What is Free-Range Parenting?
“Let them be kids” is the mantra of Free-Range Parenting. A free-range parent allows their child to experience childhood in a way that many find controversial. These parents will let their children walk or bike to school alone, they let their children walk to and play at the park by themselves, and they may even let their children take public transportation without supervision. Unfortunately, in today’s day and age, that is seen by some as neglect.
By now, you may have read about the four main parenting styles – Authoritative, Authoritarian, Permissive, and Neglectful – as we have covered them in earnest recently. These styles of parenting help (or hinder) the growth of your child and form the basis of their adulthood. There are parenting sub-categories under those styles, though, and one that’s become increasingly popular is called “Free-Range Parenting.”
“Let them be kids” is the mantra of Free-Range Parenting. A free-range parent allows their child to experience childhood in a way that many find controversial. These parents will let their children walk or bike to school alone, they let their children walk to and play at the park by themselves, and they may even let their children take public transportation without supervision. Unfortunately, in today’s day and age, that is seen by some as neglect.
What it is important to know about free-range parenting is that it has less to do with neglect than it has to do with promoting independence. Allowing your child to experience these freedoms in order for them to learn responsibility is not necessarily a bad thing.
Don’t get it wrong – free-range parents are very much involved with their children. They continue to teach their kids essential life skills, but they allow them to feel those life skills. They also help guide their children through the challenges life brings them at an early age, and they will also teach them safety precautions as they venture out.
If this sounds like how some of you grew up, well, that’s because it is. “Back in the day” kids were allowed to do these things and more. Walking to and from school (uphill, barefooted, in the snow even!) was the norm. Taking a jaunt down the street to the corner store was, well, child’s play. Heading outside early on a Saturday morning and not coming home until the streetlights popped on was a weekly ritual. And then there were summer times.
Free-Range Parenting Examples
The world has changed drastically in just a few decades, and now kids being allowed to do their own thing is so outside the norm in some places it borders on illegal. Kids usually aren’t allowed to be out on their own anymore, and if seen out and about by themselves, parents can find themselves in trouble.
Take for instance Lenore Skenazy, the columnist for the New York Sun who let her 9-year-old son make his way home by navigating the subway system in New York City. This was done back in 2008 and Skenazy wrote about how and why she did it in her New York Sun piece. She was quickly attacked on all sides. Skenazy was even given the moniker “America’s Worst Mom.”
As for free-range parenting, the controversy continues. Back in 2015, Maryland parents let their 10-year-old boy and his six-year-old sister walk from their home to a nearby park. As they were walking, police cruised by, saw the kids walking alone, picked them up, and took them home. A few hours after this, Child Protective Services (CPS) showed up at the parent’s door. The father was forced to sign a document stating he would not leave his children unsupervised until the following Monday when CPS would follow up with another visit. He was told if he didn’t sign the document, the children would be removed from the home.
Changing Laws
Laws surrounding the idea of free-range parenting differ from state to state. Some states have a minimum age for leaving your child alone in your home. In Georgia, it is 8 years old while in Delaware it is 12.
Utah was the first state to pass a law allowing free-range parenting . In 2018, the Utah legislature unanimously passed a bill stating in part that “a child, whose basic needs are met and who is of sufficient age and maturity to avoid harm or unreasonable risk of harm, to engage in independent activities …” The now three-year-old bill allows for children to “walk, run, or bike to and from school, travel to commercial or recreational facilities, play outside and remain at home unattended.”
Is Free-Range Parenting A Good Idea For You?
The free-range parenting strategy to let your child out alone in the big bad world is not for everyone. Especially in this day of the COVID pandemic, parents find themselves even more protective and cautious. Take for instance an Indiana hospital chaplain who is the mother of two young boys. A self-described “fairly cautious” parent before the pandemic hit, now she is in full-blown protection mode when it comes to her two boys.
“The pandemic has made me more paranoid and fearful of other people,” she says to The Guardian. She is gravely concerned that her boys will become sick as they are too young (ages 7 and 4) to get vaccinated. “We don’t go inside other people’s houses, and, if we have play dates, we do them outside,” she says.
While there are benefits for keeping the boys near to her – she says her boys are closer to each other than ever – there is that downside. “That social aspect of their development is something I’m definitely worried about. There’s a part of me that’s like: ‘Let them be kids,’ and there’s a part of me that’s like: ‘I need to keep them safe.’” And that is where free-range parenting has its upside.
Those who are for a free-range style say it promotes confidence and independence. It teaches kids how to fall and get back up and proponents insist it isn’t neglect. Here are a few free-range parenting characteristics:
- Plenty of unscheduled activities. Instead of moving from one scheduled event to another, free-range parents allow for numerous unscheduled events. They even encourage unscheduled playtime.
- Get outdoors. A free-range parent will encourage their children to head for the outdoors and play outside with friends rather than stay cooped up inside playing video games. They would much rather see their children build forts in the back instead of going brain-dead sitting in front of a TV screen all day and night.
- Independence earning. Kids are allowed to earn their independence. Increased freedom and responsibility are given as a child shows they can handle it. As a child shows they are capable of trying and accomplishing new things, the reins are loosened a bit more.
- Don’t parent out of fear. Understand, please. Free-range parents are not neglectful. We’ve said it before but feel it needs to be stressed. They do have rules, they do promote safety. Their children will ride bikes with a helmet on. But they do understand that while accidents do happen (kids fall and scrape knees), they don’t stop their kids from playing for fear of it. The goal is to allow kids to experience life.
It’s true – free-range parenting harkens back to the days when kids were allowed to be kids. But free-range parents also understand that this is a dangerous world. They do allow their kids freedom to experience life, but practitioners claim they do so not in a neglectful way, but in a way that still promotes safety. Free-range parents say their goal is simply to let kids be kids.
