a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  551 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What watching my daughter play ‘The Legend of Zelda’ taught me

I dunno, man, at the age of 6 my daughter decided to get up early one Saturday morning and go wander to the forest half a mile away. When she got back we set the ground rules (1) no leaving the house without telling us where you're going (2) no crossing streets with traffic lights without a grownup around (this limits her to about a 3 block radius). When COVID hit and she ended up at home ALL THE TIME I bought a pair of shitty walkie talkies so she could stomp around with the neighbor kids without me needing to keep an eye on her.

I have used "if I was good to do it, she's good to do it" as my operating principle since (1) the world is hella safer (2) she has a much better safety net than I ever did. I think a lot of today's child-rearing problems come from visible hypocrisy.





b_b  ·  551 days ago  ·  link  ·  

In Grant's memoirs, he relates a story about traveling to Lexington from outside Cincinnati where he lived to do horse trading as a 10 year old. Apparently, even for the 1830s that was a bit uncommon, but at least it illustrates how much more competent kids are than we often give them credit for. Love the walkie talkies.

kleinbl00  ·  551 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Lenore Skenazy's main point in Free Range Kids is the modern world is so much safer than it was in the 70s or 80s but because of Jon Walsh and the WhiteWomanInPeril ABC Sunday Night Movie we're all a bunch of paranoid fucks.