How much time should a parents spend with their child
How Much Time Should We Spend With Our Kids? — The Family Academy
Do parents, especially entrepreneur parents, really spend enough time with their kids?
It’s become this kind of scorecard and we justify how good we are at parenting by the amount of time we spend with our kids.
But quantity does not equal quality. A child would rather spend 20-minutes with you playing a board game if you are ‘all in’ versus an ad hoc afternoon of wandering while you scroll your iPhone every ten minutes.
Think about your own childhood memories. Do you remember the days that your parents/caregivers starred aimlessly at their newspapers ho-humming every time you tried to speak with them, or do you remember the micro-moments like playing Barbies or collecting stickers with your mom?
Stickers and Barbies always win.
So why then are we getting ourselves so stressed about putting in the hours as though clocking our time will earn us a bigger parenting payout?
Surely there is a correlation between the time spent with our kids and how they develop as world-peace-loving human beings, but let’s be honest with ourselves, it’s not *just* about time.
The sheer amount of time American parents spend with their kids between the ripe ages of 3 and 11 has almost no correlation to how children turn out. This is according to the Journal of Marriage and Family.
The study actually found one key instance that spending time with your kids is actually harmful to your children, that’s when you are tired, stressed, guilty, and feeling anxious. So when you are in that state, it’s actually best to step aside from your parenting duties (call a friend, your mom, your husband, or a sitter to come in) and get time for yourself.
Self-care as a primary caregiver is more important than scheduling all-the-things in your day. Stay-at-home-moms (SAHM) get slack for ‘just’ staying home but they are on 24/7 with little to no relief. And when they are tired/sick or just flat out need a break, they deserve that f******* break, or else everyone will get a little cray cray. Your 10 hrs/week of ‘family time’ shouldn’t ever be pegged against your mom friend who homeschools her genius kids and lives a seemingly perfect life.
She has her own challenges too, and likely some you don’t even want to hear (like she gets no sleep because of her newborn baby.)
In a survey of a thousand families, Ellen Galinsky, the head of the Families and Work Institute and the author of Mind in the Making, asked children, “If you were granted one wish about your parents, what would it be?” Most parents predicted their kids would say spending more time with them. They were wrong. The kids’ number one wish was that their parents were less tired and less stressed.
Ahh, see how this is all coming together?
So then, how much time do we really need to spend with our kids? The answer: it all depends.
I asked this question on Facebook and most parents came back with how 2-4 hours each day feels good for them during the week. Too much more and they feel overwhelmed, much less and they miss their kids. As they get older, and their kids start to lead their own lives, this obviously changes, but the quality of that time still matters.
We all raise our kids according to different values, cultures, beliefs, religions, neighborhoods, cities, countries, and so there is no one size fits all. Some parents barely see their young kids, while others spend 24/7 with them. So the argument isn’t what should you do based on the researched shared in this post. The argument is FOR rest, recovery, mental health and staying sane. How do you throttle full on running your business with parenting? How do you find the quality time with your family that actually fills up your love tank? That’s what we are looking for.
So let’s start breaking this down.
The quantity versus quality mythIt’s not to say that our time with our kids is not important, it is! There are several studies that suggest that the amount of quality time we spend with our kids - like reading books, playing sports, sitting down to dinner together, meditating together - have incredible life-long outcomes for them. Also, how a parent consistently interacts with their children - warmth, care, empathy - even in passing plays a huge role in their character development.
A deep connection can be built during the most non-obvious times. A 2007 UCLA study that found "the quiet, in-between moments of family life did as much of the real work of family bonding as any fabricated family time." MacLellan goes on to quote the researchers: "Everyday activities (like household chores or running errands) may afford families quality moments, unplanned, unstructured instances of social interaction that serve the important relationship-building functions that parents seek from 'quality time'." STUDY.
Don’t force the time, just make use of the time you are already spending with them. This morning, for example, I (finally) took a few extra moments to teach my 5-year-old how to do laundry. We loaded the washer together, poured soap together, and pressed the buttons together. As I would normally just rush through this process in order to get it done, I saw it as an opportunity to connect with him. We giggled and made a mess in emptying the dryer lint, but it was so worth it.
It lifted our moods for the rest of the morning. Now, not only is the laundry done and Noah knows how to do it, we shared an intimate five minutes together without sprinting through a task.
A mother’s income and education level are most strongly associated with her child’s future success. So when we look at female entrepreneur’s who are also mothers, the best support we can give them is in helping them achieve their business success. That could mean watching their kids for them, lending them so much needed business advice, referring them new clients or even helping them understand the value of their time better (ahhhm, teaching them to hire outside help.)
If there is a course you are circling around finally taking, knowing it will advance your skill set and help your business grow, then now’s the time to take it. When you get yourself and your business to a comfortable (if not thriving) income position, it will help you be a better mom.
Who knew?
A study by Melissa Milkie, a sociologist at the University of Toronto found that a mother’s mental health has the biggest impact on the future success of her kids. I already mentioned this above, but let me restate this: YOUR mental health - getting a good nights sleep, not being stressed, being more relaxed and less anxious - is the #1 way in which you can be the best damn mom ever. Stop thinking that you have to do it all. Whoever said you did is lying (to themselves and to you).
Ask yourself, what are the things I can delay, delegate or delete? And everyday chip away at systematizing your day. It doesn't sound pretty now, but the time you take to put into creating your daily routine and system will pay off in spades later on.
Too much is too muchWe can’t force being present, well we can but over time it becomes evident you aren’t really ‘present’. And if we force our hand at just being with our kids, for time’s sake, we actually lose the reason for that quality time altogether.
Plus, ‘distance makes the great grow fonder.” If your gut is telling you you need a little break, to step away from parenting even but for a moment, do it. Call on a friend or family member to fill in your place for a bit. There is absolutely no shame in taking a break. I once overheard a friend saying that she hadn’t had a day off of mommy duty since her 9-year-old was born. She mentioned it with a sense of pride however seeing her updates on social media, those indirect “I NEED A BREAK!” jokes about wine-o'clock and how hard it is, tells me another story. She was conditioned to think she shouldn't’ take a break or else she would be a bad mom.
No, no hunny.
A bad mom is one who doesn't allow herself time to rest and relax. A bad mom is someone who constantly ignores her own needs for months if not years at a time in order to take care of everyone else.
Today, for instance, I packed my boys a Lunchable for lunch! Ha ha, yup! Us clean-eating-veggie-slugging family sometimes fall off the wagon because we’ve learned that too much is too much.
I missed a grocery run yesterday because I was laying in the sun reading my book as I watched the boys play in the distance. Didn’t feel like leaving the house so I didn’t. Guilt? Hell no. Everyone is happy today because mommy took some time for herself.
Here is the thing, it’s never about the quantity. Quality is key. So if you’re having an off day, or your head is spinning with work stuff, or you need alone time, then take advantage of it. As my friend Ryan Robinson says “Because to me, when they are 20, 30 or 40, they're not gonna say "dad only spent 7 minutes playing with us on a Thursday. What they will remember is what we did in those 7 minutes and how much fun they had. To me, that matters more.”
It’s the micro-moments that matter. So don’t think you have to put in all the hours to up your parenting points.
It’s in the tiny, consistent moments that great memories are made.
Do Parents Spend Enough Time With Their Children?
Recently published research concludes that today’s U.
S. mothers and fathers spend at least as many hours caring for their children each week as parents did four decades ago during an era that in the popular imagination was a golden age of family togetherness.
It may seem contradictory, then, that many parents complain of feeling rushed and of not having enough time with their sons and daughters. One reason for this, authors Suzanne Bianchi, John Robinson and Melissa Milkie suggest in their book, Changing Rhythms of American Family Life, is that there is a gap between parents’ self-evaluations and the currently high cultural expectations for “intensive parenting.”
Parents today correctly believe they are busier than mothers and fathers of past decades, according to the authors, who are sociologists at the University of Maryland. Total workloads—the combined hours people spend in paid jobs and unpaid family or household care—”have risen and remain high” for married parents, especially dual-earner couples, and for single mothers.
Mothers and fathers have equal total workloads, the authors report, but the mix continues to reflect traditional gender roles. Although fathers have picked up some domestic work, mothers still do more around the house and spend fewer hours in the workplace than fathers do.
The authors made extensive use of time diaries kept by parents as part of large research studies, in which a standard series of questions walk respondents through a complete day. The first national-level study was conducted in 1965, and it was replicated in 1975, 1985, and 1995. They drew on other time-diary studies from the late 1990s and early this decade, and made use of the Current Population Survey data on work hours, the 2000 General Social Survey, and other material.
Time diaries indicate that married fathers spent an average 6.5 hours a week caring for their children in 2000, a 153 percent increase since 1965. Married mothers spent 12.9 hours, a 21 percent increase. Single mothers spent 11.8 hours, a 57 percent increase.
These increases are powerful because the figures are for “primary care” where the child is the main focus of attention, not for time spent with the child while doing other things. Time-diary numbers, however, do not say whether mothers are as accessible to their children at home during as many hours as they were in the past.
Child-Care Time Rose Since 1985
The rise in child-care time documented in parents’ diaries began after 1985. Mothers’ child-care hours fell from 1965 to 1985, consistent with an era in which the average number of children per family declined, women’s employment rose sharply, and single parenting increased. Since then, though, mothers with paid jobs and mothers without them have increased their time with their children. Married fathers’ child-care hours changed little until 1985, and rose substantially after that.
The U.S. trend parallels findings of national-level time-diary studies in Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and the Netherlands, as well as limited data from Australia.
Both mothers and fathers in those countries have increased their hours with their children, fathers most dramatically.
U.S. mothers and fathers have increased the hours they devote to enriching activities such as reading and playtime, as well as to basic child care such as feeding and dressing. This finding, the authors said, refutes “any notion that quality activities have been sacrificed as time constraints on employed parents and single mothers have increased.”
But in the face of competing demands, child-care time does not just happen: Parents have had to employ a variety of strategies to maintain the hours they spend with their sons and daughters.
To make time, mothers have reduced their housework hours over the years by an amount the authors said matches their increase in paid work hours. They have cut their free time, including hours spent on civic activities, according to time diaries cited by the authors. Employed mothers spend less time with their husbands, and have given up time with friends and relatives.
Fathers have reduced the hours they spend on personal care.
Another way parents try to make more time for their children is to do two things at once. Time diary comparisons show that parents spent twice as many hours multitasking in 2000 as they did in 1975. During waking hours, “about half of today’s parents’ time is spent doing two or more activities simultaneously,” the authors write.
“They’re doing a good job of fitting it in,” said Milkie, an associate professor of sociology. “They may feel the guilt, and that’s what’s bringing them to take their kid to the grocery store when they don’t have to.’
Mothers More Likely to Feel Rushed
Although time diaries show that mothers and fathers spend about the same amount of time doing two things at once, survey data show that mothers are more likely to report multitasking all the time as well as feeling rushed. Employed mothers feel the time crunch more than those without paid jobs, and single mothers feel the most time-pressed of all.
Perhaps, the authors suggest, that is because the complex nature of running a household today means that there never is a moment when something does not need to be done.
Parents, especially mothers, may be responding to heightened expectations, the authors said. “If our interpretation is correct, the requirements for effective and good mothering have ratcheted upward at the very time when there are expanded opportunities for women to do other things with their time, such as devoting themselves to fulfilling jobs,” they write.
Especially among middle-class parents, children increasingly are expected to be the center of family life. Today’s parents are expected to monitor their children carefully because fears of abuse and of crime have risen. They are expected to guide and nurture their children through every aspect of growing up, and to be involved in all of their activities. Because the average family now has fewer children than in the 1960s, the investment in each child is greater.
No wonder, then, that 40 percent to 60 percent of parents feel they spend too little time with their children, the authors note. They live in a society, said Milkie, where “you can’t spend enough time with your kids . . . cultural ideals are really feeding into this.”
The authors acknowledge that some of their conclusions go against the grain of popular belief. Although they raise concerns about the strains on parents, especially single mothers, they conclude that some aspects of childrearing have not suffered in the transition to a world where most mothers have joined the labor force.
“Somehow, then, despite concerns of policymakers and others that children are not receiving sufficient parental time,” they write, “parents seem to have compensated for family and work arrangements that at first glance should have taken away from childrearing.”
Reference
Suzanne M. Bianchi, John P. Robinson, and Melissa A. Milkie, Changing Rhythms of American Family Life (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2006).
How much time should be spent with a child to make him happy?
We are lying in bed with my six-year-old son, he put his head on my shoulder, We just finished reading the book. He looks at me with his big brown eyes and says, "Mom, I miss you so much when I'm at school. And I dream about how I will come home and we will play.
My heart skips a beat: “I miss you too, baby. And I also really want us to spend more time together.”
We don't really get to be together very often. Because there is a school, friends, circles, plus a younger brother. And my son misses me all the time, and I miss him.
And so, I finish with bedding, kiss him, sit on the sofa and open my diary. Where can I find time for a full-fledged game with my son. Yeah, for example, Saturday ... I can on Saturday. Perhaps I'll take him to the trampoline park, and then we'll have lunch and buy some sweets.
My husband has just agreed to take the youngest home for nap time, and I can spend time with the elder in peace. I run back to my son's bedroom, crawl under his side and tell him about my plans. He happily hugs me - of course, he is terribly pleased.
Oh, it's "quality" time with the kids...
The kids are constantly asking their parents to play with them. My sons say the phrase "Mom, play with us" seems to be billions of times a day. And sometimes it's terribly annoying. Especially when I have a mountain of work to do. But children will continue to demand our attention, because this is normal. Because we are the center of the universe and the main example for them. They need our attention just like plants need sunlight. This is their basic need. So it is very important to give full attention to children at least once during the day, but ...
...but I have so much to do!
Moms now have three times more responsibilities than our grandmothers had to do.
Society places unimaginable demands on mothers. Yes, we are spinning all day like squirrels in a wheel, only to have time to redo everything.
But even those mothers who do not need to go to the office will say: if you are at home all day and you have two or three children, it is very difficult to give full attention to each of them.
For example, it became much easier for me when I read one study that said: "The quality of time spent with a child does not depend on its quantity."
I really felt better when I realized that how we spend time with our children is much more important than how much time we spend with them.
What your child will actually remember from their childhood (spoiler alert: no one knows)
Well, that's comforting. But I would still like to have at least a few minutes every day alone with each of the children.
But how to arrange it?
I know a family with several children where the parents tried very hard to figure out how to contrive to give time to each of the children on a regular basis.
And they came up with a great idea.
They set up a schedule that on a particular day one of the children goes to bed 15-20 minutes later than the brothers and sisters. And you could spend this time together with your parent.
Do whatever the child wants in these moments. In this family, for example, they sometimes read or played board games or just chatted, but in any case, each of the children received their personal 15 minutes each week.
And my friend, a mother from this family, says that it is these 15 minutes together that turn out to be decisive in her relationship with each of the children.
“Motherhood is a skill, not an instinct”: what I learned after becoming a mother for the second time , like "he opened the car door first!!!!".
It's amazing what miracles good contact with parents can do. In general, I realized that we definitely need to spend time together with each of the children. But it is not necessary to go to the trampoline park or restaurant every time. Even a few minutes together at home also work!
Psychologist John Gottman studied the mechanisms of family relationships for years and eventually discovered the magic formula for combining positive and negative elements in communication between family members.
In general, in order for a relationship to remain healthy, this combination should be five to one.
That is, for every negative moment (yelling, ignoring, rolling eyes) there must be five joyful moments (hug, smile, nod of understanding, cheerful chatter) in order to neutralize this negative.
Dr. Gottman makes it clear that for all these joyful moments to work, it does not have to be something grandiose - just cute daily little things, signs of attention.
An exchange of smiles, a hug, or, for example, watching a game of Minecraft together works best. These little things are very important.
When time is running at a frightening speed, there are more and more things to do, and it seems to you that there is no time left for children at all, remember these small moments that really matter. Of course, it is sometimes important to go out together with your child to the theater, cinema or trampoline park, but even five minutes of intimacy a day can play a significant role.
The text was first published on August 15, 2018.
Read more on the topic:
Mom, don’t go: what is separation and how to help your child survive it
French fries to your child and feel like a bad mother? No need!
How much time to spend with a child and do you need to explain everything to him?.
"Paper" February 6, 2019
How has the relationship between parents and children changed with the departure of traditions, why is there no right way to educate and how much time really needs to be devoted to a child?
Paper publishes a lecture by St. Petersburg psychologist Katerina Murashova "The Myth of a Happy Childhood". She passed as part of the "Happiness Dialogues" project of the AdVita Charitable Foundation and Okhta Lab.
— You and I simultaneously live in two spaces — profane and sacred. The profane space is the space of everyday life. What we do every day: eat, love each other, swear, raise children. Sacred space is the space of myths.
I'm not calling for the rejection of myths. Myth is part of us. But when you interact with children, it is better to be aware of what space you are in and whether you want to be in it.
That is, do not confuse the space of myths and the profane. Because of this, a lot of sometimes funny, sometimes scary things happen.
I want to say right away that all the myths about education, including about a happy childhood, are young myths. Until recently, they were practically non-existent. Why? Childhood as a phenomenon, of course, was, but it was not valuable, no one bothered to transfer it to the sacred space. There were traditions: to put it here, to feed it, to tie a ribbon here, to spit here, to insert a bone in the nose here. Everything was clear, especially since children were considered an inferior version of an adult. It has always been like this: God gave, God took. Any reproductively active woman has five or six children, five or six more in the cemetery, what a sacredness there is.
The situation began to change when urban civilization strengthened and when scientific and technological progress made it possible to reduce child mortality. Traditions have disappeared.
Virtually none of the representatives of urban modern civilizations brings up children in accordance with traditions.
City man, having received a child in his arms, has no idea what to do with him. Not only can he not turn to traditions, he cannot even turn to his grandparents, because they raised their children in a completely different way. As soon as the void formed, myths began to creep in.
— The myth that I, as a practical psychologist, encounter most often is the myth of proper upbringing. It lies in the fact that somewhere there is a correct way, you just need to recognize it, comprehend it and build it into the empty place of traditions. And the result will be.
This is a rather malicious myth and it is clear where it comes from. Here is a child brought from the hospital, and he needs to be put somewhere. He convulsively typed on the Internet: “Where is it more convenient for a child to sleep?” Mom opens the first of a million links, and it says that the child should sleep with mom, because until recently he was part of her, the beating of her heart calms him, he will not grow up neurotic, his mother can feed him at any second.
Sounds logical.
But the mother starts reading further, and under the third link it is written that the child should sleep separately: this allows him to form a routine, allows the mother to get enough sleep and quickly restore intimate life, allows the child to understand that there are some boundaries in the world. This also sounds logical. But the child already needs to be put somewhere, he is not Schrödinger's cat. And at this stage, a myth creeps into the mother’s head that she “simply does not know how to search.” That you need to find something, and then everything will be right, under one of the million links there is the correct algorithm, the main thing is to get it.
How do I deal with this myth? [Comes to reception] a couple, with a very serious expression and a notebook. They say: “We read your book, article, blog, it seemed to us that everything was more or less clear. Our child is 3.5 years old. Much has been lost, we understand, but there is still some time left.
You are now telling us [what to do], we write everything down and leave to educate correctly.”
This myth is also dangerous for my colleagues: “Are you asking how to properly raise a child? I'll tell you now!" You can publish books. The child needs to be put here, fed like this, when the child is hysterical, you need to squat down and say: “Baby, you seem to be a little upset ?!” It's all the materialization of a myth. The mother, who has read another "intelligible", which says that the child at an early stage should be brought up with dolphins, sells the room and takes the child to the dolphins.
A little later, when the child starts acting strangely, someone says, “Don't you think this is some newfangled commercial stuff? Maybe something good old-fashioned, like upbringing according to Dr. Spock, is better? The mother reads and says, "That makes sense." And then she stops responding to the crying of the child, closes the door. The child begins to fight [in hysterics], then tear out his hair.
The doctor says to this that the child probably has neurotic experiences, apparently it is you who are to blame.
All this neuroticizes the child. The mother also feels guilty, she is in a state of “a person in search”, as if she did not let everything take its course, she improves, and after a while she will reach heights. And a child brought up in the style of the last article read by the mother has a serious chance of developing a neurosis. Usually they come to me in pre-neurosis or already in neurosis.
— A very young myth — about the equality of children and adults. The child is my equal, so I must treat him accordingly. This myth is professed by women of a certain sort. They usually come and look into my eyes and say: “You know, I had a very difficult relationship with my mother. When my daughter was born, I thought: we will be friends with her! We will share everything. She is my equal!” The daughter is present right there, she is 3.5 years old.
Why is this myth dangerous? He looks much less neurotic than the previous one.
The child, they say, will get used to being treated as an equal, and will get used to being the same. But there is one problem: we are all, among other things, biological objects. We are mammals, animals. And our children, too. And the smaller the child, the more in him from the little animal and less from the person. Gradually, as the child grows up, the proportions change, he becomes humanized. And, if everything goes right, then you and I are already dying people. Our children have some biological programs left to us from our ancestors. And these biological programs enter into a fierce battle with this myth.
Have you ever seen little ducklings? They walk one after another, and the female goes in front. Of course, there were ducklings that ran ahead of the female, only they were eaten. They have evolved. Because the duck knows where to go, but the duck doesn't. Because of this, birds and mammals have developed an instinct to follow their parents.
Without realizing it, we find ourselves in the space of a myth.
One poor little cub leads four big ducks: mother, father, grandmother and second grandmother. It is hard for the cub, he is not adapted to this load, he cannot decide anything. He is imposed initially dishonest game. But periodically they demonstrate how it really is.
For example, a child has a severe cold and the infection has spread to the sinuses. And the doctor says: “If you don’t want complications, wash your nose six times a day.” And this is a very unpleasant procedure. Parents fall out of the mythological space into the space of evidence-based medicine. The mother says to the father: “Hold him. No one cares what he will yell. And I will wash my nose. And so six times a day! The child cannot leave the space of myth, but the mother can, because she is smarter. And in this situation he finds himself in agony. This myth is almost not reflected in parents, but it is reflected in children. A grown-up child believes that adults are lying all the time, and what they are talking about has nothing to do with reality.
- The next myth is that children need to be explained everything. I don't even know what system it came from. It sounds like this: “I explain everything to him, but the feeling that he stopped hearing me, I even checked his hearing.” But the fact is that up to three years the child does not have causal relationships, he is interested in one single question: “How will it be?”
How does this work in practice? A child climbs with two nails to the socket. And then mom gets up and says: “Petenka, don’t put nails in the socket, there is an electric current in the socket, electric current goes through the wires, it is very dangerous, it can bite Petenka, Petenka will then get sick, they will take him to the hospital, they will give painful injections , mom will cry, Petenka may even die ... ” Petenka is interested in whether it will be possible to put these two nails into the socket, which very accurately fit these little black holes. Want wild! What does mom do? She frolicks in the mythological space, where she crawled of her own free will.
The child grows up in continuous blah blah blah. After a while, he hears this. It turns out that this myth has almost no effect on children, they simply stop hearing. And the carnations fly back to their mother. She either understands that at some point she must yell so that the child concentrates, or he does not hear her even when she yells. He does not hear her important explanations. And my mother, in complete bewilderment, says: “I explained it to him!”
Explaining should never become five minutes of continuous talking. For a three-year-old child, there can be only one and clear explanation.
— The next myth, which is difficult for parents, and for children, as it turns out, is that a lot of time needs to be spent with a child: to develop, entertain, pay attention. [This results in] guilt-ridden parents.
During the vast historical period, no one could have imagined that children should be entertained. Moreover, even my peers did not come up with this.
Children should have fun on their own. The maximum that parents can do is to buy toys for the child.
But then a mythological space arises, mothers-animators appear: “So now we have Doman cards, then we go to the park to feed ducks, we look at the species composition of ducks there, then we look at them in the picture, we say Latin names, then we have kinetic sand".
What happens because of this? The most common complication is nervous exhaustion of the mother. At some point, she stops doing it, because she realizes that she can no longer do it. The publishing house "Scooter" published a book called "Mom at Zero". This is about mothers who were getting out of the state into which they had driven themselves.
Children can and should be given as much time as you like. They must always lack everything, otherwise there will be no incentive to move forward. If you catch yourself rushing after the kinetic sand because someone said something to you, then you climb into the space of myth with leaps and bounds.
