Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
How many times a week/a month do your children have play-dates?
By "play-date" I mean interaction outside of school and outside of an organized, goal-oriented activity like base-ball.
If your child regularly steps out in front/in the back of the house and finds children in the neighborhood to play with spontaneously, that would count too.
However, in my experience fewer and fewer children seem to be faced with such opportunities, so it appears that parents replace regularly use play-dates to replace those old-fashioned, neighborhood play experiences.
My question is how often does your child have play-dates?
When my kids were younger the only time they actually had organized "playdates" (I still find that term odd) is when a child didn't live close enough to just go out and play with. There were kids in the neighborhood and honeslty, everyone just went outside and played. They played in our yard or house, or someone else's yard or house, they rode bikes, they went to the park....it was just called "playing"...and it happened all the time.
In my neighborhood, children my daughter's age cannot really play whenever they want. Parents work, parents are separated, parents don't like being outdoors, parents have their own family that they want their kids spending time with.
In the beginning, I would only go to a playdate once a week or once very two weeks. Now that I have an established group of mom "friends" I think we meet every other day if not daily. Most of us like each other and most of us know each others schedule. I know I can call three people in the morning and make plans to meet later. At least one will join me. We also found toddler classes where we meet up during the week.
I think a lot depends on the age of your kids, and where you live. My kids are old enough now to call their friends themselves, or they get on their bikes and ride around to see who is home and available.
I think a lot depends on the age of your kids, and where you live. My kids are old enough now to call their friends themselves, or they get on their bikes and ride around to see who is home and available.
Yes - I agree age has a lot to do with it. Since the OP mentioned school and organized activities like baseball, I assumed she was referring to elementary school aged children, not toddlers.
I think mentioning kids ages would help too... mine are little (3 year old twins and a one year old), and are only just beginning to form attachments to specific other kids, so our playdates are more general: About once a month, a few toddler moms from the area meet, in the winter in eachother's houses, in the summer in a park; truthfully it's more a mom-meet-up, with kids coming along, but they have fun . We also have a playground and park leading to a creek/ trail system at the bottom of our subdivision, I go there with the kids 2-3 times a week, and there are often other kids there.
My kids also attend a playschool two mornings a week, but I suppose that is a "directed activity". But my girl twin has made a couple of friends there that she mentions more and more, so I am hoping I can get the parents contact details before playschool lets out for the summer, and we might meet up at the splash park or similar once a month.
Yes - I agree age has a lot to do with it. Since the OP mentioned school and organized activities like baseball, I assumed she was referring to elementary school aged children, not toddlers.
Well, perhaps you could tell me by age groups?
How often for toddlers and when did they start?
How often for elementary kids?
How often for middle school (if at all at this age).
Well....it's been a long time but, to the best of my recollection, my kids were playing outside with neighborhood kids pretty much as soon as they determined there were kids in close proximity of similar ages. Now, we didn't live in this house when they were toddlers....and obviously, toddlers aren't going anywhere unsupervised anyway....When DD was in preschool, there were a few kids in her class that we did do some things with - as much socializing for the moms as for the kids. Don't remember the frequency.
I don't know of any specific age or magic formula for when/how/with whom kids get together. I encouraged my kids to play in the neighborhood - that's how I grew up and we live in a very family oriented neighborhood (which is why we live here). From time to time, it was a bit of a challenge for DD as our neighborhood was mostly boys. Although, to this day she can throw a football pretty well ....They rode bikes, they walked to friend's homes, they had sleepovers, they played in the park unsupervised () in groups. They also played sports, did scouts and other organized activities as those interests were piqued. I found it all kind of flowed naturally. If one of my children said they really enjoyed X's company and could he/she come over to play sometime, I'd make a phone call if they didn't live in the neighborhood. X could be a person they met at school, or in sports or in scouts or whereever. Once they were in older elementary school or middle school, I was certainly not arranging playdates for them.
Last edited by maciesmom; 04-16-2011 at 08:40 AM..
How often for middle school (if at all at this age).
I think a lot of it will depend on your particular circumstances. I ferried my kids around to meet up with certain friends until they were driving age.
My kids went to a magnet school so classmates and friends were scattered all over the city. If Tom, Dick and Harry wanted to meet up to spend the day hanging around together it took some planning on the part of all the parents. Because of the distances involved many of those turned into over nighters. Those types of 'play dates' happened maybe once or twice a month.
Of course they often hung around with the neighborhood kids too, but those weren't arranged. They'd simply head out the door after homework was done and say "Hey Mom, I'm off to so and so's house for a while". When the weather was nice that could be an everyday occurrence, and other times it seemed like they were content to stick around the house and hibernate in their rooms for days on end.
Toddler? I didn't do playdates for toddlers. Once in 1/2 day preschool at 3 years old, I started doing play dates. During the first months, it was probably every other week with different kids. Once my children formed friendships with a famly we clicked with, the playdates were probably twice a week. Around 4 or 5, they made friends with at least one child on the street and they would spend a couple hours playing at my house or the friend's house each day in addition to still having play dates with their preschool friends.
Quote:
Originally Posted by syracusa
How often for elementary kids?
It just increases with age. There'd be a formal sleepover probably once a week from the start. After school going to the park with both myself and another parent going was fairly regular---2 or 3 days per week. It would be just for an hour or so---a chance to let the kids play together and unwind. This was until about 1st/2nd grade.
Once they were old enough to play outside less supervised, they played with neighborhood kids every day. Like maciesmom, my kids played in the park, rode their bikes, played hide-n-seek, street hockey, etc. all unsupervised. Once they made a few good friends with neighbohood kids, they'd be outside or in each other's houses every day.
Of course, there were still the close school friendships that required carpooling back and forth for playdates a few days per week. Since we live in a very large township, it was very common to pick up and drop off kids to hang out together on a regular basis. We also invited friends to go away with us on camping weekends and vacation. Their friends would invite them for trips as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by syracusa
How often for middle school (if at all at this age).
Everyday.
I'm not going to list the organized activities because you specifically said you were interested in non-organized socializing.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
. We also have a playground and park leading to a creek/ trail system at the bottom of our subdivision, I go there with the kids 2-3 times a week, and there are often other kids there. 
....They rode bikes, they walked to friend's homes, they had sleepovers, they played in the park unsupervised (
) in groups. They also played sports, did scouts and other organized activities as those interests were piqued. I found it all kind of flowed naturally. If one of my children said they really enjoyed X's company and could he/she come over to play sometime, I'd make a phone call if they didn't live in the neighborhood. X could be a person they met at school, or in sports or in scouts or whereever. Once they were in older elementary school or middle school, I was certainly not arranging playdates for them.
