Where have all the kids gone?

[Cathryn]

I'm studying early childhood education these days (training to be a preschool teacher) and there was some discussion of this phenomenon - kids learn gross motor skills by watching older kids and they're no longer being exposed to that. In addition, those social skills like negotiation and compromise and leadership aren't being practised either. It's pretty grim.

My little boy's only 5 so I'm not going to let him run wild in the streets (even though our streets are pretty safe) but he's not stuck in front of a screen...he's playing with friends most of the time.

 

[I like Skol]

I've only just grown out of setting fire to things and smashing windows.

Does that count?

I was at a 50th birthday party on Saturday night and when the night started to cool down the other revellers were very impressed with the ease and speed with which I lit the chiminea with just newspaper, wood and the flame from a tealight candle. Who said it was a wasted youth, I refrained from smashing all the windows

My little boy's only 5 so I'm not going to let him run wild in the streets (even though our streets are pretty safe) but he's not stuck in front of a screen...he's playing with friends most of the time.

I keep trying to convince my 12yr old to organise a few mates and go out on a cycling expedition to see how far they can get. He has great road sense and is a good cyclist. He would be fine if only I could get him to organise it himself.

 

[nickyboy]

kids probably are the product of the society adults create . Perhaps this is a symptom of age and everyone can argue the same but things seem different from when I was young. Kids are no longer responsible for their actions, there seems to be a queue of excuses for them nowadays. No longer do you get badly behaved children its explained as ADHD etc. They are all very aware of their rights "Guv'na" but very few seem to be made aware of the responsibilities that should accpany these rights hand in hand.

I don't recognise this at all. When you meet them, kids seem very much like kids have always seemed. There are always shy ones, cheeky ones showing off to their mates, thoughtful ones.......

But they seem perfectly polite and ordinary. Not badly behaved or rude at all. Boisterous of course, but I like boisterous-ness in children.

Seems it is not just parents worrying about safety that are taken in by the media

 

[swee'pea99]

I don't recognise this at all. When you meet them, kids seem very much like kids have always seemed. There are always shy ones, cheeky ones showing off to their mates, thoughtful ones.......

But they seem perfectly polite and ordinary. Not badly behaved or rude at all. Boisterous of course, but I like boisterous-ness in children.

Seems it is not just parents worrying about safety that are taken in by the media

I couldn't agree more. The Daily Wailerati would of course love us to believe that everything's gone to hell since those dastardly permissive '60s, but my experience is the precise opposite - that parents' efforts to build human relationships with their kids, rather than treat them as chattels from whom they demand unthinking obedience, have paid off, in the form of a generation who, while they may have problems in other areas, are in my experience not only on the whole unfailingly polite and courteous, but also interesting, humorous, uncowed by adults or capricious authority. And their loyalty to and support for each other is genuinely humbling and inspiring. I find it all tremendously heartening and healthy.

 

[w00hoo_kent]

I only really see/hear about the guides in the company my wife runs (so 10-16). They are going out for a ride along the tow path tonight, I've cried out because I'm fed up of fixing bikes that have been left in a shed for 8 months through the duration of a 2 hour 5mph trundle, specifically the one that punctures 10 minutes from the end and suddenly it's all against the clock and argh! (in my defence I did say if she had a maintenance night last week I'd do the ride this week, but it's not happened).

Anyway, they almost all have bikes, they just don't really seem to use them much. They are generally polite, if often disinterested (we recently did a 'life skills' night and I showed them how to check fluids in a car and change a wheel which some of them enjoyed) but then that's just children. They have always been in their own world, I know I was at a similar age and would have been similarly polite, but equally disinterested. Our 'kid' is 21 in a month and they did just the same.

They are definitely molly coddled more, a couple of decades ago my wife wouldn't have had any children unable to butter a slice of bread, but now has to teach them how to do it, and how to use a sharp knife to cut onions, etc. because some of them just don't get exposed to those skills anymore as 'the kitchen is dangerous'. Although I know when ours was growing up we had lots of 'how old should they be before...' type discussions largely generated by worrying about the general public perception etc. It was often obvious that they didn't come with a manual. We just let them go to my dads for a weekend and they were allowed to be free range there (helped by him living in a much easier place to be free range, walk out of our gates, you were on an NSL country lane and rat run, hardly pootle about on your bike/skateboard territory.) I know my growing up experience was of little use when it came to being a parent (but then both my parents worked until 10pm and I was basically feral from 11 to around 18).

They are doing stuff, it's mostly indoors, or supervised somewhere. It really doesn't surprise me that they aren't out in random places doing random stuff anymore (around here anyway) it's not the way things work anymore and that's probably a mistake and I agree, a general underlying fear (even for those who should know better) is probably a big cause, coupled with modern day technology.

 

[I like Skol]

I have taken my kids camping since they were about 18 months old. Not campsite camping with a shower block and drying room but real camping, in a field where you bring your own water if you want to wash and the evening consists of finding enough deadwood to chop up and keep warm for the night. They are now 9 and 12 and if we have a small fire in the BBQ after we have cooked my wife still gets nervous about the kids putting wood on the fire. She says "don't get so close to the fire" and I always say leave them alone, they are just putting wood on and if they get too close they will soon move back a bit because it gets feckin hot! And besides, they are hardly likely to throw themselves into the flames (although, with a good run up and jump you can clear the fire and sail through the flames without any damage (DAHIKT! ))

 

[Jayaly]

They are now 9 and 12 and if we have a small fire in the BBQ after we have cooked my wife still gets nervous about the kids putting wood on the fire. She says "don't get so close to the fire" and I always say leave them alone, they are just putting wood on and if they get too close they will soon move back a bit because it gets feckin hot! And besides, they are hardly likely to throw themselves into the flames (although, with a good run up and jump you can clear the fire and sail through the flames without any damage (DAHIKT! ))

We've camped with our kids their whole lives too, although in a slightly different setting (safety people at dog agility shows get a bit worried at the thought of fires with hundreds of tents and caravans on a site hired for the weekend). Last year was the first time we have ever been anywhere we were allowed to have fires. I was impressed at how quickly the toddler learned to keep a safe distance. As you say, it's pretty obvious because it's so d*mn hot.

Now not running into roads when there isn't a car in sight, that's taken a good year to drum into him. The concept that there *might* be a car at some point was not obvious enough for a developing brain, I think.

The only time I've seen something fire-related that worried me was watching Cubs having a sausage sizzle, and that was because some of those sausages were in danger of being lightly warmed at best. We had a 'nope, cook it a bit longer' patrol going on.