leaving children on their own?

valk_scot

My mum was a real worrier and coupled with the fact she didn't drive and had a number of irrational dreads about odd things it ended up that she hardly let me go to anything even vaguely adventurous. I made up for it the minute I left for uni of course and I (hopefully) haven't passed any of these worries on to my own kids.

On the other hand I was often in the house alone from the age of about 10 and up and expected to do cooking and ironing during this time, which I would NOT like my 11 year old to do if she was on her own. But my mother thought this was quite okay while on the other hand she wouldn't let me go to the well supervised local swimming pool with my friends till I was about 14, despite me being a school team swimmer and having done a life saving course myself!

Risk perception is an odd thing....one of DD's friends wasn't allowed by her mother to go on the week long outward bound trip last autumn, when the kids were 11. Reason? She wasn't sure the (excellent) washing facilities would be adequate for her daughter and given how dirty the outdoors activities were she was concerned her daughter would pick up some sort of infection. I on the other hand had only one worry for the week which was how my DD would cope with dealing with her waist length hair alone, lol. I solved my worries by showing DD's best friend and roomate how to plait DD's hair, the other child had to spend the whole week at school with the few others of the year who were unable to go on grounds of health etc. (The girl had no health issues herself btw, only a mother with a bit of a phobia about mud.)

mumps

If I went out and got hit by a lorry I think I would be glad that I hadn't taken children with me, better they are at home phoning dad as they are worried than under the lorry with me. Maybe that's just me.

mumps

poet123 wrote: »

I do agree totally with you here. I regularly think the same of some of the teens I come into contact with but don't necessarily think it stems from lower expectations. I think it stems from the type of parenting where the child is regularly told they can do no wrong and that it is everyone else who is out of step. They have crossed the fine line of instilling confidence and instead instil arrogance.

It's funny the kids I come across who have been brought up to believe they can do no wrong are rarely the ones who are independant and self reliant, they are much more likely to be the ones who aren't expected to do anything for themselves.



Again, I agree but I don't think that leaving them alone earlier is tied into that at all. You can do this without leaving them to fend for themselves. There are other ways of doing this.

You can't seriously mean that leaving a child for half an hour while you pop to the shops is "leaving them to fend for themselves." You can't really can you? You make it sound like they are being sent down the mines for a twelve hour shift. For heaven's sake at 9 they probably spend longer than that alone in their room doing homework.


Exactly it is a ridiculous assumption that one leads to the other. We are talking about not leaving nine year olds, not keeping teenagers tied to your apron strings.

People who let nine year olds have some independence and responsibility are very unlikely to keep their teenagers tied to their apron strings. People who don't let nine year olds have any independence might.

My kids are all problem solvers ( some are more practical than others). We have come home today from a few days away and our 15 year old has son has made us a casserole and put together a flat pack desk we had left out and apparently his older brother needed a tyre changed but had an urgent apointment so got a taxi and left his car here, when he got back our youngest had changed it for him!

He has been alone for most of the time we have been away apart from overnight as his brothers are at work all day. I certainly had no qualms leaving him as we have never had cause for concern in that area.

Interesting, I would have more concern about a 15 year old left with siblings for days at a time than I would for a 9 year old left for half an hour. I suppose it depends how old and how responsible the siblings are but it could be that the 15 year old has been effectively alone for however long you have been away. How much time would a 17 year old with a busy social life want to spend with a 15 year old brother. Maybe this is coloured by my work (mental health) I think 15 year olds are quite vulnerable and have alot of pressures, exams, peer group pressure etc.

Well one thing is for sure, we all bring our children up in our own way.

mumps

Dunroamin wrote: »

I think that sounds great but surely the point of doing things under supervision at first is that they'll soon be able to do them unsupervised? Apart from anything else, I don't think anybody's suggesting that a 9 year old left alone for an hour lights a barbecue or a campfire.:)

Exactly, and isn't it amazing that a 9 year old being left for half an hour or an hour becomes them being abandoned, left to fend for themselves or even doing a barbecue. We will have them advertising a rave on facebook next.

poet123

mumps wrote: »

Well one thing is for sure, we all bring our children up in our own way.

This thread stemmed from another which you may or may not have read. That had posts from those who left nine year olds for an hour or more from choice on a regular basis.


Because you have posted within my post and not quoted I can't answer every point but I will try to respond to the main ones.


Of course I don't equate leaving a nine year old with sending them down the mines, that would be ridiculous;) I do think that leaving a child of nine for any amount of time is unacceptable, but if a parent/other adult is not there they are being left to fend for themselves and cope with whatever arises. How are they not?

I don't think that it follows at all that those who wouldn't leave a child alone at nine will be over protective of a teen, anymore than I would say the opposite; that those who would leave a child alone from choice will be disinterested in their teens and let them run riot or do as they please.

My youngest son has three siblings, two of them live at home but work as lawyers and are 24 and 26, so I doubt he was in any real danger either mentally or physically;) As for being alone he was at a sports camp for one full day and resting and revising for the other two days with a trip to the pictures thrown in. In the evenings he went to the gym with his older brother who is a teacher, and who lives just 5 mins away. Being a teacher he was also at home during the day for the duration of our trip, but, as my youngest son is quite self reliant, he didn't want to go and stay with him which he could easily have done, he preferred to stay at home and do his own thing.

Re the BBQ, that was something I used to illustrate things my sons had done under supervision, it was never suggested that a nine year old left alone would do that. But of course you knew that! Nor did I use the emotive term "abandoned":rotfl:

poet123

Dunroamin wrote: »

I think that sounds great but surely the point of doing things under supervision at first is that they'll soon be able to do them unsupervised? Apart from anything else, I don't think anybody's suggesting that a 9 year old left alone for an hour lights a barbecue or a campfire.:)

Actually they have now! But no, they hadn't, till you mentioned it and it was misconstrued!!

zagfles

FBaby wrote: »

It all comes down to how people perceive and face risk. I think there is a section about risk taking in almost all personality tests that exist.

Two different parents will have a different perception of the risk a mature 9 year old takes and then a different attitude to whether it accepts that level of risk of not.

What I am gathering from this thread is that the issue is not so much whether a child can or cannot be mature enough to left alone but whether it is 'worth' taking the risk, hence the separation between emergency and choice.

The way I perceive risk as it's been stated by a few is that risk is all around us and there is a big difference between how risk is perceived and actual risk, all this indeed very much influenced by culture, society and our lovely media. Statistics are quite clear that a mature 9 year old is less likely to experience an accident alone at home than a 12 yo walking to school. Yet the vast majority would refuse to do the first but consider the second to be a risk to be taken.

Exactly - if you had a debate about whether it's OK for a 12 year old to walk to school, you'd be unlikely to get the type of sanctimonious preaching you get when people say they leave their 9 year old home alone for an hour or two, even though anyone with an ounce of common sense will know that a mature 9 year old will be safer home alone than the average 12 year old will be walking to school.

Spendless

zagfles wrote: »

Exactly - if you had a debate about whether it's OK for a 12 year old to walk to school, you'd be unlikely to get the type of sanctimonious preaching you get when people say they leave their 9 year old home alone for an hour or two, even though anyone with an ounce of common sense will know that a mature 9 year old will be safer home alone than the average 12 year old will be walking to school.

Isn't that the truth! The most 'at risk' my son ever was wasn't being left home alone for less than an hour aged 9 nearly 10. It was shortly before his 12th birthday, he was outside, he was in the village I've lived in on and off since the 1970s and he has since he was 19 months old, he was with a friend and he came across a group of children all known to him, all attending his school or in the primary school he had just left and 3 of them knocked him to the ground, assaulting him and hitting him round the head. The others watched, jeered on and 1 of them filmed it. Son wrestled himself free and then went to an adult he saw not far away. Someone who was a stranger to him. He asked him for help cos thankfully I have never said he wasn't allowed to talk to a stranger (go off with one is a different matter). This man came to son's assistance and later contacted the school the kids involved were at also.

poet123

Risk is risk, one does not negate another. You have to let your child out of your sight, they have to go to school etc, you do have a choice whether to leave a child at home alone.

No link to the stat yet which are mentioned here:
Statistics are quite clear that a mature 9 year old is less likely to experience an accident alone at home than a 12 yo walking to school.

Spendless

I thought I had read this somewhere. It's not about being home alone versus walking to school but about the age where it is more likely that they will be in a road accident as a pedestrian.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/8010807/Road-accident-risk-doubles-when-children-start-secondary-school.html