Today Cooper had soccer. Yes, that’s right–not even out of his Thirsties and only turning two next week and he’s in a 
class called Soccer Tots for children ages 18 months to three years. It’s a little ridiculous, I’m the first to admit it. But like many parents these days, unlike my own infant, toddler and childhood, I feel obligated to somehow expose my children to different experiences in the form of baby classes at a very young age.
I’m not sure if baby classes are more for the parents or the kids. Entertainment? Education? Or to socialize our baby with like-sized peers, much like a group of puppies at the dog park. But they’re everywhere and I find that I almost feel guilty if I’m the one mother in our Mommy Group who doesn’t have her kids signed up for at least one activity–EACH.
When our first daughter Lauren was one, we took her to music class. We sat in a circle with about a dozen other moms, dads and toddlers and sang and clapped and played with puppets. Or rather, I sang and clapped and played with puppets while Lauren, who was one of the only children who had no interest in sitting in her mommy’s lap and following along, poked around the room, got into mischief and ran around. When she took a toddler art class however, she was much more focused, not wanting to smear the paint around like the other children but making deliberate strokes and shapes with her paintbrush.
Our second daughter Kate, being the middle child, had to miss out on many of the play groups and classes. Her older sister Lauren was only in preschool a few hours a week so it was the three of us almost all of the time. I couldn’t very well bring an over-active and temperamental three-year old with me while I participated in a class with Kate. I comforted myself with the thought that Lauren was still an only child at Kate’s age and didn’t have the constant companionship of a sibling to stimulate her mentally and physically. I wonder if Kate would agree? It wasn’t until she was three that Kate finally got to take a few classes of her own, ballet and then gymnastics.
Cooper is a full three years younger than Kate, which I have to admit, has made taking him to his own baby classes slightly easier. Both girls are in school long enough for me to swing it–but despite that fact, maybe because I’m “over it” with my third child or because frankly, I’d rather take him to the daycare at the YMCA so that I can get on the treadmill for a bit (and do some writing in the lounge), than take him to a music class that I would probably end up chasing him around anyway. But he is doing soccer on Saturdays and I let his Daddy take him and I happily spend a much needed couple of hours without him under foot at home. The soccer coach wisely told all of the parents to have “Zero Expectations” for their children. The only goal is to run around and have fun. After the one soccer class I have taken him to, I can tell you it’s advice worth remembering! But nonetheless, it’s fun watching his chubby cloth-diapered booty run around.
Do you take your baby or toddler to classes and activities? What are your experiences like? Do you have a “lap-sitter” or a “runner?”
We don’t do themed baby classes, but we do go to something called Baby Talk once a week. It’s ages 0-3 and the kids play while the parents talk about what’s going on with their kids. We also do lots of songs with hand gestures with the kids. Lots of dancing. The gal who leads the class also reads a book. My 16 month old in the last month has really started trying to participate more instead of ignoring everyone to play with toys.
There’s also a local moms group that hosts an indoor play date each week in the winter (in spring/summer it’s park of the week). It’s in a large room so the moms get to socialize while the kids run around being crazy (also 0-3) and burn off energy.
I think it really depends on the kid, and the activity. Kudos to your instructor for telling you not to have expectations. We have put our 4 yo in swimming (except winter months) for the past year and a half, from baby swim through learning different strokes. She does really well 1:1 but when other kids distract her, it tends to fall apart. We tried soccer, but they wanted the parents to ‘help’ coach. Wherein none of the parents learned the kids names (they wore name tags but yet the adults didn’t even try), or got their attention in any way, but went about it silently. Well, you can imagine how much attention my kid paid. None, preferring to run around in circles. We had more luck in church or library situations where there might be more kids, but the people were trained/volunteers were specifically good at working with children.
IMO before age 3 it’s basically pointless unless you’re in a 1:1 situation. Group activities should have zero expectations like you said. I personally hate to pay for something and shove kids in and out of car seats when we could do the same thing at home. Kids have YEARS to learn to socialize. Give them the benefit of parental attention instead of using that time that they’d be with a coach to play on your phone..
Not much at all in our area for babies/toddlers. Looking forward to taking my daughter to story hour at the local library in a couple years. I guess we will just have to make our own fun for now!!
No, I don’t. Not anymore. I tried gymnastics for my oldest and one art class for my preschoolers a few years back but that was a multi-age class. I’m a homeschooling mom with 5 children ages 5 months to 19 years. I simply do not have time for that anymore. I once heard from an educational consultant with degrees in education and art that most people who are now considered geniuses were children who spent very little time with children their own age. They spent lots of time around adults and had plenty of time to explore the world around them rather than structured activities. I agree that the tot classes that are so prevalent today are more for the parents than the children. They are so stinkin’ cute though. I’d love to see one of my fluffy bottomed children running around playing “bunch ball” as my husband calls it.lol. I did try a swimming class with my son (third child) when he was a baby but it was hard to get to so we only went a few times. I do think learning to swim is important so that’s why I made that exception. We have much less access to swimming pools these days so I should probably make more of an effort to teach my three youngest. I just remembered that my second child took several swim classes (not as a toddler) and refused to try any of it. She learned to swim years later while playing around in the water with her daddy. I could’ve saved myself a lot of money.lol
I’m not into it. You feel all this pressure to put your kid in classes, once you realize others around you are doing it. But until my kiddo is old enough to tell me how much he loves one specific activity, I’m going to stick to the free storytimes at the library and local bookstore.
My daughter doesn’t walk yet, but i’m definitely going to try enroll her in a baby class/sports as soon as possible. I think it’s a great way to learn boundaries and interaction with others at a young age, and i cannot wait.
I just started my 7-month-old in Kindermusik classes. It’s been a bit overwhelming for her since she’s only used to being with one other baby, but it’s fun and gets us out of the house with other babies. However, it’s mostly the parents doing the singing/dancing while the babies are carried or crawl around and play with stuff. No pressure and the class is 0-18 months, so everyone can participate. I really like the CD, board book, and instrument they gave us, too.
We don’t do any baby classes per say but we have older kids and it just isn’t practical to get a sitter for the older kids for me to take the little one. We do have play groups though with similar aged children
Ive never taken my daughter to baby classes. theres just not anything like that around here that i know of. i really wish I could though! I would def have a crawler…no lap sitting here.
I do a mamilates class with my daughter, we love it!
We don’t have much like that out here it I do take my son to story time at the library..that is 30 minutes away.
I will echo Christel. Storytime at the library rocks.
I have a friend who offered me a discounted price for Kindermusik, so we put our son in. It has been a great activity for him and I love getting to spend that time with just him once a week. I am starting to think about singing him up for a sport or swimming lessons this summer, but we’ll see.
At one of the first Kindermusik classes there was a mom there with her baby, who was definitely less than a year old. She said she also had the baby in swimming classes. Then she made a comment about making sure her daughter had a social life. It seemed like such an odd thing to say. Go to the park or have an occasional playdate–that’s plenty for a baby. But then again I’m pretty introverted.
Does momma/baby yoga count? My university offers yoga classes for new parents and babies, and I’m really excited to take my daughter. Other than that, I don’t see us being big into classes until she’s older and requests something herself — I like the idea of inviting other babies/kids along on our adventures, but I’ll admit that I’m not really into the structure of formal classes. Then again, we’ll see what happens!
My daughter is almost 17 months old and I don’t know if I could imagine her grasping the concept of soccer right now but it might be cute to watch. I just found a Mommy and Me class in my area that I want to take my daughter to, I think it is a big play area for the littles to play together
I used to go to music class but decided I don’t like paying for something I do at home. He does go to Bible Study Fellowship with me but he’s not in my class. I love it and he loves it
My son and I take swim and yoga together; he is 8 months.
The only class type setting we’ve done with our toddlers is Story Time at the local library. We have 9 children, so they have plenty of interaction here at home.
My son has done gymnastics since 18m — he is just 3 years now and I’m glad I did it. He does really well and I enjoy him getting the structure. I have looked into getting him into a music class. He really loves instruments but the music classes I have found are more as you described, sitting in a circle singing and clapping. When I told him we were going to try out a music class he proceeded to tell me he wanted to try “a violin, and cymbals, and a tuba…” so it wasn’t what either of us hoped for.
I have taken him for swimming lessons and I may do that again as well — especially since we now live on a lake.
We have baby/toddler time at our local library. They sing songs and clap and play with play silks. Other than that, there isn’t a whole lof of interaction for my baby. But we homeschool so she has 2 older sisters who are constantly here and playing with her.
We just signed our youngest up for swim lessons and for soccer. We will see how it goes though. I am being optimistic but I am not sure how he will do. We also do library story time, but I don’t like to have to many “have to” go to activities. I don’t want to overload him
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