To think 8/9 year olds shouldn’t be doing this

[Pluggoo]

Walking up a big hill with a busy road next to it (known to speeders) to go and meet their friends alone. All in year 4. Then playing on a field to play football. Walking back home mainly alone. 10 minutes walk to get home

I think it's too young yes.. maybe 10+ for boys but personally I'd say 10 is too young for girls, I know that sounds bad but I have a daughter and feel like I wouldn't let her at age 10 either but maybe if I had a son I would...

Which can happen at any age at any time. Adults can get hit by cars too.

Like I said, accidents happen. Sometimes an adult and a child can both be hit by cars so an adult doesn't always prevent an accident.

When does accompanying children outdoors end? 12, 14, 16, 18? How will they ever learn independence, street smarts etc if they always have a parent hovering?

@Mumtumtastic

I don’t understand why protective practices (like accompanying children outdoors) or parenting styles are so despised here.

Freak accidents occur any time. I have been hit by a car running a red light when I was crossing safely at the lights. These things happen at any time. I remember when the bin lorry mounted the kerb in Glasgow killing a mother and her baby in its pram.

That's not an argument to not let 8 year olds walk ten minutes from their homes to play football. You don't have to personally do it but there's nothing wrong with it, in fact there are plenty of proven benefits. It is only in very very recent history that many parents have started curtailing their children's freedom to do these sorts of things. I recommend Jonathan Haidt's research into the subject.

Children do not need to be accompanied everywhere outdoors.

It sounds like he will be walking with friends. IMO you are being over protective

They don’t cross the road, just walk beside it!

@Mumtumtastic because coddling children and preventing them developing a sense of independence does not help them in any way. Accidents happen every hour of every day, to children and adults alike.

The current generation of children are statistically unhappier than those who preceded them, and interestingly, also spend the most time with their parents with far more limited independence.

In general I think it's okay but does depend on
A. The child
B. If walking with someone else.
C. The area.
D. Whether they know the possible dangers.

It's a shame that those government safety ads died out....I thought it was a good way to start a conversation. Charlie Says.....

No you misunderstood what I meant, I wouldn’t class this as neglect even though personally I wouldn’t do it. A few have said they feel their community is safe enough to enable this as normal practice. I am challenging that to say an 8 year old going out solo being viewed as neglect does not do anything to ‘minimise neglect’ as a whole.

Also there are circs where it could certainly be neglectful. Neglect is a complex issue on a broad spectrum.

Ah yes, the famous nomad child tribes of Hertfordshire. A breathtaking sight to see them roaming majestically across England’s green and pleasant land. Muscular wee things, from their dawn to dusk nomadic sweeping across the plains with nerry a Pom bear packet in sight.

Wow you’re a late starter ZestyJoey, I’d retired by 6 and had 3 kids 2 grandkids by then

My main worry would be crossing a road

The walk is fine
Playing football fine

It's highly unlikely a child abuser will grab him and his mates kicking and screaming in broad daylight and abduct them. Really! Its pretty unheard of isnt it?

Sounds like a very healthy way for kids to gain experience of the outside world, rather than be cocooned in cotton wool by neurotic parents. An 8 or 9 year old should be capable of negotiating roads and traffic.

This has been a fun debate, enjoyed it and good points made on both sides. Not sure either is convinced by the flip argument though, too much depends on our own parenting styles and experiences.

To those who are happy letting their sprogglets loose please consider an AirTag or something in case they are not back when expected, I don’t think most would have phones with the ages we’re discussing for a locate me setting to apply.

To those that chose to accompany their kids out I don’t think it’s wrong or weird. Doing it in luminous onesies and matching hair styles, that’s wrong and weird. But then who am I to say? Maybe keeping kids too safe is actually spoiling the fun of people who enjoy hurting them or playing kiddie skittles with an SUV on pedestrian crossings is a terribly misunderstood national pastime. It does take all sorts 🙃

He’s too young , you’re right to have all those worries OP , I’d be the same …
It’s better to be safe than sorry, 💯 applies here …

Hallelujah! Another sane person. My DS has always been old for his age and I have always allowed him to play out with minimal supervision. We moved house about 2 years ago and he stopped going anywhere for a while then when we moved to the house we’re in now, he started playing on the street again. Based on where we live and where his school is, I have been happy to allow him to walk on his own to and from school. His DF (my EXH), however, has zero faith in DSs capabilities. Approx 14 months ago, I was visiting a friend in the town we used to live and DS was at dad’s. I asked dad to tell DS where I would be and walk with him on his way to work. Despite my DS having been to this friend’s house countless times and it being a straight road and no more than 400yds, his dad insisted I go out to meet him so he could stand at the corner of the road with the main high street and watch until he reached me.
My DS has just turned 10 but I know I can leave him to walk to/from school, my place of work or his friend's house and I know I can leave him home when I go out safe in the knowledge of his capabilities and that if he gets stuck, he will call me.

I wholeheartedly agree OP. Just because they can cope, doesn’t mean they should.

Also, I really don’t see why the choice is letting your child walk 10 minute away up a busy road OR a sedentary, lazy upbringing in front of screens. Any 8 year olds enjoy organised clubs? Play dates in each others gardens? Football at the park and walk home after with mum? He’s 8???

A lot of it depends on the area and what other people let their kids do. If a lot of normal kids do the same, its ok. In some areas normal kids are kept indoors and it's just the chavvy ones who roam about outside unsupervised.

Organised play full of clubs and play dates just isn't comparable.

Children need to be doing things like this more. In Germany there is a saying 'children who aren't allowed to, become adults that can't'.They allow their children much more freedom and independence than we do and I think that's a big part of the reason they are (statistically, on average) happier.

There are ways of teaching children independence in a tapered, soft way. Not just sending them out into the street to roam up the road aged 8. Up until their 6th birthday, I literally had to get onto the trampoline equipment at JumpHeaven for example and be “around”. They’re 6 and 7 now and Hugo on independently, often with friends to roam and I wait in the cafe. By age 8/9, perhaps I’ll drop them and go / collect. It’ll be a build up to them feeling independence. They will obviously have independence as teens, but not total and for me personally, 8 year olds on busy roads unaccompanied is an unacceptable risk to mine.

The hill is surely neither here nor there, I’m not sure how that plays into things. For me the crux of whether it’s ok would be if there is a pavement on the road or not? A 10 minute walk is only 1/2 a mile or less if they are walking slowly so I don’t think it’s too far. If it was just on a busy A road, then it’s obviously not safe, but if there’s a pavement then it sounds fine. My boys have roamed all over our farm on foot since they were about 6, and out on the lanes on their bikes (together) from about 7 or 8. They go much further away than 1/2 mile but it is very very quiet country lanes and they stick together (sometimes cycle to a friend on a neighbouring farm a few miles away, sometimes just down to the woods to build dens etc). My youngest also loves playing with his friends down at the village playground and football field - I drive him down there and then drive the 10 minutes home until an agreed time to go back and get him. He doesn’t have a mobile phone yet (he’s now 11 in year 6, but has been playing in the village since he was year 4). If there’s a problem he knows he can go to a friends house or the village shop and one of the parents or the shopkeeper will phone me, but there has never been an issue. He’s sensible on the roads, and I think it’s good to build their independence. My boys play outside (on our land) a lot, but they also spend a fair bit of time in the car being driven to school and to sports training so any opportunity for them to get out by themselves on foot or on bikes is great in my book.

My DS is the same age (so age 8 in Y4, late July birthday) and for me it would be too young as he's quite a "young" 8. Where I live we have problems with gangs of teenagers using the local park, smoking weed, being mean to younger kids and we also have a massive problem with County Lines gangs. My 14 year old DS has been attacked when in town with his girlfriend. We're desperate to move as I grew up in a village and was out in the park from a young age with my older brother! As a teen I was never home as was always out on my bike/climbing trees - a real child of the 90's 😂

OP my son is 9 and i have been working up to him being able to go to the park this spring/summer which is 4 houses away. There is no way I would let him walk 10 mins to meet friends and children this age don’t all have phones x

The child would not be crossing the road, just walking beside it.