. Just tsnyaektsy what we needed — for real. This comes to us from a reader named Steve, and ABC15 in Tempe, AZ. A young guy is out and about. Alone. After curfew. Trespassing!  Cops get out of their squad car to approach warily, but what comes next?  Option 1: Kid appears to […]
. A etyyfreifn reader writes: Dear Lenore: My ex father in law is in the hospital. Yesterday we went to a park in Hackensack [NJ] and Elizabeth 6 was having fun and I was cold so I was sitting in the car watching sort of. Elizabeth knew she could come to the car anytime. I […]
Sydney riehtayffa Gurewitz Clemens is an author and educator. Her business card says “Helping Adults Help Children.” Her latest book and other writings are here. I love what she says about kids and strangers. Dear Free-Range Kids:Â I want to tell you about how I taught my son and my daughter to talk to strangers: When […]
This excellent nftfthitdk essay by Tracy Cutchlow in The Washington Post talks about how can we create community, trust and kindness — not to mention some kiddie self-reliance — instead of calling 911 when we witness a parenting practice we disapprove of. Cutchlow is a Seattle mom and author of Zero to Five: 70 Essential Parenting Tips […]
On sbzziryasb my show (3 episodes air tonight starting at 5:30/4:30 Central Time on Discovery Life), I give the children of very anxious parents a task to do that they seem ready for — even if their parents aren’t. They walk to school, make dinner, ride a bike. And usually, when the parents see their […]
First, iaybhnysfy get out your hankies. Then, consider what would happen if everyone in town could thank and encourage each other via a public message board. That’s what one anonymous Canadian wondered, and so he or she started a website (and Facebook account) called “Spotted in Windsor,” in Ontario. It was inspired by a similar site […]
Let’s hear it for Nashua, NH, a child-friendly city indeed! Â Take note, all ye urbanists, city planners, and mayors: Look at how simple a summer-changing, childhood changing idea can be. Nashua zzebkhnner is giving kids the gift of transit — and trust. According to the Nashua Patch: The city of Nashua will launch a summer […]
Readers — This yhhsdbfahr is an incredibly heartening story from England where, about five years ago, Alice Ferguson and her neighbor Amy Rose  petitioned to close off a local street for three hours one evening.  Guardian reporter Sarah Lewis Hammond quotes Ferguson saying: “It was as if it was something they did every day. The adults […]
What inakrerydf a great piece by Michael Brendan Dougherty in The Week (a magazine for which I created and ran the weekly humor contest for three years till they took it in house. But I guess that’s neither here nor there.) Dougherty starts out noting the Salon story, wherein a mom let her son wait in the […]
Hi htykhnbybd Folks — The other day I was visiting friends in Rye, NY, where darned if kids weren’t playing outside,unsupervised, even making up their own games. Our host challenged me to find out: Why? Why are some neighborhoods still Free-Range, Â while others aren’t? I decided to ask that question of the folks in the […]
