Choosing Your Kid's Activities Eight fun activities for your child. FEBRUARY/MARCH 2010

A few decades ago, Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts of the USA were the primary extracurricular organizations. While these groups have never lost their popularity among parents looking to keep their children active after school, a whole array of other activities have cropped up and garnered just as much popularity. It also used to be that extracurricular activities were geared toward school-age children; now there are activities even the youngest members of the family can enjoy.

Multi-sport centers make it convenient for busy parents to keep children of different ages involved at the same location. All About Kids, on Blankenbaker Parkway in Louisville, offers gymnastics, cheerleading, dance, swimming, and Tae Kwon Do for every age child.

All about Kids offers Fun Fins, swimming lessons for children as young as 6 months old. The baby classes (for ages 6 to 36 months) teach infants and young children to be comfortable around water. These classes also require parent participation, which is an added benefit and offers an opportunity for parent-child bonding.

The Champion Gymnastics program — a parent-child class at All about Kids — enrolls children as soon as they are able to walk. In this class an instructor leads the parent and child through a 45-minute class, which involves stretching, singing, running an obstacle course, and working on the balance beam. “It’s a high-movement class. It keeps the kids moving the whole time, which is really good for that age,” says Angie Tyler, owner of All About Kids. Angie says gymnastics helps young children to gain strength, flexibility, coordination and balance, as well as build self-esteem. “The main benefit is that they are learning how to follow instructions. Gymnastics helps to build cognitive skills. As far as early childhood movement education, you can’t get any better than gymnastics,” adds Angie.

Louise Harpole, whose 2-year-old daughter is enrolled in the class, says they’ve both gained a lot from it. Louise believes this experience will prepare her child for school and other sports activities in the future. “It’s just amazing to watch how quickly the kids develop week by week,” she says. Her daughter is also benefiting from the interaction with children her age, and Louise herself is enjoying being in the class with other moms. “It’s nice to get out and talk to other moms and hear different points of view.”

Many parents seem to favor high-movement activities when choosing extracurricular programs for their children. Tony Acree’s twin girls Katy and Lauren, 6, have been involved in extracurricular activities since the age of 3 when they took soccer lessons. Since then the girls have taken cooking classes, swimming classes, and they’ve played T-ball. They are now part of a newly-formed Girl Scout (Daisy) troop and are involved in cheerleading and basketball through their church.

The activity they enjoy best of all, however, is their Tae Kwon Do class at Hwang’s Martial Arts. “They really like Tae Kwon Do because it gives them a lot of confidence,” says Tony, remembering a recent incident when their burglar alarm went off at home and their mom locked all three of them in the bedroom while the police were on their way. “Both girls got in front of their mom and got into the Tae Kwan Do stance, because they were going to protect her.

“In today’s world I think it’s especially important for women to learn how to protect themselves,” Tony asserts.

The increasing cultural diversity in our city makes programs like those offered by Los Monitos a sensible choice for after-school activities. Located on Frankfort Avenue with a new location on US Highway 42 in Prospect, Los Monitos offers Spanish language classes for children ages 3-12. The classes are taught using fun activities such as cooking, music, and art. Children in the 3- to 5-year-old class are introduced to vocabulary for greetings and farewells, age, number, color, alphabet, and body parts. The children get to use the words during specific activities. The older kids are introduced to vocabulary for greetings and farewells, food, family members, animals, clothing, weather, and days of the week. The older kids also take part in activities such as drawing a family tree and identifying what each family member is called in Spanish.

Los Monitos also offers cooking, music, and art camps. Students in the cooking camp get to prepare a couple of dishes while learning all the words to the recipe and the kitchen tools in Spanish. The music and art camp introduces them to vocabulary related to art and music. Sara Silva, one of the instructors at Los Monitos, says learning a different language has great benefits for kids. “It helps them do better in school and in their relationships with other people. When they grow up it is a lot easier for them to pick up another language. It really opens up a whole new world,” she says.

The YMCA of Greater Louisville — helping to foster good values in Louisville’s youth for decades — is synonymous with extracurricular activities. The YMCA offers several programs for older children and teens, among them the Black Achievers, Teen Fitness, Teen Leaders Club, and Youth Ambassadors Abroad.

The Black Achievers program, which is offered at the Chestnut Street family branch, aims to prepare those in grades 8-12 for the job market, as well as encourage them to pursue a college education. The Teen Fitness program is a certification program, which teaches children ages 10 to 13 about healthy lifestyle choices as well as cardiovascular and strength training. Trained YMCA staff members supervise the kids as they learn to use the fitness equipment. After completion of the program, the kids are allowed to use the fitness area.

The Teen Leaders Club is a volunteer program for youth between the ages of 12 and 18. The teens in this club participate in community service activities while also focusing on developing their social, physical, and leadership skills. One of the requirements for the club is that the teens maintain a minimum 2.5 GPA. Besides performing community work, the teens also take part in weekend rallies and social activities.

The Youth Ambassadors Abroad program is run by the International Services Committee, a YMCA volunteer group. The teens in this program focus on community service as well, but also get the chance to travel abroad to interact with other teens. More than 100 local teens have traveled to countries like Germany, India, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Russia, and Togo.

Involvement in extracurricular activities is an excellent way for children and teens to grow and develop physically, mentally, and emotionally, but too much of a good thing can diminish the benefits. Tony says he and his wife try to limit their daughters to one activity a week. “We want the girls to have time to be kids,” he says.

Opportunities abound, and with thoughtful choices and planning, extracurricular activities complement a child’s school and home life.