Age groups being allowed to mix in kids clubs?

I have three children (will be 10, 8, and 5) when we cruise. They are all pretty close and like to have the opportunity to play together, even when involved in kid club type activities. On which cruise lines are the different age groups kept separate from one another? I know that based on their personalities that not having the option to be able to play together will cut down on their enjoyment. This will be our first family cruise and I want everyone to love it as much as possible!

I think all of the cruiselines have age separations in the clubs. Most folks wouldn't want their younger kids paired with much older kids.....that's just trouble brewing! They will have ample opportunity to be together....they won't be in the club 24/7! The 8 and 10 year old might be in the same group on some ships, but there's little chance the 5 year old will be with the 10 year old on any ship.

On our Carnival Dream sailing last week, the 6-8 and 9-11 got together frequently. The 2-5 were always in their own room.

Generally all the younger kids (under 11) will sign in to the same youth program. Once inside, they will be with counselors in their age group. Some of the activities- like the scavenger hunt will be done as a large group. At other times the kids will be in with their age group.

The youth program should be fun for your kids. If they go the first day and then say they don't want to go again- I'd be surprised. Even if they aren't all in the same group they will have fun.

The first day the youth program will be open and the kids can go and meet the counselors and see the space. This is when parents sign them up. It's a little meet and greet and the parents are allowed to stay with the kids. I think it gently guides them into the program.

I was a very shy child and did not want to be in any group activities ever. I wanted to be with my Mom. My older son was the same way and wouldn't go to the activities. Thankfully my younger son would go gladly from the time he was three. He absolutely loved it! Every child is different.

Are there any families on CC where the kids can't stand each other and look forward to no interaction with each other on the ship??:)

It also depends on how many kids are on your sailing whether the groups get combined or not. Sometimes they will allow an older child to go down a level to be with a sibling.

Are there any families on CC where the kids can't stand each other and look forward to no interaction with each other on the ship??:)

We did a cruise a couple years ago and the parents insisted that this three year old kid stay with his 10 year old brother. There weren't many kids on the cruise and so the counselors complied. Well the 10 year old enjoyed playing videogames with my son who was 10 and this three year old was jealous that his brother was playing with my son and was a little terror. I think the mother knew the three year old was a handful and wanted the brother to make sure he behaved. This definitely made it not fun for the older boy and i don't think parents should saddle a sibling with a younger child.

Disney is the only cruise line that does not keep those age groups separated. On all the other cruise lines, the 5 year old would be in a different age group than the older siblings. On RCCL, all 3 would be in different age groups. As has been mentioned, when there are not too many kids, they will combine the age groups at times. I have seen this mainly on HAL and Princess.

Seriously? Your 10 year old wants to spend a week finger painting with his 5 year old brother?

Also, please keep in mind that it's not all about you and your family.

Other parents are expecting the age groupings to work in a certain way and may not be thrilled to find a child 5 years older/younger is with their children.

I personally have a kid in the under 5 group and would have a problem if I walked in a saw him in a room full of 10 year olds.

How about just plan some family events together and let the kids know they get the opportunity to meet new friends while they are at Camp? It's like school, they split the kids up for a reason. ;)

We are recently back from an RCI cruise which we all loved as a family. However the kids clubs were a bit of a disaster for us. Our oldest (15) stuck her head round the door of the teen club for 2 seconds and declared she wouldn't be going and would do her own thing for the whole 14 days when onboard, our youngest (10) went to one session and begged not to be sent again although he met other kids and made friends, I was hopeful they would use the clubs but I was not surprised at all at their reactions to them and we didn't push it with them, we wanted them to have a good time and they did.

NCL will not allow children to attend any group except their own age range, the only exception is their "freestyle" play timed which are listed in the dailies. I've seen the 6-9 and 10-12 groups mixed together, but that was on no cruise with relatively few children. I've also seen the freestyle play cancelled due to too many children being in the program.

Ita with previous comments that the age ranges are there so that all children can enjoy their experience. I didn't like the DCL approach of all kids 3-12 together, as there is a big difference between a 3 yo and 12 yo :)

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We were 12 nights on NCL Spirit and they combined the age groups. My oldest dd was a little disappointed as this meant she was "stuck" with her younger sister. I believe the ship had 35 kids onboard, mostly toddlers. It was a mid December cruise, and the crew commented that on the next cruise(over Xmas) they were expecting over 900!!! What a difference.

Royal Caribbean's age groups are 3-5, 6-8, 9-11, and above that is a tween/teen program. In my experience, they are sometimes a little flexible about allowing kids to stay in a younger age group; my older daughter was allowed to stay with the 3-5s when she was 6, so that her 4yo brother wouldn't be alone. I don't know if they would do the opposite--let a 5yo go into the 6-8 group to be with an older sibling. And I would guess they wouldn't be so amenable to, say, having a 10-year-old in the 3-5 group.

This time around, our oldest will be on her own in the 6-8 group (she confesses to having been a tad bored in the 3-5 group last time), and our younger two, at 3 and 5, will be together in the 3-5 group. DS turns 6 two weeks after the cruise and they'd probably allow him in 6-8, but he's said he wants to stick with his little sister as this will be her first time in Adventure Ocean. (She was in the nursery on our previous cruises.)

According to what I have been told onboard, the older children are permitted to go down in age but the reverse is not true. The younger children are not permitted to go up in age- that means if you are 5 when you step over the threshold- you are considered 5 for the whole cruise.

If there are very few children in a certain group they may combine two age groups but this is not the norm.

We did a cruise a couple years ago and the parents insisted that this three year old kid stay with his 10 year old brother. There weren't many kids on the cruise and so the counselors complied. Well the 10 year old enjoyed playing videogames with my son who was 10 and this three year old was jealous that his brother was playing with my son and was a little terror. I think the mother knew the three year old was a handful and wanted the brother to make sure he behaved. This definitely made it not fun for the older boy and i don't think parents should saddle a sibling with a younger child.

Seriously? Your 10 year old wants to spend a week finger painting with his 5 year old brother?

 

Also, please keep in mind that it's not all about you and your family.

Other parents are expecting the age groupings to work in a certain way and may not be thrilled to find a child 5 years older/younger is with their children.

I personally have a kid in the under 5 group and would have a problem if I walked in a saw him in a room full of 10 year olds.

 

How about just plan some family events together and let the kids know they get the opportunity to meet new friends while they are at Camp? It's like school, they split the kids up for a reason. ;)

I think these are important points being made.

Don't know when the OP is considering going on a cruise, but if it's while most schools are in session, there will tend to be less kids on board (not including homeschooled kids). With few kids booked, there may be more regrouping of kids so that less staff needs to be hired.

Here's some things to thinks about:

1) insurance liability for the cruise line. If smaller kids are with the older kids, there's more chance for problems. And the head of the kids' program has to consider this.

2) staffing will be based on how many kids are booked (there's probably a percentage that is predicted to go to the kids' area). We've been on holiday cruises in which teachers have signed on for that cruise only to make a little extra money. Many on the staff aren't going to be full timers all year around. If a great number of kids are allowed to switch their groups from day to day, then it throws the staffing into disarray.

3) Being strict on the age groups (and don't forget the cruise line will verify your kids' date of births before they're allowed to get on the ship) will take care of one situation: parents insisting that their little darling is "mature" for his age. And many of us who are teachers or have helped at their kids' schools know that often these parents are the most wrong about their kids' emotional age.

4) In reality, parents may feel that their kids need to be together, but most likely the older sibling is seething inside about being stuck with little bro or sis on their vacation. And even worse (as noted above), the other kids in the older group don't want little Billy, who they don't even know, to be hanging out with them, either.

5) And really, we're talking about school-aged kid (the 5 year old is already in preschool or kinder or about to start school), and they're going to separated there unless you live in a small town with an one-room schoolhouse.

6) As a family, you're going to be spending plenty of time together: when the kids' rooms are closed, at meals, maybe checking out any family entertainment shows (we started taking our little one to the big production shows from her first show on -- we did take her to Blues Clues Live the month before her first cruise, and at 15 on her last cruise, she wanted to go to the Motor City show with us on the Golden Princess).

To the OP, you can go on the various cruise line websites and read up on their children's program. Often sample activities are listed. Also read up on whatever facilities they have (some ships have rock climbing walls, pools with water slides, etc) besides the kids' rooms. When you go on board, hopefully there's info about the program in your cabin (Princess will give you a packet with day-by-day activities for each group -- Pelicans, Shockwaves, Remix -- that cover your kids' ages. Plan to take them to the orientation meeting the first night so they can meet the other kids and you can meet the staff.

Go over the activities schedule with each kid -- maybe they want to make sure they're there for the tee-shirt design activity, but not interested in the "Olympics" games (often alternative activities are available). They're not required to be there at the start of the time period or stay the whole time. They might even skip a day and hang out in the pool area.

OP here...

Wow, for my first post in these forums I consider some of your responses to be quite a welcome. I am not asking for cruise lines to bend the rules, I was just curious if some did mix the groups. When we go places where there are many ages mixed, my kids always choose to play together first. Yes, they are not in the same school and will make new friends but they find a very strong sense of comfort being able to do things together. Thank you to the previous poster who mentioned a Disney cruise. That was helpful information. Telling me that my shouldn't want to be together is not.

We've cruised for over ten years with our dd's. I've been on the boards for several years and have met some great people at the meet and greets. I respect everyone's opinion, although I don't always agree with them. Our world is so different today, as I'm sure you know. Kids are forced to grow up too soon and are robbed of so much of their childhood. I think it's wonderful that your kids choose to play with one another, that's how it should be. I suggested a longer cruise, as there will be less kids and they do combine groups. Have a great trip and welcome to the crazy but wonderful boards.

All cruises are family cruises and your kids will have fun. If they like to play together that's perfect because then you aren't dependent on the youth program- they will make their own fun. I have two sisters and I never went to the youth program as a kid. We hung out together so I totally get it. Our ages were 6, 10 and 14 and somehow we could always find something to do together.

Having said that, I'm sure there will be times that they enjoy the youth program even if they aren't in the same groupings and it is so important to go there from day one because then the kids get to know one another.

One year on Celebrity there was one 9 year old girl at my dining room table. She was traveling with her 18 year old sister and parents. My son was six at the time. He was loving the youth program and the 9 year hadn't tried it until my son convinced her to go (it was about day 4 of the cruise by then). Well she LOVED it and I'd see her with her group of kids and the counselor throughout the ship and this kid was excuberant! So they just need a nudge. I know because I was so shy as a kid.

OP here...

 

Wow, for my first post in these forums I consider some of your responses to be quite a welcome. I am not asking for cruise lines to bend the rules, I was just curious if some did mix the groups. When we go places where there are many ages mixed, my kids always choose to play together first. Yes, they are not in the same school and will make new friends but they find a very strong sense of comfort being able to do things together. Thank you to the previous poster who mentioned a Disney cruise. That was helpful information. Telling me that my shouldn't want to be together is not.

Please realize that not everyone's comments are necessarily in response to your OP.

While some posters are trying to read the "real intentions" behind your post and respond based upon their assumptions, others are speaking from experience and may just be urging you to make certain that you fully understand the consequences of what you are asking.

On Disney, for example, the groups mixed freely. That may meet your need to have the kids be able to play together, but also means that a 3YO and an 11YO may be included in the same game that your 5YO and 10YO are involved. Your 10YO may get frustrated having to deal with the younger participants who are not his/her sibling. Similarly your 5YO may get get in over his head in something with a group of older kids. The lack of structure in age grouping may translate into a general lack of structure - so things may get a bit chaotic.

Kind of a "be careful what your ask for, so you might just get it!"

While I understand the rules are rules, I am pretty bummed my daughters (best buddies) ages five (one month away from six) and seven will be separated in the youth program on NCL's Epic. The younger one is mature for her age and is used to playing with 7 year olds. So placing her with the preschool age of 3-5 may be boring for her. I wish there was a way around this as they love to hang out together, but I contacted the cruise line and it seems there are no exceptions. Hopefully they will have a great time anyway.

Disney was great in that they got to stay and play together. I think that helped their comfort level for sure. But I agree with some PP's that ages 3-12 placed together is a bit much.

When they are expecting lots of kids- they have to separate them into age appropriate groups. You would be very upset if a rambunctious eight year old landed on your five year old. The youth program has free play time with climbing frames and the like and it would be easy for a large child to injure one of the smaller ones.

They have to keep to the rules otherwise they would be negotiating with so many parents that it would be come chaotic.

While I understand the rules are rules, I am pretty bummed my daughters (best buddies) ages five (one month away from six) and seven will be separated in the youth program on NCL's Epic. The younger one is mature for her age and is used to playing with 7 year olds. So placing her with the preschool age of 3-5 may be boring for her. I wish there was a way around this as they love to hang out together, but I contacted the cruise line and it seems there are no exceptions. Hopefully they will have a great time anyway.

 

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There will most likely be other mature 5 year olds for her to play with. As others may have mentioned, the older kids aren't going to want a 5 year old in their group, no matter how mature she is. I've always found a little space is good for my kids on vacation.

Best,

Mia

We have only sailed Disney with our kids, so this is an issue we will be face with on RC this summer. My kids (4 and 5 at sailing) will be together, but my daughter (5) and my niece (8) will be separated. We live in different states, so family vacations is the time when the girls get to be together. And they LOVE to play together! I imagine we won't be using the kids clubs as often as we did on Disney. :(