DD wants to walk to school alone

[Mumto1amazinggirl]

Hello, this is my first ever post on here and I’m hoping some of you can help me.

What age did you let your kids walk to primary/secondary school on their own? Also how did you deal with the worry of it?

I have a DD who is ten in December and she has started to ask me and her dad if she can walk home from school. So far I’ve said no, but my OH seems to think it’s ok. I will admit to being very protective of her which is why I am really questioning my judgement here. Plus he had a very liberal childhood (lots of freedom), I had a very restricted and strict childhood so we end up disagreeing over what to do.

It takes about 10-15 minutes to walk to ours from school but it’s through an estate where the roads are very quiet (good traffic-wise) although I have seen drug deals happening and I just worry that she will be approached by/attacked by some one and feel she’s too young still to be out on her own.

She is a lovely girl but is very old headed! She has precocious puberty so is a bit more developed than her peers and is having treatment to pause the puberty, plus she has asthma/eczema. She deals with all this really well, but is not the most confident girl so her promises of “I’ll shout and scream and kick them in the potatoes!” if she’s ever attacked doesn’t fill me with confidence lol!

What did you all do in this situation?

Thanks xx

nearly all year 5 & 6's walk home alone round here and some younger in my opinion it is fine
if most kids walk home with friends it is a bit overkill to stop your child unless genuine safety concerns ie the risks are too great for that child in those circumstances even though it is alright for others, this maybe a child with much lower awareness of danger, inability to cross roads, that your house is in a more remote spot or along a more dangerous route than the routes for other children in same class

Mine were walking to school on their own by about age 7-8. Almost 10 seems fine to me. Children learn so much from being given some responsibility and freedom.

Has she got a friend who lives nearby and maybe they could all walk together (safety in numbers). Most kids round here walked after the Easter of year 5.

My DS is 10(just). We live about 5 minutes away.
It is still a no from me.
One small road to cross but blind spots and lots of cars parked on kerbs etc.
I worry more about the road and traffic than strangers.

Mine walked from the beginning of Yr 5, as did most of the others in his year

Does her school have any guidelines about walking alone? I think at our local (huge) primary school they say children should be over 9yrs old and have a safe and relatively straightforward route that parents check every so often.

I’m assuming next year she will be in secondary school. What will happen then?

As an aside, ten isn’t considered precocious for puberty, puberty blockers can damage bones and cause a dip in IQ. I would really consider leaving her go through puberty now, as ten isn’t at all unusual.
My dd had some signs of possible pp at 8, scans showed that it wasn’t pp, but pre the scans we had talked with her consultant re treatment, and he said that the drugs had side effects that we might need to think about, including a drop in IQ.

I would let my dd walk home with a friend or friends, but not alone, no.

10 years old/ (nearly and takes 10 mins.) I say yes.

From Y5 (so just 9), crossing two residential ratruns and one main road. She texted me when she got there safely, and sometimes met a friend half way. Your walk sounds fine.

I first started letting my eldest who is 11 now walk home from primary (10 minutes walk) when she was 9 I started gradually either me or her nan would meet her half way home (outside post office) it worked great for us as we could see her having to cross the busiest road to cross and see how well she crossed it from standing by the post office and then walk rest of way together once she had showed me I could trust her to be responsible enough to walk by herself (think it was around a month) I started letting her walk home with friends who also live in our street and wait on doorstep for her after a few weeks i didn't even wait on doorstep and I started similar to this age letting her go to local park with friends without me but she had to take her mobile she's now 11 and has proven how responsible she is and I trust her to go most places local now on her own only conditions I have now she's to keep me informed where she is and be home at a certain time and she's flourished from this independence and responsibility and often messages me the most random things while she's out too (this lets me know she's ok without her realising)
But I don't think it's so much age it's much more to it and many more factors, each child is different such as how aware they are when crossing roads and also the route they have to walk or the area they are passing, and we are all more than aware of the awful dangers but we can't wrap them in cotton wool forever they will only resent you for it and as for how I coped I can't remember being to anxious about the walk from school I was more proud of her in my feelings but letting her out for a hour down the park was very nervy to me and I worried everytime, I coped with a lot of texts and phone calls to which my family kept telling me she's fine leave her play with her friends but once she was home seeing her face and how happy she I could see why it's important to children to take this step

Hi all thanks for replying.

Unfortunately she doesn’t have any friends who live nearby to walk with as they have moved schools 🙄 So she would be on her own.

She’s only just started year 5, think OH and I have decided to reassess in the new year.

Sirvixofvixhall we did our research before deciding to put her through the treatment. Ultimately it was her decision and as she has started this process at 6 1/2 it was definitely too early. The deciding factors included the school not being equipped with sanitary bins etc, DD not being able to deal with it and she was horrified at the thought of not growing any taller and being the only one with a period. I’m a qualified nurse and did much research into it, so I am confident treatment was the right choice - plus having gone through it myself, it’s no fun being the only girl in the year growing up so fast 😉

Thank you all so much for your advice, it would build her confidence to be more independent and we’ll look into a compromise xx

I think that it really depends on so many factors - how responsible your child is, what roads they have to cross, the distance they have to walk.

It's a moot point for me as I have to walk my 7 year old to the same school anyway. But my 9 yr old (10 in December) is not confident enough to do it. We also have to cross a very busy road with no pedestrian crossing so I think even if she did walk by herself, I'd have to cross her over that road first.

DD’s primary school only allowed the Y6 to go alone but in reality nobody checked in the morning where the parents were. So her childminder often let her go alone while she got the younger ones to the KS1 doors. At drop off she had to be collected though.

We started letting her walk alone to clubs like Brownies and gymnastics as the parking was always awful so we dropped her off at a corner and she did the rest.

We also let her go alone to the library while I did food shopping. Or she went alone to shops to spend her pocket money.

From secondary no one is brought by their parents, even in bad weather I am only allowed to drive her so much on my way.

They need to learn how to be independent, we wrap them far too much in cotton wool.

I would suggest a compromise of letting her walk once the nights are lighter, so in 6 months time

Just to check, would she really be on her own, or just not with friends?
Are there no other parents with children walking your way?

I'd be tempted to say after the clocks change in the spring which gives you and her another 6 months. But maybe do some letting her walk ahead of you so you can monitor how she does the roads etc. You could also say you'll set out to meet her at the time school gets out so you should see her by half way (or earlier).

Will you have to give permission to school?

It's completely dependent on two things. What your child is like and what your area is like.

In our village children are out and about from as young as 5. My DS and DD have walked home alone at 6 years old.

That being said they're very mature, well behaved and trustworthy, the area is a small busy village where everyone knows everyone and we live a street and a half away.

If we lived elsewhere then it would be a no.

DD (now 9) has after school things on Mon and Wed and she walks home herself when it's over so I don't need to go back out after picking her little brother up.

Only you know if it's something that you can allow.

Eldest DD (turned 12 this year) has walked the mile to high school every day. She's a second year pupil now.

I am not really sure why people suggest to wait u TIL Spring. DD had to leave the house at 8.15am and came home from 3.30pm onwards.

Hardly dark at all.

In general terms I'd say 10 is fine - I think I started meeting my DD half way from school in year 5 then she walked on her own by end of year 5/ beginning year 6 - but it was a short walk (10 mins max) in safe area with lots of other kids & parents about. If she would really be walking through an estate where there are sometimes drug deals going on it would definitely give me pause for thought!

In terms of calming your nerves and worries, if she's allowed a mobile phone (maybe not at primary) you can use an app like Google Link to track where she is.