Busy Kids Have Less Chance To Get In Trouble

For divorced parents with children, summer break may be a source of stress for parents trying to figure out how to keep their kids out of trouble this summer. From baseball to basketball and from tennis to frisbee golf, there are sports your kids can join to keep busy during the summer time. Local park and recreation departments and private sporting clubs should be starting to allow parents to sign their children up for teams to play a variety of summer sports.During the school year, divorced families often function well with their established custody and visitation plans, as a family lawyer can attest. As the school year winds down, many parents start asking themselves how they are keep children occupied during the summer months, especially when many divorced parents work.

Putting your kids in summer sports not only occupies their time, it helps keep them from having time to get into trouble when they are bored and have little else to do.

Busy kids have less chance to get in trouble

Children with few responsibilities or demands on their time can get bored and out of boredom kids have an opportunity to let their imaginations run wild which can lead them in the wrong direction. When there are multiple children in a neighborhood with nothing to occupy their time, they tend to spend more time with other neighborhood children, among whom some kids are leaders and others are followers. The more adventurous and stronger leaders of the group might establish dominance by pushing the limits of rules and boundaries, pulling other kids into trouble.

Meanwhile, the kids playing on one or more sports teams during the summer time have little time to do much of anything outside of practice and compete. When these busier kids do have down time, they may be more likely to spend that time doing something productive personally or helping around the house. The busy kids may also be less likely to run around in the packs of neighborhood kids and get in trouble, which brings relief to divorced parents worried about their kids.

The long-term benefits of organized sporting activities

Playing summer sports gives kids an opportunity to learn the variety of positions played in a variety of sports and how important it is to work together as a team. While they may only be focusing on their personal performance and how many times their team wins, the long-term team building skills they are learning should stick with them well into their adult years and careers where it really matters.

Being busy with sports and lots of activities where a child can play an important role should give a busy kid a sense of self-importance and pride. When the team is counting on you to support their teammates to win, being late or not working your hardest doesn’t get the job done. As they grow older, the kids who learned these values from summer sports may have a jump start on their young adult years and beyond.