After a short lull, there was another question about remote living. Shall we?
An away game three hours away? How exactly does one handle sports in that regard?
This is a good question, because it really is just that crazy.
Our school is so small that students there actually play football with the school twenty miles away, and even then, it's only six-man football. There just aren't that many schools that play six-man football, so to have any games at all, there is a lot of driving.
Yes, the away games all require over two hours of driving. The game last week was on a Saturday. So they left here at 10:30 a.m. and took the team to lunch before their 4 p.m. game.
A. went to watch, so he brought Cubby home. They got home around 9 p.m.
One of their upcoming games is against a school that is over five hours away. For that one, they'll pick a mid-point school to meet at and both teams will travel a couple of hours to play.
Volleyball is also going right now. They have a lot more games--because there are a lot more teams--and they do occasionally need to do things like leave school at 11 a.m. on the day of the game. And there are definitely days they get home very late.
Although there are club sports for things like Little League, we told our kids that they had to wait to play anything until they were old enough (sixth grade) to play on a school team. Because then the school takes care of transportation.
We just could not handle driving literally hundreds of miles a week for Little League games and practices. We have too many kids, and that is just too much of a time commitment and disruption in our family life.
For people who are really into sports, the travel is worth getting their kids involved. We are not those people, however, so school sports it is.
Thank you for answering my question - that is a lot! Perhaps I should never again complain about driving my kids across town for practice/games!
ReplyDeleteI know sports are a big one but what about other activities?
ReplyDeleteAndra: Really the only other activity for younger kids is 4-H, which we tried and didn't care for. All the older kids at our school do Future Farmers of America, which is a pretty comprehensive leadership program that involves public speaking, debate, writing, etc. And the older kids at our school also produce a newspaper twice a year, which is pretty awesome. But that's it. No music, band, dance, gymnastics, etc. It's pretty much DIY kids' activities here.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read that Cubby was playing football in an earlier post, I almost asked if it was six man football. My son went to a very small Christian school in the town we live in and they had six man football. We played teams all over the state so there were so long drives to games. This school was so small that the elementary classes were two grades in the same classroom ( first and second, etc…). High school was combined as well as much as they could. Like it doesn’t matter if you take American history or World history first, biology or Earth science first.
ReplyDeleteJoellen: Yup, same here. Cubby and Calvin are two grades apart, but are in the same class this year.
ReplyDelete