I've never had a child in little league before. We've had brief forays into soccer, basketball and football. But this little league stuff is serious. I guess it is the All-American sport (um..Is it? I just said that when really I know almost nothing about any sport). First off, we are only in "Pre-Season." Using my terrific grammar skills I take this to mean that the real "Season" hasn't started yet. This is shocking to me considering that we already have two two-hour practices and two (approximately 2 1/2 hour time commitment) games per week. Using my terrific math skills this translates into an average of nine! hours per week committed to baseball.
Why didn't someone inform me of these numbers before this conversation happened:
Eliseo: Mom, can I play baseball?
Me : Sure, that sounds fun.
Let's talk about Asians for a minute. How many times have I heard people commiserate on the amount of time Asian children have to spend on school work and music lessons. It's true, too. I've seen elementary aged kids spend 3 hours on homework and that's after they went to cram school and music lessons. If you search Youtube for children playing piano you will find a plethora of five year old Asians playing Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, etc. They have this box-like contraption under their feet that helps them use the damper pedal since their little legs swing about a foot above it. If you are a Westerner, search your Western soul for what you think about this. Does it feel like pushing a five year old to practice piano two hours a day is...excessive? It feels excessive to Westerners because it is pretty much an impossible task for us since all our children's peers don't have to do anything excessive like that and so they would naturally resent it. It works in Asian cultures because all the child's peers are spending equal amounts of time in cram schools and music lessons and because the parents can easily say, "I had to do this when I was your age!" So it is a matter of course for the Asian child.
However, I've now discovered that Asians have nothing on us Westerners when it comes to pushing kids into spending excessive amounts of time on a pursuit. Take, for example, nine! hours a week spent playing baseball in the Pre-Season. I'm afraid to see what kind of time commitments will be expected during the Season. Eliseo loves baseball so far. He feels dressed to the nines in his uniform and asks me seriously if he looks like a "real" baseball player. I love to see him having fun. He doesn't really get much exercise-most of the little league games seem to consist of the following: the pitcher pitches, the batter swings and misses or doesn't swing at all, the ball bounces off some portion of the catcher's gear, the catcher jumps up, throws off his mask to chase down the ball, throws it back to the pitcher who misses and then chases down the ball so he can pitch again. It would be annoying if it wasn't so cute and funny-but it melts my heart to see how much he loves it.
But..but..but..the life lessons he's learning in little league could be learned, IMHO, in WAAAAAAY less than nine! hours per week. These nine! hours per week, I'm pretty sure, are not going to end in a professional baseball career for Eliseo. Or even a sports scholarship. But if I could get my little Eliseo to spend nine! hours per week on academic pursuits (after school) there could be a real chance of an academic scholarship in his future. He would breeze his way through college and have his choice of careers and be set for life. But instead we are spending nine! hours per week playing little league baseball. It just seems....excessive.
3 comments:
fun...we're doing baseball this year too.
You forgot the part about the occasional wild pitch or foul ball that hits the coach.
You have to read about Tiger Mom, the Chinese mom (and Yale law professor, author, walker-on-water, etc.) who is all about pushing her two girls to be the best they can be (i.e. the way their mom wants them to be). She wrote a book on how well it works with one of her girls, and how well it does not work with her other girl. Kristi and I had tons of conversations over this lady and her philosophy.
I played little league through college baseball so I played way more than 9 hours a week on a regular basis. I have wondered if I did waste my time playing baseball. I could have spent my time reading, writing, playing an instrument, working a small job - various other intellectual pursuits. But I don’t think I could have done anything as fun as play baseball. Not even chemistry.
So let him pursue the dream. Eliseo is a kid! Let him have fun. He has the rest of his life to spend concentrating on professional development. Personally, I would give up 10%, even 20% of my salary to play baseball 9 hours a week.
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