The Rules of Parenting, 3rd Edition

RULE 26

Let them go (wild)

Remember the days when you used to leave the house in the morning and be off all day, and your parents didn’t know where you were? Which was probably just as well because you were getting up to all sorts of things they probably wouldn’t have wanted to know about. Building dens, play fighting with sticks, stealing milk, lighting fireworks, climbing trees, sticking slugs on next door’s cat.

Kids need to do those things. They need it as much as they ever did. But parents are increasingly reluctant to allow it. We worry about physical damage, when the emotional damage of keeping them under wraps is far worse. Life is a series of risk assessments, and if children don’t learn to take risks when they’re young, they won’t ...