At what age is it safe to let your child play out - unsupervised and out of your sight?

[pinkpyjamas]

I know each child is individual, but at what age did you let your child play out? I don't mean in the same street, but as in playing in the local area but out of your sight? My neighbour lets her three year old DS out of the street with her seven year old DD looking after him. This worries me, but maybe I'm too over-protective?

I am in a difficult situation. I have a ds 5 who goes to my neighbours before and after school 2 days a week. She also has a ds 5 who she lets walk home from the local shop across a busy road, albeit with traffic lights, and the other day she let my ds do that too. I think he is too young but she is really independantly minded.

I think I will be just about ready for some independance when he is about 7, in primary 3.

Even if I think it is OK for ds to go on the street/corss the road/whatever, I would never dream of making that assumption on behalf of someone else's kids. I would always check with their parents.

The time when I let ds go off and play on a climbing fram out of the building and out of site was at a Mumsnetter meet-up - but I still checked with the Mumsnetter that it was OK for her dd to go outside to play along with my ds.

Hi can I join in ?

I was shocked when I read about the 3 year old playing outside unsupervised . I can't imagine that being OK in any circumastances. We used to live on an estate where you'd often see a 4 year old wandering alone at 10pm and it used to really worry me. Also, a little girl who lives near us has been walking alone to the park since she was 4 and playing there alone all day

I think its best to play safe. Pervs are often opportunistic, so I wouldn't give one the opportunity - no more than I'd leave my purse hanging out of my bag for someone to snatch. Not to mention cars etc, I know myself how difficult it is to see children, specially if you are reversing out of your drive and the children are at bumper height. I know several people who leave their toddlers locked in cars for long periods, which also freaks me out.

It does get very tricky when you are reliant on someone else to pick up your LOs and they are more relaxed than you are.

With regard to what age, I think it depends on the child as much as the location. Children vary so much in terms of how sensible they are and how much they remember from what you've told them.

I have to admit that when it comes to this subject, I am on the nuerotic end of the scale!!

I know I am also neurotic about them being out of my sight (or someone elses as I am not mad enough not to want some piece and quiet sometimes) I know that there will come a time when they start to rebel at the level of control but until that happens they will play in the garden and be walked to and from school.

Dsd (10) was playing out last night at her mums. They were playing chase and she ran across the road, looked one way but not the other and didn't see the car that was coming. It's a very quiet cul de sac and thankfully the woman was only doing 10 mph. She went over the bonnet, cut her head and is very shaken, but thankfully nothing more serious.

I still think she was old enough to be out playing, but maybe now she'll listen to us when we tell her to keep away from the road. It's daft as where she lives and with us there are loads of open spaces with no roads for her to play.

Dd is 3 and is definitely too young to go out of the garden, and I'd not let her go with a 7 year old. However, like MB when we were camping I let dd (3) go off with other children on the campsite. Everyone seemed to look out for everyone else's children and there were older children in the group as well it just felt a bit different.

You are making the idea of going camping sound very attractive!!

DD (3) also ran out in front of a car about two weeks ago - I was actually walking a few meters behind her. Likewise the driver was going slowly and so no harm done.

Surfermum, hope your DD is OK and it will make her a lot more careful in future as it would have given her a real scare.

Whoops, sorry I meant Dsd!

Hi Can I join in too? I worked on govt road safety campaigns and the spike at 12 is considered to be because people let their kids walk to school when they get to secondary but have often driven them previously so they don't have as much learnt experience with their parent. However England's child deaths are higher than europe and the reasoning for that was because we have a lot of busy roads in our towns whereas ont he continent a lot of busy roads go round residential areas, so kids learn on slower roads and then build up their hazard spotting skills. Interestingly figures are higher for boys and reserach indicated that peer pressure wouldmake you show more bravado and be more risky.

Personally we went campign for 1st time thie year and I almost let my 3.5yo walk to the park on the site although I chickened out at the last minute.

Cars are my biggest worry rather than paedos. Think the stats are 7 kids are killed a year by strangers and 400 are killed on roads, not to mention injured.

I will start to let my kids walk alone when I have watched them enough on the roads to see how they react (I expect that to be 6/7/8). However they can know about the rules of the road at that age but if they are playing an exciting game it all goes out of the window. Someone close to me was killed at 7 when playing chase outside her hosue although she had excellent road sense. IMO roads are not for playing on they are for travelling on.

Hi

Cat and Man' - I totally agree with you both - some really sensible advice. DS (age 6) has been doing some of those things, probably since about 4, where we can onbserve him. As well as teaching them, it really gratifying isn't it, seeing your LO ask for things in shops, work the money out and politely play etc. I also think it prepares them to be responsible and make decisions in case they ever have an emergency e.g. if Mum has an accident for example, its important the child knows how to get help etc.

I'm still not sure when mine would be allowed to play out of site alone - have to play it by ear and make a judgement call when the time comes I suppose.