Team building is a necessity in today’s fast-paced business world. Eighty-hour work weeks and increased demands create stress, while a culture of job hopping makes it harder than ever for managers to cultivate team spirit. Taking time for activities t…

I am a kindergarten teacher in Batavia, IL. I see the children in my class who are just starting soccer, football, and hockey practice. A lot of the benefits of what you spoke of are there for the children.

What’s missing from your article are the pitfalls behind all this organized sport mayhem.

There are children who at age 7 have soccer practice every day after school, from 5 until 8 pm. They practice so late on these evenings that it’s dark at 7:30 and they’re still going.

There are children who don’t complete homework, eat dinner until 8:45 pm, and have the appropriate amount of sleep in order to be at their best when the school day arrives.

There are NUMEROUS families who have their entire weekends planned out for them by coaches who enter teams in tournaments anywhere from 30 to 300 miles from home. Families skip Sunday mass in order to be at their first match, at 8 am.

Some families get so hooked into being part of the “sports scene” that they are willing to pay out the nose just to be included. One family I know very well just put up $3,000 for their two children to be on a traveling soccer team. And that didn’t even pay for uniforms. This same family also has their children enrolled in tackle football, baseball, basketball, and dance. Sounds more like an addiction than a way of life for children.

Sure, there are many social and physical benefits of joining a team. But this community of parents who believe that they need to go full-bore on a daily, weekly and annual basis, are taking away from their children’s childhood. Not adding to it.

At what point will we realize that kids need to be kids. They need to learn how to socialize and work with one another without their parents and coaches organizing everything for them. They need balanced nutrition from a home cooked meal, made by the parents, and not Subway or McDonald’s.

Children need to play outdoors in the neighborhoods. They need to get on the phone and set up pick up games. They need to ride bikes, hunt for frogs in window wells, do the monkeybars, go swimming, and read books. They do not need what the greater sporting world is providing for them, in overabundance.

Life’s not about a college scholarship. Life’s about living to its fullest with our priorities placed on faith, family, friends and community.

If you think I’m a biased sports basher, think again. I am also a high school track and cross country coach. I get the kids who are sick and tired of soccer, and the other sports that they’ve been playing for 8 to 10 years.

America is burning with desire for more and more sports. I see American children burning up right before my own eyes.