"My friend, I'm glad you wrote in, because, respectfully, your husband isn't the only one who needs a wake-up call here. It is absolutely unacceptable that you allowed your 6-year-old child out of your sight, out in the world, for two hours. Even 10 minutes gone without explicit permission and knowledge of where exactly you could find him would have been too much! As soon as he was out of your sight, you should have been after him."
"Your kid is 6! He needs a parent with him when he's outside riding his bike, period. The marker for whether a kid can be left alone unsupervised isn't the ability to ride a bike by himself. It's the maturity to know what to do if he loses control of the bike and falls and hurts himself, or if a stranger stops him to talk to him, or if he comes across a mean dog without a leash, or any number of totally unforeseen things"
A six-year-old named Xavier rode a new bike and was out of parental sight for over two hours before returning. One parent insists that he should not be allowed to ride without a parent until about age ten, while the other downplays the incident by recalling similar childhood freedom. Allowing a six-year-old to be out of sight for hours is deemed unacceptable; even ten minutes away without permission or known whereabouts is considered too long. Parents should search immediately if a child leaves without notice. A child needs a parent present while riding because maturity determines how to handle falls, strangers, dogs, and other unforeseen hazards.
Read at Slate Magazine
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]