What age do you allow your kids to 'play out' out of your yard/garden?

[Northerner]

I ask this as we live on a street of Victorian terraces, all of the houses just have a small yard but no gardens. Because of this the kids play on the back street. It is a quiet street, but cars do occassionally come down - normally residents who park at the back, so normally driving slowly.

My ds (4) is desperate to play with the bigger kids (most are 6-10 yrs) but there are a few 4/5 year olds. I ket my ds out if I am in the yard reading/gardening etc but dh does not let him out at all.

Just wondered what everyone else does.

northener, my dd1 is just 3and a half and the kids in our street are always asking if she can come out and play

2 of them are 4 yrs old but i think this is too young

do the younger ones play with older brothers/sisters?

sometimes that might make a difference

Yes I think teh younger ones have older brothers.

No, my ds is not at school yet. Starts in Sept.

My DD2 has played out since she was 3 1/2 but only with her older sister present (who was 7 1/2 at the time). She is now about to turn 6 (her sister being 10) and we still mostly stick by the same rules. I feel a bit mean on the 10 year old who is therefore responsible for her but it mostly goes ok. She now occastionally plays out without her sister and is very good re. cars etc. I def think 4 is too young to be unsupervised though.

I would never let my 5 year old to play out of the yard unsupervised by an adult. I was almost abducted at aged 4 when I was playing outside our house gate, and I remember the incident vividly.

Id let him out if I was sitting on the doorstep keeping an eye on him. Could you do that? Could you really settle without being able to see him?
I linger at the window when my 8 year old dd is playing with her mates on the grass in front of her nans house.
I cant settle till my kids are back under my wings!