This post originally appeared as a comment from Donald Christensen, an Australian dad interested in psychology and cognitive behavior therapy (CBT). He explains this subject through his OnMySoapBoxx blog with simple, clever analogies and pictures. I’ve learned so much from him! Here’s his take (punctuated the Aussie way) on why we’re hearing the word “safety” all the time: Safety is used for many things other than ‘Safe’. 1. Safety is used to say, “Do what I say now! End of discussion”. ‘Danger’ has become a trump card. ‘Danger’ can be substituted for, ‘Because I said so that’s why’! A toddler…
Author: lskenazy
The infantilization of our kids goes hand in hand with the time-wastification of us parents. Here’s an example from, of all people, the American Cancer Society. Those folks should understand better than anyone that life is short! Don’t waste it on red tape! http://relay.acsevents.org/site/DocServer/Chaperone_Agreement.pdf?docID=450597 Dear Free-Range Kids: My daughter is a capable, independent, and responsible 14 year-old. She babysits. She’s also empathetic and loves to volunteer. So when she volunteered for the Relay for Life for the American Cancer Society, I was pleased she was supporting a good cause. But I never imagined that for her to volunteer, it would…
Yes, yes, we must support our fellow parents as they grope — sorry, bad word choice! — their way through this whole child-rearing thing. I don’t recommend scolding them in public. But when a pop culture advice dispenser actually recommends worst-first thinking (dream up the worst-case scenario FIRST, no matter how unlikely, and proceed as if it’s likely to happen), we must register our dismay, as a reader did when she sent me this recent Dear Annie column: Dear Annie: I am a single mom with two boys, ages 4 and 7. We recently took a trip out to…
Anna kana kills it (and others) in this edgy little sketch about the way we sanctify over-protectiveness. Anna, we DO understand! We really do! . . .
This comment from CrazyCatLady made me wonder: Is this really happening? Parents are sitting through every practice, rain or shine or monsoon? Dear Free-Range Kids: When I was a kid, back in the ’70s and into the early ’80s, there were not a lot of “after school” activities. Latchkey kids were a thing. Sports after school was Kiwanis Baseball. My brothers did this. They rode their bikes to practice and back. They rode their bikes to the various games. Occasionally, my mother, father or step father would bring siblings to the games. We were all proud of them at the…
This is an article about an article about a book. The book is “Freudian Fraud: The Malignant Effect of Freud’s Theory on American Thought and Culture,” by the psychiatrist E. Fuller Torrey, published in 1992. The article, “Child-Proofing the World” is by Nick Gillespie, editor of Reason, whose interview with Peter Gray went up on this site on Monday. Their main point is one I make in my own book, too, in a chapter titled, “Relax! Not Every Little Thing Has That Much Impact on Your Child’s Development!” But it is precisely that fear that contributes so heavily to the…
This is an amazing new tool — simple, clear, interactive — from Outsideplay.ca (Canada) that helps parents see the importance of giving their kids free, unsupervised time AND make a concrete plan to bring that about! As the University of British Columbia’s Medical School press office explains: Developed by a team led by Marian Brussoni, an Associate Professor in the School of Population and Public Health (SPPH) and the Department of Pediatrics, Outsideplay.ca walks parents through their priorities for their child and common concerns about playing outdoors to help them develop an action plan for changing their approach to outdoor…
Here is an interview with my friend and hero, Dr. Peter Gray, author of the mind-opening book, Free to Learn. He is interviewed by another friend and hero of mine, Nick Gillespie, the editor in chief of Reason.com and Reason TV, which produced this piece. . Video edited by Mark McDaniel. Cameras by Todd Krainin and Jim Epstein. Music by Broke for Free. As Reason reports: “School has become an abnormal setting for children,” says Peter Gray, a professor of psychology at Boston College. “Instead of admitting that, we say the children are abnormal.” Gray….says that a cultural shift towards…
Since this pseudo-helpful video is making the rounds again, here’s my take on it, again: It may look like the creator of this video, Joey Salads, is doing something other than creating terror, angst and hate with his Stranger Danger “social experiment.” But he’s not. As you’ll see, Mr. Salads asks parents if they’ve taught their kids not to talk to strangers — a lesson I don’t endorse, since most strangers are good and you want kids to feel confident asking strangers for help, if they need it. “You can TALK to anyone, you cannot go OFF with anyone,” is…
At the Second Annual Southern Indiana Human Trafficking Awareness Conference at Indiana University Southeast, the keynote speaker told the audience: There are a few things that members of the public can look out for to spot a victim of sex trafficking…. Tracking chips are becoming more popular in sex trafficking victims, as well. They’re often found on victims’ hands between the forefinger and the thumb, as well as underneath their arms and on their necks. This tracking thing was something I hadn’t heard before, though years ago when I interviewed the head of Brickhouse Security, he told me that while…