What age is safe to let kids out?

[Cycling Naturalist]

It's all about perspective, circumstance and situation which only you can judge and others can't. Whatever you do there'll always be 'tutters' and interferers.

For instance if I told you that the other day I let my two kids 8 and 10 walk down the main A road, with no pavement with cars going past beeping so they could play in a tree with a rope a 1000 yards away out of sight and hearing, you'd rightly raise an eyebrow or two.

If I then said the main road is a singletrack and the people beeping were also waving hello, the tree was outside their friends house and both of them at that age are also accomplished cimbers with ropes and harnesses the whole thing would look very different.

And if you said that you'd sent the children out to get you a bottle of scotch and 20 Bensons, there would be others who would be raising eyebrows.

 

[Crackle]

And if you said that you'd sent the children out to get you a bottle of scotch and 20 Bensons, there would be others who would be raising eyebrows.

How did you know that!

 

[yenrod]

User76 Jr(8) has just returned safely from his first solo trip to Tescos Metro, complete with a box of Oxo cubes and a sherbet dip. The shop is about 10 minutes walk, along a traffic free cycle/footpath, the only road to be crossed is the entrance to the car-park. He took his walkie-talkie and, unknown to him, I followed with his sister about 3 mins behind, so we are talking remote supervision. He had no idea we were doing it though. He is dipping away now, chuffed to bits, and feeling mighty grown up.

However, he met one of our neighbours in Tescos, she is appalled I took such a huge risk What do we think?

Magg'man - you'where following behind so [fingers] t' the neighbour


Seriously, now worrries like I said...you where behind him !

 

[Cycling Naturalist]

How did you know that!

'Cos it's what everyone sends their kids out to get while the parents are lying in bed watching daytime TV.

 

[Jaded]

isn't it 'Fingers' the neighbour that we are all worried about?

 

[Cycling Naturalist]

isn't it 'Fingers' the neighbour that we are all worried about?

Not, if you're a prudent parent and have done a "PaedoCheck."

 

[Harlin Amos]

And if you said that you'd sent the children out to get you a bottle of scotch and 20 Bensons, there would be others who would be raising eyebrows.

Don't know about the scotch, but when I was a kid I earned my pocket money by getting the old man's baccy and papers from the off-sales counter at the local.

Easy money.

 

[laurence]

i find that once they're too big to fit up the chimney they they should be sent out to sell matches, clean shoes, that kind of thing.

 

[yenrod]

Not, if you're a prudent parent and have done a "PaedoCheck."

Just think if this country had culture then Patrick wouldnt have this p.o.v !

Or, if the DHSS or whatever its called, DIDNT exist then, prudent and moral parents on average - would exist !

I know Im gonna irate a few forumers but - Ive seen it, experienced it, and sadly it does exist though not as much now.

But its only a small side of life.

I feel it was a bit obnoxious of Pat to mention that at all...like he is a solicitor: hardly earning the NMW or benefits.

 

[col]

I think you had it well covered,so it was safe.I was four on an raf camp,and able to wander,but times were different then i think.

 

[Joe24]

I was let up to the shops when i was about 8. But it was with my 2 older brothers that were over 10. It was up to paper shop, and we knew the guy that worked there. When i was 13 i did a paper round on my own, which was good because it made me feel more confident. I didnt go and play out though, didnt really interest me.
As long as the child has a way of contacting you if they need you, and they arent far away then i cant see a problem.

 

[summerdays]

Its a gradual process and its different with each child ... first child I was more confident of her road crossing abilities and used to let her walk to school or home on her own in y6, whereas no 2 is more dozey and nervy, and I'm not ready to let her do it yet ... but hoping by the summer term that I will be able to.

As a kid I definately remember more freedom, but also a lot less traffic. I remember one of my first escapades on a bike with my cousin a year older than me. We cycled to the local villiage and on the way back took a corner/junction very wide and turned onto the wrong side of the road - with a car coming towards us. Cousin made it back onto the right side of the road, me I ended up on the ground in front of the car. The worst part was went he got out to see I was OK, he asked who I was and turned out that he had gone to school with my Mum (my parents had moved to England when I was little so I had assumed they wouldn't need to hear of this escapade).

The point I'm trying to make is that although I think of all the little problems, scrapes etc that I got upto ...... I also think of those years of freedom as being happy ones. I hate to think of my kids doing those things (experimenting with fire, dens in haysheds, wandering around the countryside) but it is how you learn ... sometimes I suspect its better that parents don't know what their children are getting upto until later when it just becomes a humorous tale.

 

[Twenty Inch]

You're on the wrong forum - this is cyclechat, not mumsnet.