselves?
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: Do they like going uphills? Go rock climbing, go fountain bike?
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: The more opportunities we provide for our children in a
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: supported environment, the more likely they are going to find
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: what they love.
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: Hope you enjoyed that, Amy and Sean, and that your
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: question has been answered. If it hasn't, boy, oh boy,
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: it was fun conversation anyway. If you have questions for us,
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: every Tuesday, we do our best to answer your questions.
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: Podcasts at happy families dot com dot you. The Happy
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: Families podcast is produced by Justin Ruhland from Bridge Media.
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: Craig Bruce is our executive producer, and if you'd like
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: more info about how to make your family happy er,
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: you can find it at happy families dot com dot
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: a u