Hi Readers! Here’s a nice story: Turns out an Iraqi war vet who made his sons (age 9 and 11) a tree house does not have to tear it down! How do you like that? Well, actually, he DOES have to tear it down in five years…but at least it has a half-decade reprieve, which is apparently the most we can hope for in this day and age. The sweet little structure violates some obscure zoning law and a neighbor (gotta love ’em!) complained. Anyway, you can read the story here. – L.
Author: lskenazy
Hi Readers! Here’s my Wall Street Journal column from last year, slightly edited, about today’s holiday. Boo! — L STRANGER-DANGER AND THE DECLINE OF HALLOWEEN, by Me! Halloween is the day when America market-tests parental paranoia. If a new fear flies on Halloween, it’s probably going to catch on the rest of the year, too. Take “stranger danger,” the classic Halloween horror. Even when I was a kid, back in the “Bewitched” era, parents were already worried about neighbors poisoning candy. Sure, the folks down the street might smile and wave the rest of the year, but apparently they were…
Hi Readers — It occurs to me that maybe the best way to fight Halloween paranoia is with cookies. Start with the fact that there has NEVER been a case of children poisoned by a stranger’s candy on Halloween. That’s according to University of Delaware sociologist Joel Best, who has studied the urban myth since 1985. Nonetheless, the advice we ALWAYS hear is to “check your child’s candy for tampering,” and treat homemade goodies like radioactive waste. All of which is based on the belief that we are quite likely surrounded by psychopathic child killers (who hold it in till…
Hi Readers! Sometimes I think that in our uber-safe society, poor scribes are locked in a room and told they can’t come out until they dream up some new worry — no matter how far-fetched — to caution folks about. (My current fave is the U.S. Food & Drug Administration’s apple bobbing cautions, below.) That’s why I love this column from Spiked-Online, a great, British site filled with all sorts of surprising info and opinions. It’s by Nathalie Rothschild, a freelance writer based in New York. Visit her personal website here, and find her on Twitter @n_rothschild. THE HORRORS OF…
Hi Readers! I am on board with this (even though I am guilty of some of the “don’ts” myself!). The list-maker, Darreby Ambler, is a writer and mother of 3 from Bath, Maine. – L. . Dear Free-Range Kids: Thought you might like this old list I found in a drawer yesterday. When I read the first sentence, I thought immediately of Free-Range! These were the travel rules we used with our kids when they were smaller. They are now 15, 19, and 21, and travel independently and joyfully around the world. (You can tell from the rules that…
Hi Readers! Trick or treat or track? Those are the three Halloween options this year, according to this piece in the Orlando Sentinel, thanks to an app that allows parents to track their kids as they go trick or treating (or as they go anywhere, any day. It’s not like the app only works on Oct. 31.) According to Trick or Tracker’s website, the app “enables responsible parents to know the exact whereabouts of their trick-or-treating kids…” So I guess it’s only IRRESPONSIBLE parents who allow their kids to go around the neighborhood without the equivalent of an electronic parole…
Readers, readers — I can’t stand how stupid our culture is some times! Like…right now! At this school! This story came in as a comment to the previous post. — L. Dear Free-Range Kids: We just recently had a similar situation at my kids’ elementary school. Last week, a first grader fell and hit his head in the cafeteria. The extent of the injury in not clear, but all reports are that the injury may have included some blood, but no serious injury requiring serious medical intervention. The kid basically fell off his stool backwards and bumped his…
Hi Readers — Just got this note from David Robert Hogg, who blogs about traveling the world with kids at MyLittleNomads.com. Talk about making a mountain out of a molehill! — L . Dear Free- Range Kids: I live in Seattle. Home to hikers, snowboarders, world travelers. It seemed like everyone I know was giving their kids the freedom to explore pretty much how we did as kids. OK, maybe not quite, but close enough not to land us on the Outrage of the Week. . Then I got our weekly email from my boys’ school. They are taping off…
Readers — Here’s the wildest “safety” story of the day: A middle school kid has been told he can’t take his sax on the school bus, because it is a safety hazard. Apparently the bus is already crowded, but somehow the sax makes it TOO crowded to ride safely, even though it fits under the seat. The company refunded the boy’s bus fare so his parents can simply drive him and his infernal instrument to school, but as his mom notes: “They are making it difficult because I work. I work full time. Do I have to quit my job…
Hi Readers! This is just a beyond-belief great playground idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqi1KyJJeKg As simple as it gets. As fun as it gets. And (if we must justify the idea of kids doing things on their own) as developmentally rich as it gets. Watch it and weep — with joy for the kids with this kind of recess, with sadness for those who never get to do anything this free-form with THEIR friends. As the narators on the video say, “Children who are happier and engaged in play have a better experience in school.” This kind of “mixed-age, mixed gender” creative fun…