It's complicated: Knowing when you let kids quit a hobby

That has a diverse range of extracurricular choices accessible to children who definitely are only starting to find out their interests, once in a while kids want to quit one thing and learn about another. When can it be appropriate to insist children stay the course?

Laura Kreutzer wrote a column for Sunday’ Wall Street Journal with all the headline, “Should Parents Let Their Kids Quit a hobby?” The catalyst that brought Kreutzer to this question was the stated wish of her 8-year-old daughter, Neva, to relinquish dance lessons after several years because “it’s getting way too hard ..”

“When things get difficult,” Kreutzer wrote, “Neva's first inclination is usually to give in, and we often let her take action. … Although I realize which a portion of her attitude is age-appropriate, another section of me doesn't want her to build up believing it is OK to just stop trying when things get difficult. … My hubby, Clay, is less bothered by our daughter's love-it-or-leave-it attitude. He argues that at her age, Neva really should be allowed to experiment, so she can find out what she enjoys before the need to commit. Quitting specific things now, he admits that, doesn't imply that she'll turn into a quitter later in life.”

When it comes to Neva’s want to quit dancing, ultimately her parents allowed her for this because she wasn’t letting down any teammates and Neva consented to choose another extracurricular activity to effectively replace dancing.

Deciding if you should let kids quit is one area that practically all parents wrestles with eventually. On a single end on the spectrum are people like author Lisa Endlich, who explained over a Huffington Post blog a year ago why she never lets her kids quit: “On the risk of overgeneralizing, I do think our youngsters have so many various ways to enrich their lives that quitting happens to be an uncomplicated a reaction to frustration or boredom. I regret many of the things in daily life that I quit, not because I'd been enjoying them once i left, but because if I had stuck out and reached any kind of competency, I'd personally have found that illusive enjoyment.”

The Chicago Times’ Lisa Boone offered a nuanced procedure for parenting kids who want to quit.

“Once i signed up my 8-year-old son to try out flag football recently, I encountered a startling statistic: 70 percent of kids quit youth sports by the time there're 14,” Boone reported this year. “… The issue of kids quitting — music lessons, summer camp, sports — is certainly tough on parents. … The solution, naturally, is determined by the circumstance. … Parents needs to watch practices, measure the activity plus the coach, then trust their instincts if a child desires to quit, (University of Alberta professor) Billy Strean says.”