Readers, at some point I will stop posting what I have started calling Zero Tolerunce (so it rhymes with dunce!) incidents. But I couldn’t resist this one, as a Sunday evening sheesh: Last week a kindergartener who showed his cowboy-type cap gun to his friend on the school bus was hauled off to the principal’s office and interrogated for SO LONG (2+ hours), that he ended up peeing in his pants. Or so says The Daily Caller. As for the 10 day sentence…er…detention he received? He’s just lucky there were no caps in the gun, said the principal, or it…
Author: lskenazy
Folks — Got this note today and had to share, so it’s not just ME going, “I am so sick of people amping up fear so as to tamp it down with some product or program!” While I haven’t seen or heard of this program, the way the writer describes it, it sounds excessive. — L. Dear Free-Range Kids: Are you familiar with the program radKIDS? It is a safety course for children that is extremely popular with the local moms where I live. I have not sent my children, but I have had the opportunity to eavesdrop on…
Readers — I was just responding to a woman who bravely lets her kids play outside even though she is almost consumed by horrible thoughts of the Cleveland kidnappings. For her, it’s personal: She used to live near there. But others feel it, too. So what I’m wondering about, that maybe some psychologists can explain, is this: Is this utter despair and empathy with victims new? I mean, I know we have always felt sympathy for crime victims. And certainly my mom must have heard about kidnappings and child crimes. But I don’t think parents of her era felt as…
Thanks very much to the commenter Gary who just sent this video in! (And if anyone can figure out the embed code, so I could put the clip here, instead of the link — please send it along!) – L.
Readers — Yesterday, on Google plus, I put a link to my post about the 7th graders who weren’t sure whether to help an 84-year-old who asked them to bring her a package from her driveway. I said that when we teach kids across-the-board “stranger danger” we aren’t making them safer. We’re stunting any kind of common sense and street smarts we’d like them to develop, by making them scared of absolutely everyone. Here’s the one response that got me shaking: Lenore: I usually agree with you. Unfortunately, this time, you’re dead wrong. The boys should’ve gotten a well known…
Folks — The Manifesto Club in Britain is just a brilliant group dedicated to many of the same issues as Free-Range Kids. Among them: The way that pedophile panic is making us distrust absolutely every adult around a child. The latest example? This: An Australian primary school has banned parents from taking photos of their kids’ swimming gala. The headteacher justified the move thus: “We want parents to be able to have a record of the children’s events and be part of that, but it’s about protecting our children. (Swimming) is part of their curriculum and they should be able…
Hi Folks! Here’s a bit of advice actual “safety experts” are giving kids — and parents. But first, the backstory. This New York Times guest parenting blogger wrote that her 7th grader came home one day and announced he “didn’t do it.” Didn’t do what? He and his friend were walking home from school (points for that!) when — Their commute home this February day was interrupted when a short, white-haired woman standing in her doorway called out to the boys and asked them to move a medium-size package from her front step into her house. On the sidewalk, the…
Readers — It’s Memorial Day in the States, the “unofficial beginning of summer.” Seeing this 2-min video of childhood from Britain in the ’50s, I feel tears going up my nose. How many kids would LOVE going outside and finding a field of friends to play with? And how few do, anymore? Free-Range Kids is dedicated to getting more kids outside, playing. It’s as noble a goal as making sure all kids get enough to eat. – L. *Besides the snow, I mean. Played in Britain from BBC Motion Gallery on Vimeo.
Hi Readers — I give you today’s “Ask Amy” column titled, “Kids, Like Chicken, Should Be Free-Range.” THANK YOU, AMY! Read her sage advice and then take the Free-Range Kids Challenge of the Weekend: Dear Amy:My wife and I think it might be a good idea to let our 10-year-old son explore the city in which we live. What do you think of this? Is it even legal? If it is, how far can he stray? — Daring Dad Dear Dad:It depends on where you live. When you ask how far your son can stray, the answer is, he can…
Readers — This is a letter I got from Chris Byrne, who is always deep and wise about childhood. He was responding to the post about a new, less “scary” rhyme kids have picked up from My Little Pony. Instead of the age-old “Cross my heart and hope to die/Stick a needle in my eye,” they’ve learned, “Cross my heart and hope to fly/Stick a cupcake in my eye.” – L. Dear Free-Range Kids: Like so many things (“Ring Around the Rosie” being related to the Black Death), these were the ways children played with fear. “Cross My Heart…”…