Free-Range Kids

FREE RANGE KIDS has become a national movement, sparked bythe incredible response to Lenore Skenazy?s piece about allowingher 9-year-old ride the subway alone in NYC. Parent groups arguedabout it, bloggers, blogged, spouses became uncivil with eachother, and the media jumped all over it. A lot of parents today,Skenazy says, see no difference between letting their kids walk toschool and letting them walk through a firing range. Any risk isseen as too much risk. But if you try to prevent every possibledanger or difficult in your child?s everyday life, that child nevergets a chance to grow up. We parents have to realize that thegreatest risk of all just might be trying to raise a child whonever encounters choice or independence.