Time to UNDER-schedule your kids
Or: how to take your kids off the activity treadmill and feel good about it
Do you ever look at your child’s schedule and think it looks busier even than your own?
Soccer on Mondays. Piano on Tuesdays. STEM club on Wednesdays. Swim lessons on Thursdays. Birthday parties on the weekend and homework until midnight. The chock-full calendar like a badge of honor that you’re setting your kid up for a future with every opportunity at hand.
The demands of over-scheduling
For many parents, especially those balancing demanding careers and busy family lives, this kind of schedule has become the norm. It can also feel like the price of keeping up. After all, if every other child seems to be learning Mandarin, playing soccer, and taking coding classes before age eight, it's easy to wonder whether your own child is falling behind.
But lately, we’re hearing more and more parents asking an important question: Is all of this actually good for my kids? And we think it’s time we talked about it.
Increasingly, research (and many parents' lived experiences) suggest the answer isn't as clear as it once seemed. It’s starting to look like over-scheduling comes with a price (and we’re not just talking about the insane cost of after-school classes…).
More activities = better outcomes?
There's no question that extracurricular activities can be wonderful. Sports teach teamwork. Music builds discipline. Art encourages creativity. Clubs help children discover interests and make friends.
There is, however, a valid question about these activities: is more always better?
A growing body of research suggests that when children's schedules become too packed, the benefits begin to diminish. A 2024 study examining the daily schedules of more than 4,300 children found that the "last hour" of enrichment activities often provided little additional academic benefit. At the same time, it was associated with poorer mental well-being, including higher levels of anxiety, depression, and emotional distress.
Researchers in this study emphasized that the problem wasn't any single activity on its own. It was the cumulative load of too many of these activities stuffed into a week.
The value of unstructured play
Play is how children learn
For younger children especially, free play isn't time that's being wasted. It's how they learn.
When children invent games, build forts, draw, wander outside, or simply entertain themselves without adult direction, they're practicing problem-solving, creativity, emotional regulation, negotiation, and independence. These are skills that don't come from structured instruction alone.
So while from the outside it might look like just filling the time with imaginative play to make the time pass, inside your child there is an explosion of learning going on – and in the way that is best suited to your child’s cognitive abilities and emotional development at that time.
In fact, in Scandinavian countries like Sweden, unstructured play is written into the national pedagogical curriculum for preschool-aged children.
The pressure parents feel is real
If you're feeling guilty about starting to rethink how many activities your child participates in, you're certainly not alone. One huge reason why parents in our nanny agency network say they keep over-scheduling their kids is that they compare themselves to others and don’t want their child to fall behind – or seem like they’re not invested enough in their kid’s future to set them up with enriching activities. Opting out today might somehow close doors tomorrow, is a common fear.
Back to that classic vise of parenthood: you’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Over-scheduling is hard on parents, too
Beyond the needs or wants of your kids, here’s another factor that makes over-scheduling so exhausting: the logistics become way too much.
Today's families are juggling careers, commutes, homework, household responsibilities, and countless logistics. Every after-school activity means another pickup, another drive across town, another evening spent eating dinner in the car. If you have more than one kid, forget about it. It’s not like all the extracurricular activities organizers got together and worked out a schedule that made it easy for you.
For working parents, simply getting everyone where they need to be can become a second full-time job.
Activities are expensive
You’ve seen it, we’ve seen it: the cost of everything is up right now, and kids’ classes are no exception. Add to that equipment, uniforms, even the gas to drive your kid around, and suddenly your bank account is starting to look like Are we already paying college tuition?
For many families, pulling back on activities is an absolute necessity, financially. But as with anytime your wallet makes decisions for you, it’s so easy to feel that creeping guilt again, second guessing yourself if you’re really giving your child everything they deserve and need.
Well, the good news is, in the long run, you are.
It’s all about balance
Talking about balance in parenting is such a catch-all it sometimes feels like a cop-out. But here’s the thing – it’s pretty much always the best answer.
As shown in the study above, extracurricular activities can add to your child’s cognitive, social, and emotional development, and can give them a leg up in academics moving forward. But there’s also a point where more activities don’t improve their chances, but rather add to their stress or anxiety.
Unstructured play is fantastic for kids to learn – but there’s also something to be said for learning discipline and what it means to follow a coach’s instructions and put those skills learned through play into practice.
And for you as a parent: there might be a level of activity in a week where you feel like it’s worth the logistics and the cost for what your kid gets out of it, whereas doing more than that leaves you (and your wallet) depleted. And in the long run, a depleted parent can’t be the best parent anymore.
Check-in: is your kid over-scheduled?
Every family is different, so there isn't a magic number of activities that's right for everyone. But check in with yourself on these questions and it might give you an indication of where you’re at.
Does your kid regularly have unplanned afternoons?
Can your kid play without adult instruction?
Is there room in the schedule for spontaneous playdates?
Do you feel like every weekday is rushed to try to fit everything in?
Do the activities you have on the books feel joyful?
If no one else in your social circles had any activities planned for their kids, would you keep all the plans in your current schedule?
The big one here really is whether or not there is time for unstructured play. It’ll look different at different ages, of course, but some level of spontaneous activity is necessary for kids.
And remember, choosing fewer activities isn't giving your child less. You’re also giving them time to rest, imagine, build organic friendships, spend time with you, discover who they are without constant direction… all kinds of wins! After all, they have a lifetime of adulting ahead of them – but only these years to really be a kid.
How can we help your schedule?
It’s no secret that having working childcare is a huge part of the logistics puzzle of parenting. If you’re set up with an engaging after-school sitter or dedicated nanny, there might be more room in the schedule for both structured activities and free play.
Nannies and sitters at Smart Sitting are experienced and know just how to engage kids at their level. Need a nanny with toddler experience? We’ve got you. Need an after-school sitter who can seamlessly transition between math homework and playing tag? Look no further. Whatever you need, tell us about it and your own personal Family Specialist will be in touch to get to know your family and your needs better. Just click the button below to get started.
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