Thread: 'Free-range' children are let loose to go play

Overprotective rules are harmful to kids, author and parents say

'Free-range' children are let loose to go play

Patty Machelor Arizona Daily Star
April 27, 2010 12:00 am

Clara Utzinger, 8, and brother Alex, 12, are outside playing rather than indoors watching television or playing video games. Their mother, Amy Utzinger, says Tucson neighborhoods aren't more dangerous for children than they used to be.
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Poll: Free-range kids

Would you feel comfortable letting your children be 'free-range kids?'
Yes, kids need some freedom and independence
No, there are too many safety concerns
Not sure
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A few years ago, Amy Utzinger, a Tucson mother of four, read about a woman who allowed her 9-year-old son to ride the New York subway alone.

That mother, Lenore Skenazy, found herself at the center of a raging controversy about freedom versus safety. (Skenazy has since founded a website and has written a book, both titled "Free-Range Kids.")

Skenazy's ideas resonated with Utzinger, who allows her children to walk and bike with relative freedom around their midtown neighborhood. Her oldest child, who is 12, bikes to school each day.

Utzinger said she reflects on her own childhood in Houston, where she walked to kindergarten each day with her sister.

"Is it that much more dangerous now than it was then? No. And so why was it not a big deal then and it is now?" Utzinger said.

Part of the problem is how readily available news about crime is today, said David Finkelhor, director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire.

While news reports might make it seem like violence is on the rise, crimes against children and teens declined between 40 percent and 70 percent from 1993 to 2004, Finkelhor said.

Even so, Finkelhor said, child victimization is "alarmingly high" here compared with other developed countries. But the problems, he said, are most often found in the home or at school.

"The truth is that kids are most at risk among the people with whom they live, with siblings and family members, and among their peers," he said. "The two things that most damage our kids are abusive and neglectful parenting, and kids who are the targets of a lot of peer victimization and ostracization and bullying."

While the threat of stranger abduction is low when compared with other crimes against children, it does occur. Since January, there have been two reports of abductions of girls on their way to school in Tucson. Two more attempted abductions were reported on the northwest side and in Marana, also involving schoolgirls.

Finkelhor said parents can be careful and aware without being overly protective, he said.

Bob Fee remembers growing up in Tucson in the 1960s, when he would take off all day.

"We would hop on our bicycles and go wherever our little legs could get us in a day," he said. "We could be gone all day as long as we were home by sundown."

In 1963, Fee's father moved his family from the comfort of its spacious midtown home in El Encanto area to a cattle ranch. Part of the idea was to give the kids more freedom and more responsibility.

Their new home was a one-bedroom adobe, and the kids had to take turns sleeping in a truck camper outside.

"It was a great adventure for a little kid," said Fee, now 55.

Fee said he learned to care for the animals, how to weld, repair and build things, and how to be a reliable worker.

But on weekends, there was free time, he said, and that free time meant freedom to explore - without an adult around.

Children need space to play, learn and grow, said Kim Metz, director of the Parent Connection, a member agency of Arizona's Children Association.

A common-sense approach works best, she said.

"You don't let your 2-year-old walk down the street to play with a friend, but your 8-year-old could walk or bike there," she said. "Sometimes we just need to take a deep breath and allow them to experience these things. They need these opportunities to feel confident and good about themselves."

Utzinger agrees.

"You have to have rules, but within those boundaries there's a lot of latitude," she said. "It makes life so much more pleasant if you don't have to be afraid all the time."

Utzinger said she isn't immune from concern, but said she can't live her life imagining worst-case scenarios all the time.

"I realize that things can happen, but that doesn't mean we have to live in fear. We have to give them the tools that they need to succeed in society," she said. "I don't think we do kids any favors by not letting them encounter any obstacles."

Last summer, Utzinger and her family spent the summer in Germany. There, she said, kids played with much greater freedom than they do here.

The children would "go to the park and hang out, and there were never any parents around," she said. "The thing I liked is that it's safer when all the kids do it.

Contact reporter Patty Machelor at 806-7754 or pmachelor@azstarnet.com

http://azstarnet.com/news/local/article ... a4d59.html

Right. Let your kid bike around East LA or Miami.

Geeeze, I live in a "nice" middle class area and I don't even let my kids play on the sidewalk in front of our house unless we are out front to watch over them.

No way.