To start off the New Year right, here’s a happy, simple tale of a mom, a spunky 6-year-old, and a life — two lives! — enhanced by the power of trust. In this case, that involved trusting a girl to do something on her own for the first time — a challenge I’d urge us all to do many times this year: Try something new and brave! Send me stories (Lenore@LetGrow.org) and Happy New Year! — L.
Author: lskenazy
FIRST, A PLEA: IF YOU LOVED YOUR OWN “FREE-RANGE” CHILDHOOD AND WANT THAT FREEDOM GIVEN TO THE NEXT GENERATION, PLEASE DONATE TO LET GROW BY CLICKING HERE! And now: Head over to Let Grow to read the whole list of parenting moments — good and awful. But let me just state my favorite one here, as it seems to encompass everything that is crazy in our culture: A Beaverton, Oregon, man screamed at a lady for leaving her kid in the car while she ran into the grocery for two items. She was not only irresponsible, she was hurting others…
As you will read over at Let Grow today, kids who are “just playing” are learning a ton. They even learn a lot from the part that drives you crazy — the bickering and the “That’s not fair!”s. Learning to be jerks? No — they’re learning to get along, believe it or not. This involves wheedling, conniving, compromising, asserting oneself, accepting defeat — all the things you probably had to do at work yesterday. (And possibly again the second you got home.) There is no substitute for the lessons kids get in play. But since there is also no substitute…
Growing up I always made my parents presents for the holidays — great things like egg carton candy dishes, and egg carton jewelry boxes, and sometimes even things NOT made out of egg cartons. Like mugs made from half-and-half cartons. No, really — I was better than that. Wish I’d saved some of these masterpieces. (Why didn’t my parents???) There were the coasters made of hardened glue. Statues sculpted from wetted, squished tissue paper. A mini baseball game in a box. A book holder made from a hanger. (That actually works, and you don’t need the pliers.) Giant balls made…
“Daddy, help.” Those were the words Rebecca Gomez’s toddler kept repeating when he couldn’t get the battery into his Buzz Lightyear. But daddy was distracted helping his other two kids — and this turned out to be a small blessing. Read the tiny, happy story over at Let Grow by clicking here!
I realize that headline wouldn’t have made sense in any generation till now. Of COURSE 9-year-olds roamed, and of COURSE they didn’t have phones. The fact that this is, indeed, Free-Range headline material shows just how normalized constant adult supervision — in person and via electronics — has become. So read this Alaska mom’s essay at Let Grow for a dose of what was once called “normal childhood” or “normal confidence” or just plain normal life, and enjoy the fact it is not out of reach, even in these anxious and overprotective times. The essayist is Nancy Fresco, author of…
Fourth grade teacher Kevin Stinehart, the 2020 teacher of the year in his South Carolina District, stumbled onto a surprising new way to fight bullying. As he explains in eSchoolNews: “A few years ago I had a student who walked around with a chip on his shoulder. He never smiled, never laughed, and always seemed angry. He was cruel to other kids, had frequent behavior issues in class, and in the course of one week had three office referrals from three different teachers for his extreme behaviors. Other kids would label him a bully, but where they saw a bully,…
Let your tots do what the Japanese kids do on the TV show “My First Errand,” and I’ll be visiting you at Sing Sing. Take a look at the video I posted at Let Grow. The kids look like they’re about 5 and 3, and off they go — to several different stores — to get the ingredients (that look spectacular) for dinner. There are tears and then — triumph! It’s not that American kids are so much less capable that kids in other countries, just that we act — or are encouraged to act — as if they are.…
How is it I had not heard of these before? Every year there are hundreds of Acton Children’s Business Fairs around the country — and world. They look like a farmer’s market — lots tables under pop-up tents — but instead of overpriced kale, there are kids selling everything from cooking classes to origami to weird stuffed animals. (Really weird — one kid chopped the heads off all her Beanie Babies and sewed them onto different Beanie bodies.) The kids learn how to make a budget and create something to sell, and then they learn how to get out…
Neil deGrasse Tyson sounds like the most Free-Range of fathers when he begs parents to let their kids stomp in puddles, try new things, and make a mess. His inspiring video is posted on Let Grow, so all you have to do is click here to watch 3 wonderful minutes of Tyson explaining, in the simplest of terms, how to raise a scientist. (Or at least a kid who makes a mess!)