In the 1980s my son and his friends played outside unsupervised for hours. I didn't realize at the time that this privilege would disappear. I think you can still get away with it in our neighborhood, because it is a rural dead-end street where everybody knows each other. I still see kids playing outside, mostly in a pasture with goats and pigs and chickens, when nobody else is around. Their mother told me that hanging out with animals after school helps them unwind.
Sometimes kids walk to other kids' houses in our neighborhood too, without supervision. It is perfectly safe because there is almost no traffic. Again, I didn't realize until I read this essay that this normal privilege of childhood was in danger of disappearing.
Playing with animals and in the dirt is very important to develop immunities and avoid allergies. Not incidentally playing with peers is very important in developing executive function. The Scandinavians have more time in the playground than here. AND they do better academically.
In the Netherlands, we are privileged in this respect. When I look out of my window in summer, I see plenty of kids out on the street playing without adult supervision. This is regarded as normal or even desirable. It is very common to see children as young as 8 cycling alone to an activity like violin classes or soccer or hockey, and of course, most children cycle to school. Of course, traffic in Holland is pretty safe. In the 70's the number of children killed in traffic was so high that a popular movement arose, called "Stop de kindermoord" ( Stop the children's murder) and since then the traffic infrastructure has seen a complete overhaul, making traveling also safe for the most vulnerable road users like children, pedestrians and cyclists.
38% of all children have a CPS visit at some point? Is there really nothing better for these people to do?
In a related problem, I am often upset with Safe Harbor programs in most states that are in place to reduce human and child trafficking. This is generally a good thing! But these programs will talk as if, and make communities feel as though, there are huge risks of young child being snatched off the street to become a trapped worker or sex worker. I'm sure there are extremely rare cases of this. Instead, often an older teen, 16+, connects with a predator online, who then meets up with them and then controls their life. Its awful and things should be done to stop it, but the real danger comes from neglected children that are idle inside the house, not children busily playing outside in known neighborhoods.
By the time I was in the third grade (that's at ~ 9) My mother would give me money and on my bike I'd do the shopping. My guess is about 10 blocks away. Later, I got lost on my bike and stopped at the guard house for Moffett Field. I asked for direction back to down town Palo Alto. Quick, a policeman showed up, put the bike in the trunk, and drove me home. I was disappointed, as I wanted to bike home. Since we moved to Santa Barbara in the middle of my fifth grade it had to be at eleven or earlier. Mom gave him a box of chocolates.
So things have changed since the forties. How many urbanites have the experience of saddling their assigned horse, milking cows, feeding pigs, and adding oil and water to the engines driving the electric generators at a ranch school? My eighth grade.
I forgot to add: after a few months, and we had showed sufficient maturity, we became PPP (permission privileged persons). We'd saddle up, and explore the red woods after last class and signing out. Back by dinner.
A few years ago, when my kids were 7 and 9, they came home from a walk to tell me that a neighbor told them they shouldn't be out alone and that they needed to go home. We moved here when my older child was 4 months old, and my younger daughter was born in this house. As they got older, they had larger areas of independence in our neighborhood. This neighbor lives 1.5 blocks down our street, which is only two blocks long. I had them bring me to the house, knocked on the door, introduced myself and my kids, thanked her for her concern, and told her they were allowed to be anywhere on our street alone. She seemed surprised, but it never happened again.
Another time, my younger child was 3 or 4 and playing in our front yard. We have three windows next to each other facing the front, and my front door was open. I saw a van stop in the street (because I can see the whole yard from my living room and kitchen), so I immediately went out. An older woman came up my walk and was nearly frantic telling me that my kid was alone outside. I assured her that I knew exactly where she was and that she was allowed to be there. That woman did not seem happy at all about it and left, scowling at me on the way to her van.
We live in a small neighborhood in Charlotte and can easily walk to the library, park, grocery store, post office, coffee shops, etc. We're a homeschooling family (SDE), and this semester they will have neighborhood quests as assignments. My teen suggested a banned book hunt at the library, which I love.
I find it very surprising that even the elderly (the woman from your example) are now completely behind these unwritten policies that children shouldn't be outside alone. They don't seem to remember their own childhood at all, in a time where all the kids played outside all the time.
Finally finished readig -- so the 1980s is that when Janet Reno led the fear of child abuse? I think she did great harm. Fortunately, many of the abuse cases were eventually overturned. But the people killed in Waco will never return.
In the 1980s my son and his friends played outside unsupervised for hours. I didn't realize at the time that this privilege would disappear. I think you can still get away with it in our neighborhood, because it is a rural dead-end street where everybody knows each other. I still see kids playing outside, mostly in a pasture with goats and pigs and chickens, when nobody else is around. Their mother told me that hanging out with animals after school helps them unwind.
Sometimes kids walk to other kids' houses in our neighborhood too, without supervision. It is perfectly safe because there is almost no traffic. Again, I didn't realize until I read this essay that this normal privilege of childhood was in danger of disappearing.
Playing with animals and in the dirt is very important to develop immunities and avoid allergies. Not incidentally playing with peers is very important in developing executive function. The Scandinavians have more time in the playground than here. AND they do better academically.
It's not a mere privilege, it's a right that every free human being has, that is stepped upon by increasingly coercive "authorities".
In the Netherlands, we are privileged in this respect. When I look out of my window in summer, I see plenty of kids out on the street playing without adult supervision. This is regarded as normal or even desirable. It is very common to see children as young as 8 cycling alone to an activity like violin classes or soccer or hockey, and of course, most children cycle to school. Of course, traffic in Holland is pretty safe. In the 70's the number of children killed in traffic was so high that a popular movement arose, called "Stop de kindermoord" ( Stop the children's murder) and since then the traffic infrastructure has seen a complete overhaul, making traveling also safe for the most vulnerable road users like children, pedestrians and cyclists.
38% of all children have a CPS visit at some point? Is there really nothing better for these people to do?
In a related problem, I am often upset with Safe Harbor programs in most states that are in place to reduce human and child trafficking. This is generally a good thing! But these programs will talk as if, and make communities feel as though, there are huge risks of young child being snatched off the street to become a trapped worker or sex worker. I'm sure there are extremely rare cases of this. Instead, often an older teen, 16+, connects with a predator online, who then meets up with them and then controls their life. Its awful and things should be done to stop it, but the real danger comes from neglected children that are idle inside the house, not children busily playing outside in known neighborhoods.
By the time I was in the third grade (that's at ~ 9) My mother would give me money and on my bike I'd do the shopping. My guess is about 10 blocks away. Later, I got lost on my bike and stopped at the guard house for Moffett Field. I asked for direction back to down town Palo Alto. Quick, a policeman showed up, put the bike in the trunk, and drove me home. I was disappointed, as I wanted to bike home. Since we moved to Santa Barbara in the middle of my fifth grade it had to be at eleven or earlier. Mom gave him a box of chocolates.
So things have changed since the forties. How many urbanites have the experience of saddling their assigned horse, milking cows, feeding pigs, and adding oil and water to the engines driving the electric generators at a ranch school? My eighth grade.
I forgot to add: after a few months, and we had showed sufficient maturity, we became PPP (permission privileged persons). We'd saddle up, and explore the red woods after last class and signing out. Back by dinner.
A few years ago, when my kids were 7 and 9, they came home from a walk to tell me that a neighbor told them they shouldn't be out alone and that they needed to go home. We moved here when my older child was 4 months old, and my younger daughter was born in this house. As they got older, they had larger areas of independence in our neighborhood. This neighbor lives 1.5 blocks down our street, which is only two blocks long. I had them bring me to the house, knocked on the door, introduced myself and my kids, thanked her for her concern, and told her they were allowed to be anywhere on our street alone. She seemed surprised, but it never happened again.
Another time, my younger child was 3 or 4 and playing in our front yard. We have three windows next to each other facing the front, and my front door was open. I saw a van stop in the street (because I can see the whole yard from my living room and kitchen), so I immediately went out. An older woman came up my walk and was nearly frantic telling me that my kid was alone outside. I assured her that I knew exactly where she was and that she was allowed to be there. That woman did not seem happy at all about it and left, scowling at me on the way to her van.
We live in a small neighborhood in Charlotte and can easily walk to the library, park, grocery store, post office, coffee shops, etc. We're a homeschooling family (SDE), and this semester they will have neighborhood quests as assignments. My teen suggested a banned book hunt at the library, which I love.
I find it very surprising that even the elderly (the woman from your example) are now completely behind these unwritten policies that children shouldn't be outside alone. They don't seem to remember their own childhood at all, in a time where all the kids played outside all the time.
Banned book hunt, I love it.
Finally finished readig -- so the 1980s is that when Janet Reno led the fear of child abuse? I think she did great harm. Fortunately, many of the abuse cases were eventually overturned. But the people killed in Waco will never return.