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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Overprotected Kid .
A trio of boys tramps along the length of a wooden fence, back and forth, shouting like carnival barkers. The Land! It opens in half an hour. Down a path and across a grassy square, 5-year-old Dylan can hear them through the window of his nanas front room. He tries to figure out what half an hour is and whether he can wait that long. When the heavy gate finally swings open, Dylan, the boys, and about a dozen other children race directly to their favorite spots, although its hard to see how they navigate so expertly amid the chaos. Is this a junkyard? asks my 5-year-old son, Gideon, who has come with me to visit. Not exactly, I tell him, although its inspired by one. The Land is a playground that takes up nearly an acre at the far end of a quiet housing development in North Wales. Its only two years old but has no marks of newness and could just as well have been here for decades. The ground is muddy in spots and, at one end, slopes down steeply to a creek where a big, faded plastic boat that most people would have thrown away is wedged into the bank. The center of the playground is dominated by a high pile of tires that is growing ever smaller as a redheaded girl and her friend roll them down the hill and into the creek. Why are you rolling tires into the water? my son asks. Because we are, the girl replies.
Its still morning, but someone has already started a fire in the tin drum in the corner, perhaps because its late fall and wet-cold, or more likely because the kids here love to start fires. Three boys lounge in the only unbroken chairs around it; they are the oldest ones here, so no one complains. One of them turns on the radioShaggy is playing (Honey came in and she caught me red-handed, creeping with the girl next door)as the others feel in their pockets to make sure the candy bars and soda cans are still there. Nearby, a couple of boys are doing mad flips on a stack of filthy mattresses, which makes a fine trampoline. At the other end of the playground, a dozen or so of the younger kids dart in and out of large structures made up of wooden pallets stacked on top of one another. Occasionally a group knocks down a few palletsjust for the fun of it, or to build some new kind of slide or fort or unnamed structure. Come tomorrow and the Land might have a whole new topography.
Other than some walls lit up with graffiti, there are no bright colors, or anything else that belongs to the usual playground landscape: no shiny metal slide topped by a red steering wheel or a tic-tac-toe board; no yellow seesaw with a central ballast to make sure no one falls off; no rubber bucket swing for babies. There is, however, a frayed rope swing that carries you over the creek and deposits you on the other side, if you can make it that far (otherwise it deposits you in the creek). The actual childrens toys (a tiny stuffed elephant, a soiled Winnie the Pooh) are ignored, one facedown in the mud, the other sitting behind a green plastic chair. On this day, the kids seem excited by a walker that was donated by one of the elderly neighbors and is repurposed, at different moments, as a scooter, a jail cell, and a gymnastics bar.
http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/03/hey-parents-leave-those-kids-alone/358631/
An excellent article on how we've sacrificed the spirit of adventure that comes naturally for children in the name of safety.
unionthug777
(740 posts)reminds me of my childhood. no smart phones, no computers, 5 channels on t.v., we would play hide and seek around the neighborhood or go to the park. had to make up our own fun. parents didn't seem to care what you did as long as you were home for dinner. sigh....the good ol days....i miss them.
sufrommich
(22,871 posts)sorry for all the kids who will never experience the true adventure of being a kid.
blueamy66
(6,795 posts)We swam in irrigation ditches. The horror!
In the Summer, we ate lunch at the house we just happened to be in.
We rode our bikes everywhere.
We came in when the neighbor's front light came on.
I feel bad for kids these days....
Although my niece does let her 3 boys do some crazy stuff. She doesn't hover over them. And let me tell you, they are ALL BOY!
Seeking Serenity
(2,840 posts)Made me wistful for my childhood. And yeah, in the summertime and on weekends, my playmates and I would be gone for HOURS without any parental supervision or even contact, roaming the neighborhood, playing down by the nearby ravine, using our imaginations, and the only thing my mom had to say about it was, "Be home by dark."
sufrommich
(22,871 posts)has changed for our little ones and not for the better I'm afraid.
Seeking Serenity
(2,840 posts)sufrommich
(22,871 posts)reformist2
(9,841 posts)Lizzie Poppet
(10,164 posts)It seems to this childless-by-choice person that a lot of parents are simultaneously overprotective and overindulgent. That combination isn't doing kids any favors...
Tommy_Carcetti
(43,181 posts)No, we don't need to have our kids walking around in protective bubbles. But on the same accord, neither do we need to have them doing stuff that in retrospect comes off as incredibly stupid and reckless, either.
In all things, moderation.
BrotherIvan
(9,126 posts)There is so much pressure these days to be "attached" to your child they are smothering their imaginations and independence. My friend has a child who is five years old and cannot play independently because he has always had a parent staring at him and cheering on his every move. Because they practiced co-sleeping, he cannot sleep on his own, so when they had another baby last year, mom sleeps in bed with the baby and husband sleeps with the five year-old in separate rooms. The parents are completely overwhelmed by his constant neediness and it takes two adults at a time to watch him.
I see the same with all of my friends with young children. They are exhausted, overwhelmed and ruled by their children. These are all cool people who many times have reminisced about playing outside until the streetlights came on. Of going down to the creek if they lived in the country or walking to the little downtown to buy gum. Now these parents feel guilty if they don't spend every minute of every day "interacting" with their children or taking them to a scheduled activity. It is making them completely overburdened and far more frazzled than I remember any of my parents' friends being.
There is so much guilt and fear pushed on parents these days. Also the idea that somehow you quite literally make your child who they are rather than raise them. Or that you are not only your child's best friend, you are the entire world. It's odd, because some day, these children will grow up and have to live on their own and it seems they will not be prepared at all.
In New Zealand, there is a school that is lightening up and letting kids really play: climb trees, mudslides, riding scooters. "Dangerous" stuff today, normal thirty years ago. And what happened is they had a lot less behaviour problems and bullying. The kids were able to get their energy and creativity out. Wadding children in these Disney fairytale bubble worlds is doing them absolutely no good.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/9650581/School-ditches-rules-and-loses-bullies
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)It is an interesting read. I'm passing it on to a good friend who designs quite innovative playgrounds. Interested in hearing her comments too.
cali
(114,904 posts)The happiest childhood memories I have are of outdoor adventures; wandering the brook, building things, painting the chicken coop and turning it into a playhouse. In short, I did all kinds of things that had an element of danger to them, from swimming in ponds without an adult present to sledding down steep hills.
My son had the same sort of adventures. He was born in 1986. By the time he was 6, he'd be off with his friends into the woods. He was chopping kindling by 8. He started skiing at 2. (OK, he did almost chop his thumb off). He had a rough and tumble lots of outside time childhood.