Part
01
of one
Part
01
How do boys and girls in the US ages 4 to 8 spend their time outside of their home & school?
Hello! Thank you for your inquiry related to how boys and girls in the U.S. ages 4 to 8 spend their time outside of their home & school. In short, studies related to this particular age group are extremely limited. Some information in this report is related to children in various age groups, however, I tried to narrow it to at least the elementary school ages. There are several activities that children age 4 to 8 spend time on in the U.S. such as: homework, sports, TV and other electronics, along with various other activities. On average children, elementary school ages have 2.54 hours available for free time a day, and studies show that most of that time is taken up by screen time such as TV, videos, electronic games and computers. Below you will find a deep dive of my findings.
METHODOLOGY
To research your request, I searched through a variety of academic databases, corporate websites, industry reports, government reports/databases, regulatory filings, trusted media sites, user forums and review sites to find the information requested. As I previously stated, studies related to this particular age group are extremely limited. Some information in this report is related to children in various age groups, however, I tried to narrow it to at least the elementary school ages. I will report the age groups related to each finding throughout this brief. Due to limited availability, I could not find particulars on weekdays vs weekends or specific economic characteristics as requested.
There was a detailed report on how American children spent their leisure time in 1997. I felt this was too dated to include in this report, but have included the attachment for you to read if you wish.
TIME SPENT BY U.S. CHILDREN ON ACTIVITIES
Statistics show that children in elementary school spend 17.8 hours of free / leisure times and 4.1 hours on scheduled activities such as tutoring, lessons and non-school sports per week. This comes out to only 2.54 hours of free / leisure time a day and around 34 minutes a day on scheduled activities.
In a statistic related to all age groups in America, it showed time spent per day includes, sleeping at 7.55 hours in women and 7.51 hours for men. Eating was attributed to just over an hour a day for both genders. I use this information to show that at least this amount of time per activity can be attributed to children age 4-8.
In an article published by Forbes, it reported that American mothers of children age 3-11, spend on average 11-30 hours a week fully engaged in their children’s activities or at least accessible when needed.
STUDY ON ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN PLAY / FREE TIME ACTIVITIES IN THE U.S.
A scholastic paper showing the results of several global studies on free time in elementary school aged children shows that in the United States 95% of the mothers surveyed believed it was important for their children to spend time playing every day. When these same mothers were asked about how much time was set aside for free play in children of this age group, only 61% of the mothers hoped their children were allotted enough free time for play.
The importance of free play has been shown in studies. When recess is delayed in elementary schools, children are less attentive to their studies and recess provides children in this age group with the opportunity to grow in social development.
Elementary school aged children in the United States watch more than three hours of TV each day. Children age 7-12 were more likely to watch high amounts of TV than those age 1-6. Another study showed that children in the US age 3–6 spend on average 3 hours a day watching TV and that a typical child is watching an average of 4.5 hours of television before the age of 5. This accounts for almost 40% of the time the child under 5 is awake. This study also showed that in children under 3, 58% watch TV every day and 30% of children under 3 have a TV in their bedroom.
Elementary school aged children also spend an extra 1.24 hours on other media such as music or videos, 37 minutes on computers and a little over one hour on video games. Another study showed that in the U.S., 38% of those 5-7-years old used electronic games every day. These numbers account for approximately 5.61 hours of children’s free time per day in elementary school age groups.
From all countries in this study, when it came to playing electronic games, 34% were boys and 22% were girls. These results are not surprising when you look at other reported statistics that show that 1/3 of American children under-age 2 have a tablet and the average American child receives their first cell phone by the age of 6.
Also, found in all countries were 50% of all children in this age group played with toys, and around half of them draw, paint and play music. Only around 25% of the children globally engaged in imaginary play.
According to the survey," significantly more boys in all countries played outside or on a playground than girls (63 % compared to 53%), and more boys than girls took part in organized sports (25% to 21%)”.
In an article printed in 2016, entitled, “Children spend less time outside than prison inmates,” it reports that 50% of children between the ages of 5-12 spend thirty minutes or fewer outside each day.
SPORTS ACTIVITIES
This 2013 study shows that the average age boys start organized sports is 6.8 years and girls is 7.4 years. By the time kids reach grades 3-5, 51% of suburban boys participate in an organized sport, and 36% of suburban girls. The statistics drop down to 11% overall for urban children in this age group. In a different study, they reported that overall only 26.6% of children were participating in sports, organized or unorganized to a healthy level.
When it comes to choice of sport in those age 6-12, adolescent boys play: 40% football, 40% basketball, 24% baseball, 20% soccer 17% track, 10% wrestling, 9% swimming, 8% tennis and 5% cross-country. The adolescent girl play: 25% basketball, 23% volleyball, 17% base / softball, 17% soccer, 17% track, 12% swimming, 8% tennis, 4% cross-country and 3% lacrosse.
HOME WORK
It was reported in 2015 that children in elementary schools were getting three times as much homework as the recommended. Children in kindergarten, who are not recommended having homework are being assigned as much as those in third grade are recommended to have. Children are only supposed to be assigned 10 minutes of homework per grade, however kindergarten parents are saying their child spent on average 25 minutes each night working on after school assignments.
SUGGESTED FURTHER RESEARCH
Due to the limited availability of the age group 4-8, you may want to broaden the research to all school age children or change the groups to preteen and teens. There is more information available for these age groups. The largest amount of information related to U.S. children and how they spend their time, is related to screen time.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, studies related to this particular age group are extremely limited. Some information in this report is related to children in various age groups, however, I tried to narrow it to at least the elementary school ages. There are several activities that children age 4 to 8 spend time on in the U.S. such as: homework, sports, TV and other electronics, along with various other activities. On average children, elementary school ages have 2.54 hours available for free time a day and studies show that most of that time is taken up by screen time such as TV, videos, electronic games and computers.
Thank you for choosing Wonder! Let us know if we can assist you with anything else.