Hellobee Boards

This is my son, to a tee! I keep asking him what he wants to do on the weekend for a class, and he always says "nothing."

The problem is that he has to do something on the weekend, otherwise he gets bored, so I am going to look into the sports complex a town over from us. He's going to a boys gym class and I will take a fitness class while he's there.

There are always trial classes, you can basically go for one class free.

I wouldn't worry about extracurriculars at this point unless she really wants to do something in particular. I know it's popular to do group sports, dance, etc., but if the goal is to start to develop mastery of a skill at a young age, the best learning setting is almost certainly one-on-one. If the goal is primarily social, I think group lessons are not the best place for that either. We did several group extracurriculars and the child-to-child interaction was actually quite minimal and superficial during the class. Classes were sort of useful to meet other children and parents/exchange phone numbers, but we've had much better success meeting people at the park (volunteering at our local park has been really good for meeting people and learning new and interesting things, plus it's free!), library, and other places we like to go than at group classes.

DD1 was the exact same when she was 3ish. We did an open gym at a gymnastics place, and she always interacted really well with the other kids there and the staff (who also teach the kid classes). But whenever I asked if she wanted to do a class by herself ("no, mommy would just watch you from right over there"), she said no. So we held off for a couple months, and then I just signed her up and figured we would give it a shot for one session. She was a little hesitant on the first day, but ended up loving it.

ETA: we also are taking a break from everything this summer (except some play-based camps at her preschool), just to keep her from getting burned out on any one thing...or on activities in general! lots of park and play at home.

DS is only 2.5, but we just kind of decide for him. To be fair, we haven't done that much though. Last winter we did swim lessons, partially because I thought he'd like them and also because we were headed to FL in February and I wanted him to be comfortable in the water.

We've also thought about signing him up for indoor soccer, which I think I'll do this fall/winter. My thinking for soccer is that it's good for him to get some energy out when he can't play outside, plus he likes playing with balls .

I signed up lo 1 for soccer and gymnastics when she was younger but she asked for ballet lessons. LO 2 asked for soccer and ballet!