What's better for children- country or city?

Becca said:
What's suzuki violin? As opposed to just learning the violin?
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They give classes on playing the violin while dancing on the back of a motorbike.

ice said:
We live in a 'good' area in Dublin. Nice quiet cul de sac where the kids can play out the front safely...lots of children around, good facilites re swimming pools, playgrounds etc.
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There is a huge benefit in allowing kids to interact with their neighbours without having mummy or daddy hovering close by. I've told my wife that even if we win the lotto, we're not moving out of our cul-de-sac until the little one is all grown up for exactly this reason - though maybe we'll buy the neighbours side of the semi-d and make one big detached house?
 

Totally agree with your wife. The trend now is for lots of 'play dates' where children from school go to each others house for a few hours. This is great and my son loves having people back but if they are not getting on well or one is tired and kranky they are stuck with each other until the mother comes to pick them up. When kids can play out in the cul de sac, green areas etc they can come home if someone is annoying them or if they get tired etc. They can also do all the things little boys should be doing like disecting worms, climbing trees, calling each other 'fart head' ....all the fun things that their mothers would say no to do....
 
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I grew up in a small town by the sea in the west of Ireland.

I had a great childhood playing in rock pools and swimming etc. because I loved water. However my brother hated it. Sometimes that sort of idyllic thing won't suit everyone.

We were lucky though because there was a good mix of stuff we had locally in walking distance (athletics club, football etc) and stuff in the next town 15 mins away and stuff in the big town about 30 mins away. So I think small town is better than being out the country somewhere where you do drive everywhere.

I live in commuter belt Dublin now and I do worry about kids - I can see it's great for them to play with their neighbours etc but *nothing* else is in walking distance except maybe a spar and an off license and there isn't really anything community based for kids. So it's worse than a small town. I just wonder whether there's really anything there for them, and what will happen if there isn't. Even as an adult, there isn't really anywhere in most estates to go for a nice walk . . . .I mean who really wants to walk around an estate.
 
Coming from a rural background I was happy with my lot & and am delira to give the same chance to my wee man (with more to follow ......).

The main fear townsfolk have is that you have no mates. My youth was spent on a bicycle to football (gaelic of course!), friends houses, occasionally as far as the beach. So I didnt feel at a loss.

I'm hoping my kids will have the same experience though I admit there are concerns re road safety & other unthinkable risks (not particular to the country).

Most of the activities mentioned are available in the local town which might be up to 15 miles away but not totally undoable either. So if you can get country kids back on their bikes you solve most of the isolation problems
 
It looks like the answer is it's down to the area of the city or country and what your needs/ likes are; horses for courses and all that. A good location in the countryside or a town is better than a bad location in a city and vice versa.
 
I love where we live but sometimes I think life would be a little easier if there was even an established public transport system into the local towns. I know when we built our house someone I know commented to me that he had lived nearby a decade before but ended up selling and moving into a local town because he and his wife were constantly on the road ferrying their children to one thing after another.

Actually the local community spirit is great and they do try to organise lots of events- but even at that these are sporadic in nature. I know I grew up on a farm and spent my entire time outdoors, a complete tomboy. I was a very immature and naive teenager and until I was 16 thought boys were yeuchy- well I do have four brothers- who could blame me?. Now I can't recreate that for my children because even living in the country side they are exposed to much more in day to day living nowadays than I ever was. God almighty- Bratz dolls? Please tell me that other people agree these are just hideous things! But still I look at my nieces in Dublin and they are just great girls, a little more sophisticated than I was at that age, but still great, intelligent and they have many opportunities that I think my children won't have in terms of actual hobbies and clubs. So I do wonder.

By the way, as a complete aside, do children learn a third language in primary school these days or is that still normally only in secondary school?
 

I hate Bratz dolls as well and the whole push to sexualise pre-pubescent girls (clothes, toys, media etc). It disturbs me greatly. I don’t know what I’m going to do when my daughter (now 4) is 8 or 9.

As for hobbies, I don’t think that’s such a big issue. Many people take up sports and hobbies in college. What would concern me is that as your children grow up it is unlikely that they will live near you and may effectively move out at 18 or 19. I don’t know if I’d like that. You may find yourself spending weekends in Dublin/ Cork/ Galway etc or even London etc.
 
Purple said:
IYou may find yourself spending weekends in Dublin/ Cork/ Galway etc or even London etc.
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Hmmm, this doesn't sound like too much of a hardship! Seriously though, I hadn't thought that far ahead. I suppose it was pretty much taken for granted in my family that once you were 17/18 you were going to college and moving out of home. My parents were extremely strict with all of us but once we went to college that was it. From then on we were expected to behave like responsible adults. Mind you, we were always so broke we couldnt get up to too much mischief anyway.

Anyway, even if we lived in Dublin, what are the chances our children would end up in Dublin? They could just as easily study and work anywhere else in Ireland or abroad.
 
Vanilla said:
Anyway, even if we lived in Dublin, what are the chances our children would end up in Dublin? They could just as easily study and work anywhere else in Ireland or abroad.
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Better than them living in rural Kerry...
 
Ho ho. Point taken.

Still think that to really get into certain hobbies or sports you have to start young though.
 
Vanilla said:
Still think that to really get into certain hobbies or sports you have to start young though.
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If the hobbies are not washing, smoking weed and thinking your parents are assholes then I find they are nost commonly taken up in college. But I suppose that in general I agree with you.
 
I think the provincial towns are catching up in terms of the range of facilities available, if not the choice.

Cultural pursuits are different, though. There are a lot of options in Dublin if you care to exploit them. As someone who's lived all his life in Dublin, however, I can say that this doesn't happen as often as intended. Things tend to get put on the long finger. Sometimes I feel if I lived out of the city, I'd make a greater effort to get the most from my vistis to the big smoke.
 
yup, it's true - many of my kids friends couldn't come over for play dates because they had so many extra curricular activities. As both parents were often working, it was the childminder who got the lunch made, homework done and then the ferrying..... Everyday something different: drama, soccer, art, Irish dancing, piano.....Poor little beggers never got a chance to laze around.
 
I grew up in Dublin but had a number of country cousins (in Carlow which of course is now commutable). The only observation I'd make is that my country cousins seemed to be 'braver' - all of them travelled a lot whilst at college and worked abroad, at a time when it wasn't the norm to do so (late 80s/early 90s). One of them thinks it's because they had no fear of the world, simply because they didn't know about it. Whereas in the city being told to mind this, mind that, not being let out after dark to play etc. made city children more fearful and less likely to take risks. Certainly seems to make sense to me as I sit here in my city centre Dublin job, and travel home to my home located 1.2 miles away from where I was born and went to school. This particular part of introspection was caused by viewing some of my classmates on one of those reunion websites and realising they all seem to live somewhere hot, wealthy, and lead glamorous lives!
 
I think kids lives are so much different today, in comparison to what they would have been like 15/20 years ago.
Nowadays both parents are usually working so there isn't always someone around the house to keep an eye on them. Because of the fear factors (car accidents, abductions, etc), kids are now usually driven everywhere. It is now unusual to see kids cycling around the place, particularly in the country.
When I grew up in the country I walked or cycled to school unles it was pouring rain. Nowadays the school playfield is alass no longer the place we played football and ran around. It has been decimated to make way for parking so mummy or daddy can drop off their precious little ones.
I heard recently that kids are not allowed to run or cycle in schoool grounds lest they fall and their parents bring in their favourite lawyer.
In my opinion we may have gained a lot over the last 20 years but we have also lost a lot in the process. And no I am not saying go back to the days when priests ruled the roost and we had a narrow minded opinion of everything.
 
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