Does this actually happen? Can any American parents here confirm that they actually do structure every free minute of their kids' time and never let them simpl

Does this actually happen? Can any American parents here confirm that they actually do structure every free minute of their kids' time and never let them simply run around and play on their own? We raise our kids kinda like the author describes as the "French" way. You know, taking them along as we live our lives, and letting them play however they like. As it happens, we do actually live in France, but it never occurred to me that we were doing anything particularly novel. If anything I thought our way of raising kids was the "American" way, and that the French are too stifling in the way they confine their kids to pushchairs with pacifiers in their mouths to sit quietly in the corner until age 5. The only case I can think of among my acquaintance of the overscheduling described in the article was an English mother. Still, I wouldn't use that as an example to base an article like this on. In short, I don't buy it. Surely nobody actually thinks that is a good idea.