Parents often worry about children’s activities and how much time child should be allowed to play or do the homework during school day.  Education experts as well as pediatricians has recommendations on child’s school day activity time that could help parents to understand how much time should be allotted for various activities of a child.

• Physical activity: According to American Association of Pediatrics, everyday 60 minutes physical activity helps children to be fit and healthy. In the 60 minutes children can play in the play ground, play in school football / soccer team, play with friends and classmates or take a karate class. Any sort of physical activity that helps to build strength in child is recommended everyday for 60 minutes.

• Outdoor time spending: To get benefit of Sun and nature, children must spend time outside. Sitting and bound to indoor for long hours results in loneliness and affects social behavior, can lead to vision problem and obesity related to overweight. Outdoor walking or playing at least 60 minutes a day in the green nature is good for children health. This outdoor activity can be unstructured and children can play or read sitting on bench.

• Socializing time: Having friends will help children to build social skills. They will understand the nature of living together, will learn to listen, share and help others. Friendship will help them to control and handle the emotions.  Half an hour to couple of hours spending time with friends is recommended. If parents feel that their child need to mingle and socialize more to learn certain skills or to overcome shyness then, they can decide how much time their child should spend in socializing based on child’s behavior.

• Spending time with parents: Daily encourage and spend some time with child. If parent is stressed out and push themselves to spend time with children will have negative effect on children’s growth. Parents need to make sure that while talking and spending time with young minds a positive conversation will boost child’s morality.  Don’t stress on spending time with children. If both parents and children have common time to spend together, everyday then child should get benefit from positive attention. Pediatricians recommend a quality time of 6 hours per week with children.

• Sleep time:  According to child’s age recommended sleep time for children

a)       14 to 19 – At least 9 hours sleep

b)      6-13-year-old need 9-11 hours of sleep

c)       5 year kindergarten child need 11-13 hours sleep

o   Time in school classroom: Children go to school most part of the year. Once they are inside the classroom they need to concentrate on learning and studies. On an average recommended timing in the class room for a child is 6.7 hrs. per day in an academic year (PS -The number of school days might vary in different schools).   This time is enough for child to sit and listen and learn the subjects that are allotted for the year.

o   Homework time: Based on the grade of the children homework time varies. Recommended time to do homework everyday for a kindergarten child is 10 minutes per evening. Frist grade and second grade children – 30 minutes, Fourth and fifth grade – 50 minutes. Sixth grade – 15 minutes per academic class, Seventh and eighth – 20 minutes per subject, Ninth and 10 the grades = 25 minutes ;per subject, 11th and 12th -30 minutes per subject. However,  parents must also understand that time spending on homework depends on child’s ability to learn and practice skills. If homework is more then expect child to spend little more time on each subject or it depends on the requirement of an assignment or type of coursework. If you feel your child is spending too much time on homework and getting less sleep – talk to child to know more about homework policy or any issues that child might be facing.

Electronic screen: Everyday 20 mins to half an hour time should be sufficient for a child to play with smart phone. The negative impact of playing with smart phone is more. In fact, children below age 10 should not be encouraged to handle smart phones. Watching TV for entertainment is an hour to 2 hrs per day. 

References:

• https://www.verywellmind.com
• https://www.verywellfamily.com
• https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com
• Image credit: Photo by Yogendra Singh on Unsplash (Free for commercial use)

Image credit: Photo by Yogendra Singh on Unsplash (Free for commercial use)