Readers — I’m in Bulgaria, running on caffeine and excitement (and feta  cheese), but even so, I don’t think it’s my hopped up status that is making me feel dizzy after reading this article. I think it’s the parents of the kids in question. Here’s how WHAM13, an ABC channel, reports the incident: Clyde, N.Y. [...]

Filed under: Bad Laws, Rules and Verdicts, Crazy Parents, Miscellaneous | 35 Comments »

Hi Readers! Remember the horrifying 2011 case of a mom convicted of vehicular homicide after her son ran into the street and was hit by a drunk driver? (Who was NOT charged with homicide?)  She was facing a possible three years’ jail time. As I wrote at the time: In brief: An Atlanta mom and [...]

Filed under: Bad Laws, Rules and Verdicts, GOOD News, Miscellaneous, Walk to School / Stay Home Alone / Wait in Car | 46 Comments »

Hi Readers — This insightful note comes to us from reader/commenter Linda Wightman, who says she is “passionate about ‘small’ in the big things of life:  birth, education, parenting, homemaking, health, church, conservation, farming, business and more.  Except for families, where large is good:  seven Free-Range grandchildren and counting!” She blogs about all this and more [...]

Filed under: Miscellaneous, Worst-First Thinking | 11 Comments »

Hi Readers and greetings from Csopbanka, Hungary, a town of 3000 outside of Budapest, where I am staying with a friend I haven’t seen in  (ahem) a couple of decades: Erno Gyori, and his family. We met way on a train going from Paris to Istanbul – same route as the Orient Express – except [...]

Filed under: Miscellaneous | 39 Comments »

Hi (from Vienna!) readers: This ad is so sane, so Free-Range, it’s making me a little suspicious.Why is an insurance company reminding us about the importance of taking small risks? Is it to make us less lawsuit-happy when something bad happens? Or to get us to buy insurance? (“A car can crash…”) Or maybe Allstate’s [...]

Filed under: Insurance repercussions, Miscellaneous | 44 Comments »

Readers — This letter comes to us from a mom in Alberta, Canada, who is giving me a lot of hope. Change can be swift and, since it makes everyone happier, lasting. . Meantime, this intro  comes to you from Vienna, where I just flew in (arms tired, etc.) to give a talk tomorrow at [...]

Filed under: Creating Community, GOOD News, Miscellaneous | 31 Comments »

Readers — A school in Hayward, Ca is offering a “toy gun buyback” to its students, modeled on the buybacks of real guns at real police stations. While I don’t have a big opinion about the idea — on the one hand, sometimes people mistake toy guns for real ones, which is tragic; on the [...]

Filed under: Bad Laws, Rules and Verdicts, Miscellaneous, School and Zero Tolerance and Bullies, Worst-First Thinking | 100 Comments »

Readers – An area of Alexandria, VA, a suburb of D.C., is debating whether to allow a  hostel to open near, among other things, some day care centers. As the reader who sent us this news story wrote, “To hear some of the comments, you’d think they were planning to build a gun store/brothel/drug den!” Notes the article, [...]

Filed under: Bad Laws, Rules and Verdicts, Eek! A Male! (and Stranger Danger), Miscellaneous, Sex Offender Issues, Uber Safety, Worst-First Thinking | 47 Comments »

Just a reminder of what education can be. Happy weekend! L.   Kids Microadventure from Alastair Humphreys on Vimeo.

Filed under: Fun, GOOD News, Miscellaneous | 27 Comments »

Readers — Here’s what happens when we panic, whether about security or about bumbling the security: Dear Free-Range Kids: Something that happened this weekend made me think of you. My husband, our almost 3-year-old son and I have been going to the Indianapolis 500 since 2011, when the little one was only 9 months old. My [...]

Filed under: Bad Laws, Rules and Verdicts, Miscellaneous, Worst-First Thinking | 46 Comments »