What Extra-curriculars for a 5 Year Old Boy?

My son is a tap dancer.
Yep we are in year 3 of tap class and he LOVES it. He want's to try out for the competitive company next year.
He's been doing this since he was 4. He goes once a week for 45 mins
One of his heroes is Gene Kelly and wants to learn to dance just like him.

My son is in bed at 730 lights out at 830.

Music is a great activity for kids that age. It can range from a class exploring various instruments, music styles to private lessons on a particular instrument. Music engages children's whole being: self-expression, physical ability, listening skills, enhances their personal skills and allows them to feel the efforts of team work in an ensemble or group class. The Suzuki method I great for private instruction on an instrument, it involves the parent and can be so much fun!
Gymnastics is a good physical work out with less time investment compared to t-ball and my son does dance... Tap dance.
Good luck!

My youngest son who is 4 (will be 5 in March) has done a year of Tae Kwon Do (which we no longer do) and two seasons of flag football. He also goes to afternoon pre-k. He gets on the bus at 1215ish and gets home about 515ish. He's tired, but he LOVES his sports.

If you want to, introduce him to other things and see what he likes.

I think team sports are extremely beneficial and feel bad for kids who's parents don't WANT to do them, so the kids miss out. (I do not think you are doing this, just making the statement. The kids I used to nanny for are now 13 and 11 and are beyond anti-social. Any sport they wanted to do the parents said no simply because they're lazy.)

My son is 5. He is in Kindergarten.
He is not enrolled in anything.
Why? Because: he does not want to, he is TIRED when he gets home from school and he gets homework and if I drag him to some class, after school, and rushing through homework, and with him being so tired as it is from his day at school, he will not... be spot on and would be fussy. AND yes, it would conflict with his bedtime. And he needs to wake up early the next day for school.

So for me/us, it is just not the time yet, to have him enrolled in anything yet.
And I do not feel guilty about it, because I am going according to my son's cues.
Sure, he has lots of interests. BUT, when we do sign him up for something, it will be according to HIS interests. Not mine. And certainly not according to what all the other parents may have their kids signed up with.

I know some kids who are my son's age and they ARE enrolled in extracurricular things after school or in the evenings on the weekdays.
And... quite honestly, these kids are TIRED as heck, the next day and even while at their classes. And the kid is doing it because they have to.
Not because they want to.

Don't feel guilty. Take your cues from him balanced with the familys needs overall. My boy is full of energy and would stay up till midnight if I let him. He has no trouble popping out of bed in the morning. I have to keep him in sports just to burn some energy. We do basketball, flag football, soccer, t-ball. NEVER at the same time. We do a little 6 wk season and take a month or so off, then the nest season comes around. We might sit out a season if we have a lot going on at home. If money is tight, he doesn't play that time. Extra curriculars are not a requirement or an obligation. They are supposed to be good clean fun. Just do what you can feasably do, so long as he shows an interest.

Don't feel the pressure to do team sports. It's a huge obligation and we've been lucky our kids haven't been interested.

Our kindergartner is currently in swim lessons and gymnastics, each once a week.

I think the key is finding out what your son WANTS to do. He's at the age when he can start a variety of activities, from art and music to individual sports. Our kids' school even offers an after-school Lego building class.

Honestly, I think it's better not to overschedule kids and just give them time to play. Don't feel your son must be in an activity to live a full life.

I would not mess with your son's natural sleep schedule just for the sake of T-ball. Practice til 8 p.m. is really late for little guys! Also, I would not feel guilty for just doing kindergarten. Kindergarten is a BIG step up from preschool and is probably more than enough stimulation for him at this age. If he is going to bed at 7, I would spend the precious hours after school hanging out with him -- you can take walks around the neighborhood, play catch in the yard, ride bikes. If you want to do something organized, you could try the YMCA -- they may have a weekend class he can join. But really, I wouldn't worry about it unless he is asking for more to do.

Boys love Karate. See if he wants to do that. They love soccer, too.

I'd start by seeing if your town sponsors any sports or activities for 5 year olds. They are usually super cheap.

Well, I think I would start by reevaluating his life style. Going to bed at 7pm is crazy. I understand he must go to school in a different town or something but surely there is some school closer to home...

How sad for him to have to get up that early. Perhaps if he didn't go to bed that early he would start taking a nap again. I guess he's really too old for that too.

Sad thing is all the other kids are still up until 8-9pm at this age. All sports and activities not school related will be after dinner. I guess until he gets out of this school he will have to just wait. I honestly can't think of anything that is over with by 5:30 or 6pm. That way he can go home afterwards, take a bath and go to bed. Most people aren't even getting off work and having dinner by then and that is why everything is after dinner.

My son is also in kindergarten (just turned 6) and we don't do ANY weekday extra-curriculars for exactly the reasons you explained.

We choose one Saturday morning activity and he does that for a session at a time so he can do different stuff. He did soccer in the fall (just a Saturday morning class each week... no other practices or games), and is doing swimming now. When swimming is over he'll be doing spring soccer.

Our parks and rec department has a t-ball program that only meets on Saturdays so we might do that but there's just no way to make it to weeknight practices these days.

At age 10, my boys still play fall soccer & spring tennis. They also take piano lessons. We feel one sport & instrument is enough at any given time (soccer is T/Th/Sat; piano is W). Check out your rec center - ours offers "skills & games" 2 days/week, as well as other interesting things to try out (archery, woodcarving, stand-up paddleboarding). Lots of kids like karate/tae kwon do (though my kids weren't interested at all) & there are aftercare vans that pick up from our school (if you need that). We are close to an ice skating & hockey rink, & also have a BMX track adjacent to our soccer/baseball/football fields. Cub Scouts is an option. What are his classmates doing? Is there a particular friend he might enjoy doing some activity with? It's easier if there are kids he knows doing the same activity. Good luck trying out new stuff!

my 6yo kinder does tennis lessons for 45 minutes twice a week, my older son is on a swim team, they practice for 45 minutes twice a week...

Joe turned 5 at the end of October. The last 12 months have looked like this: last spring he was in "preschool" 3 days a week, and played soccer (one practice during the week, game day was Saturday), in the summer is swim lessons (every year since he was 2) and playing with the family at the beach 3 times a week (but that was us as a family), plus occasionally going to the neighborhood pool to swim as well, maybe 1 or 2 evenings a week. Fall: we pulled out of preschool for several reasons, knowing I could do a better job anyway, and with that money that we're saving every week, he's been doing horseback riding lessons one day a week, and a kung fu tournament. He's been doing kung fu for 12 months now and LOVES IT--he goes Tuesdays and Fridays from 4-5pm (there's also a 5-6pm class but it's mostly "big kids"....5 year olds can choose either time slot at this school). Kung Fu is his all the time activity, and his choice. He also has church Sunday mornings and Awanas (kind of a cubscouts meets vacation Bible school kind of thing) on Sunday evenings. I have to say that I would not appreciate a practice or game going to 8pm for him though. That's late. He's in bed by 8:30, which means we start winding down and doing our bedtime routine (shower, teeth, story, cuddles, prayer, etc) BY 8pm. That's an awfully late practice for your guy!
This coming spring, we will let him make a choice: he can do soccer again, OR he can take an additional sparring class. At this age, his martial arts class is mostly on forms and technique, but not actual fighting. If he wanted to spar and prepare to be on the traveling tournament team, he would need to take one additional class each week. I don't really care what he chooses to do because there are benefits and downsides to each choice and it's more on what does he WANT to do, in my opinion. If he wanted to do soccer and sparring, we could do soccer in the spring and then sparring class after soccer is over.
What we do in my "homeschool" pre-k (he wasn't able to do kindergarten this year because of his late birthday) is practice reading, writing, the very basics in math, and Health / PE everyday. PE may be kung fu or horses, or on other days it could just be lessons on making healthy choices, or playing Army Dodgeball, kickball, Tball, or soccer right in our backyard. Sometimes we'll have a couple neighbors over to play---I consider that his PE "class". On Thursdays we do art (which could be anything from playing with play-doh, watercolors, fingerpaints, regular paints, texture prints, cutting out pictures, or doing a little craft together or going on a field trip to a ceramic shop, to see some glass blowers, to a museum or art gallery, etc). My husband teaches him "Logic" on Saturdays (but my son is unaware of this "class" as he thinks they're just playing)--they play checkers or connect 4 and discuss strategy and "why did you choose there?" or "what could you do if I do this?", and lots of thoughtful exercises while taking walks in the nature preserve. We go to drum circles, concerts, all kinds of things in the community and we have kid version instruments that they play with when we work on music and tempo and stuff like that. So....some of it is stuff you can take him to and pay someone to help with (it IS important, in my opinion, that children get some physical activity and learn some lessons that team sports can offer) but you can also learn lessons with more one on one activities (a walk together, or bike riding, etc). Maybe you could find like-minded parents who have children that could play Tball in the backyard or a vacant lot instead of it having to be a league all the time. And don't forget that you can have fun learning art, science, and music while STILL doing physical activities every week. Being well rounded is what it's all about! (And my son too----LOVESLOVESLOVES his activities, which is why he's in them).

Your kid won't be ruined if he's not doing extra curriculars. But if you're really worried about it, my daughter (who is turning 5 on Feb. 16) is doing karate lessons and soccer. Karate is 1-3 times/week for 45 minutes each time, and soccer is 1-2 nights/week for 1 hour each time, plus a game on Saturday. Practice from 7-8 at night is ridiculous for 5-year-olds, but I'm sure that team is not the only gig in town.... find something else. Also my older daughter (8) didn't start coach pitch until this year, 5 seems young for coach pitch, doesn't it?? I don't know much about that though...

My son is 7 now. When he was 5 he enjoyed doing swim lessons once a week for a while and gymnastics once a week. The gymnastics was in the afternoon and not after dinner. He also did the local free basketball program for a little bit that year - it was Saturday mornings. We have the rule that you have to do one extracurricular activity. Right now our my son does piano lessons and soccer (which starts up again in a month or so). Have fun finding something your son loves!

at age 5, our ball season was t-ball, moving into bantam. We were very lucky to have parents available to do practice at 5/6.....(sigh).

Our small town also offered soccer for both spring & fall.

I believe my sons began Scouts at age 6/1st grade. The 1st year is Tiger Cubs.

We also did occasional trips to the bowling alley & skate zone. The afternoon session at the skate zone was great!

We filled many weekends with exploring the immediate locale. Parks, museums, living history wkends, etc....filled many wkends....as did spending great quality time with cousins. That's when the lifelong memories are made!

My 5 year old started hockey this year and he is in preschool. His practice is Friday 5-6 and games are Sunday morning 7:30-8:30. He loves every minute of it and would do more if he could.
I would find stuff that works with your schedule and ask him what he wants to do.

I wouldn't worry about it either. My son might have played t-ball then but that was about it. In first grade, he did Cub Scouts and soccer. Now in 5th grade we are overloaded with Cub Scouts, martial arts, school sporting teams, school band, etc. I think when my son was younger, we would do things like $2 children's museum day and visits to a kid's art center. I think these kinds of outings are more important for a kid this age than organized sports. I remember him doing Tae Kwon Do too. Look at your local YMCA as others have suggested. Sports and other activities there are not as time intensive and are sometimes in the afternoon.

I wouldn't worry about it too much!
Maybe try a class or a lesson on Saturday mornings just for fun. Our community center has lots of classes like that, martial arts, dance, music, art, cooking, mad science, etc. Those classes are pretty low key and reasonably priced.
If you have a gymnastics center nearby that could be fun too. Ours offers tumbling, obstacle course, trampoline and rock climbing at that age. Lots of fun there, especially when the weather is yucky outside.
He's at the age where he's just trying out different things. My kids never really enjoyed organized sports until they were a little older, like around 7/8 years old. You have plenty of time, take it slow so he doesn't feel pressured or get burned out :)

What does HE want to do? My grandson is 6 & I have had him with me during the day since he was born. We have tried almost everything. He loved Power Rangers, so we tried Karate when he was 3 1/2. He is still doing that. He played t-ball (and he was very good). Now he wants to play soccor. Try bowling, they usually bowl in Saturdays. My daughter did not like team sports. She loved roller skating & started that at 5. They grow up so fast, enjoy these years. Before you know it, their friends are a priority.

My son is 5 & he goes to gymnastics class once a week in the afternoon at the Y. Check it out (Hollywood YMCA), they have afternoon classes if your son is interested, he can also go for a trial class to see if he likes it..
I'd like to put my son in soccer class on a weekday afternoon (Soccertots) but there were no other kids enrolled in that age group so the class was cancelled..my son misses that as well!
I agree that other activities I've looked at are way late (like karate, Hollywood wildcats, Kidonetics) around 6 pm or so & that encroaches around family/dinner prep time for us..
We also do the ocassional playdates so if you ever want to meet up, let me know! :)

My daughter the same age does My gym at 3:30. So we have time afterschool for a snack and bonding. I agree with you that doing anything after 6pm is too late for little ones.

Just read another reply and 7pm is not too early for bedtime. Little ones need alot of sleep at night for a healthy mind at school. My are girls go to bed a bit later but then i compensate by getting them up at 6:30. We live 2 blocks from school.

I wish my son actually wanted to play a sport... My son turned 5 in October, (he missed the cut off for kindergarten, so he's in VPK) and only likes playing with his friends...
We tried karate and he hated it... He LOVES just running around outside with his friends.. Playing hide and go seek, riding his bike, LOVES riding his scooter and building legos... He doesn't like playing sports where he doesn't know all the kids...
Some of his friends do karate, basketball, tennis and soccer..

If he wants to do something, by all means let him give it a shot, but if he isn't asking to do anything, enjoy the time hanging out together. Extra-curriculars are not required.

My youngest is 7, in the second grade, and doesn't do any extra-curriculars during the school year. Like your son, he goes to bed at 7:00. He needs his sleep, or he gets cranky and emotional. He'll have first communion this year, so he has a first communion class once a week from 7:00-8:00 and he stays up late that night, but other than that we don't do much on school nights. My 14 year old is about to start tennis, so we may be a bit busier soon.

During the summer, our youngest plays a lot of golf. That's the sport he loves. He plays with his dad whenever he can on the weekends, and he does a couple of week long golf camps. That's it. That's all he wants to do right now, and I'm fine with that. School keeps him busy during the year, and he's an avid reader.

If he doesn't want to do a bunch of other activities, I'm not going to push the issue. As long as my kids know how to socialize, have friends, and they are active (they don't need extra-curricular activities for social of physical reasons), then I'm not going to urge them into them.

Just my thoughts.

My third grader does gymnastics. He started in 2nd grade. Of corse he does it longer than most kids his age. He goes twice a week for 2 hours a night but he's on a team now. But Kinder is a great age to start them out with something like that. Unfortunatly most sports will be late and on weekends. With gymnastics they usually have classes much earlier.

Good luck and God bless!