Most people look back on their childhood with cheerful sentimentality, wishing they were young again. However, I am beginning to wonder if the next generation will do the same.
When our parents were in school, there was no a push for achieving the highest possible scores on a standardized exam. There was no looming threat of funding cuts if you failed said assessment (which, today in Kansas, ring more poignant than ever.) There was also no obsession in enrolling your child in every sport and activity known to man, leaving them with little free time to discover what they truly enjoy.
Kids went to school. Then they went home. And stayed home.
Until my mom was sixteen and began taking piano lessons, she came home from school and, about ninety percent of the time, stayed there until she had to leave for school the next day. Furthermore, she explained, this was totally and completely normal. A few, well-to-do families were in sports or dance. But most kids, at least in my mom’s neighborhood, had the same experience she did.
Now, to be fair, the 1970s was quite a different time—most mothers didn’t work, so they could stay home to watch the children when they got home from school. While my mother stayed home with my siblings and me, and I feel beyond blessed that she did, I know that’s not what I have planned for myself. I admire my mother for what she does, but I’ve known for years that I’m not cut out for that.
But I am not here to discuss stay-at-home parents. I am here to discuss the future of this nation’s children—a future that I feel is headed in a direction most parents, teachers or anyone who has ever cared about a child would not support.
Burnout.
Now, some people think this idea might be absurd. How could children possibly burn out?
How would you feel if you were constantly subjected to a wide range of authority figures—not just your parents and teachers, but also your daycare provider, your after-school supervisors, your different coaches and activity leaders, among others—all with different management styles, rules and personalities, who demanded your obedience in all things?
How would you feel if someone was constantly looking over your shoulder, telling you how to behave, how to solve a problem, and, essentially, how to think?
How would you feel if you were never given an outlet for all of this, or if you were, the outlet was full of more authority figures, telling you exactly how to go about releasing your feelings?
About six months ago, I volunteered at an after-school care program at a local elementary school. My experience broke my heart and most likely jumpstarted this entire rant. When I arrived, the children were playing on the playground, on a beautiful day, as I believe they should have been. However, shortly after my arrival, the underpaid college students in charge rounded up the thirty or so third through fifth graders they were in charge of and herded them back inside. The students, who had been cooped up in a classroom for the better part of a day, were forced to again sit quietly in their assigned spots on the gym floor and do homework. If they didn’t have any homework, they “got” to read. Talking was not allowed, and would get you loudly called out by the provider. You had to sit up. Movement, unless you were being forcibly moved to a more solitary environment by the person in charge, was forbidden. Drawing (even if you were quietly sitting in your spot and not bothering anyone else, which I’m pretty sure is all the providers wanted anyway,) would also get you yelled at if you were caught. The entire situation was making me anxious, and I technically wasn’t even the one in it.
I wanted to yell back at the providers, “No! No! Put those children back on the playground! Let them run around! Let them talk to their friends! Heck, let them yell and scream! Do not tell them to sit down and shut up and do school things because they’ve been doing that all. Freaking. Day!”
But I didn’t. I helped a young Hispanic boy read a Thomas the Tank Engine book. We reached a page where the conductor scolded Thomas for going onto the wrong tracks. This boy, who probably was all of eight, looked up at me, seriousness emanating from his glasses-rimmed cherub face and said, “My dad does that to my mom sometimes.” We didn’t even get to finish the book before his sister came to pick him up.
After that boy left, I went to help a fourth grader with his math homework, and decided to be a rebel by actually caring about him, not just his behavior. I asked him questions about his life, about his family, in addition to (trying to) help him with his math. He seemed like a really great kid. His sister, who was in kindergarten, walked through in her line and waved to him. “I wish I was still in kindergarten,” he told me.
When my service hour was up, I sat in my car and cried. I have aspirations of working outside the home, even in the event I have children. Yet I knew I could not in good conscience subject my future children to that hellish after-school environment. I hope and pray that this experience is the exception, not the rule, to after-school-care programs. However, I know that the lack of free time for children—truly free time, with little adult oversight—is few and far between in this day and age, which I believe is causing some of the issues parents and educators complain about in today’s society—which I will address next article, so stay tuned!
