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I wrote a book advising parents how to give kids a life of independent neighborhood play. Check out Playborhood - http://playborhood.com http://playborhood.com

I wrote a book advising parents how to give kids a life of independent neighborhood play. Check out Playborhood - http://playborhood.com http://playborhood.com In a nutshell, I contend that this is a social problem of neighborhood culture, and parents should work to make their neighborhoods as fun and inviting as video games and the Internet. Simply cutting off electronics and shoving them out the door won't do it because there's no one out there - neighborhoods are very boring. Somehow, we need to create a culture of play, first with parents, and later without, in our neighborhoods. The book Playborhood is all about that.

Mr_RobRoy 8y ago
I think you're right. Just unplugging and kicking the kids out the door just isn't effective, ultimately. I think that's true mainly because it takes all of the parents in the neighborhood doing the same thing. Otherwise, your kids end up outside with no one to play with because all of the kids their age are still inside attached to their electronic devices. I think it's much harder today to create alternative activities than it used to be.
- aylmao 8y ago
  I think siblings play an important role here. More than a few times I remember going out and having no one to play with but my brother, only to be joined later on by other kids. Moreover, I can only assume that it was through me that my brother got introduced to the "social scene" of the neighborhood. I was the older one, so when we came out to play, I was in charge of him, and that meant always inviting him to play and introducing him to all my friends. Siblings are like friends you have no option but having (and playing with). Incredibly reliable, in that sense (:
  - Mr_RobRoy 8y ago
    I think that parents who help their kids understand that their siblings have the potential to be their best, life-long friends are doing a wonderful thing for their kids. My sisters and I (2 years between each of us) spent a huge amount of time playing together even up through Jr. High school. We're still very close today.
    - aylmao 8y ago
      Same with my sibling and I. Unfortunately were far apart-- he's in college, I'm abroad, so interestingly enough the only way we can play together now is through video games. I care so little about League of Legends I've never played a match outside the ones we play together, but I always prioritize any planned League time over any other leisure activity (:
- feistypharit 8y ago
  Or worse, one family kicks their kids out, and they float around to all the neighbors. Eventually, neighbors learn to avoid them because it's everyday and they misbehave. /Rant
irrational 8y ago
The problem I see is that people simply don't have children anymore. We are surrounded by couples in their 20s-50s living in houses without children. When my kids want to visit friends they have to ride their bikes 1+ miles to the next family with kids (and we don't live in a rural area, we live in a densely populated suburban area) and from their those 2 kids will ride another 1+ miles to the next family with kids. I suppose the real culprit is people can't afford to have kids anymore (though we managed to have 7 kids on a single income, so it is possible).
- sevensor 8y ago
  I don't know how to identify them ahead of time, but there are definitely pockets that are densely populated with children, and I lucked into one. My kids have loads of neighborhood kids to play with. The place we moved from across town has no kids to speak of. I'd draw the same conclusion as you, if I still lived on the other side of town.
- ACow_Adonis 8y ago
  Keeping in mind I am no way a necessary fan of raising children in suburbia: My own parents moved from acreage into suburbia when I was 10 or so, but its not like distances were shorter out in the semi-rural area. And its not like many of us have a practical choice. But of all its problems, what's the problem with kids having to ride 1+ miles to their friends? When I was about 10-11, I was riding 2kms by myself (and then with my younger sister) in the Australian summer holidays down to a tennis camp. Sometimes it ran late and the sun went down, so my parents would come and pick us up in their car...just kidding, they bought me a generator to put on my bike and a reflector and I rode home in the dark. When we moved again, I had a regular neighbourhood friend and we'd go and play networked computer games and nintendo during school holidays and after school during my teenage years (having two pc's you could network was quite advanced for the 1990's). But putting this into google, his place was 1.4 kms away from my house. There was a video store 5 to 6 kms by car that had some rental games and videos, but of course we couldn't drive. But it must of been 4-5 kms by taking a shortcut through a nature reserve with our mountain bikes. And that's what we did. After a year or two, another store opened up a few kms in the other direction and we went there as well. Even back then, video games were a huge part of my life...we were nerds in the absolute sense, but so were the mountain bikes and the exploring. Maybe we were lucky backing on to some nature reserves, but even in the staid morass of suburbia, are there too many places with nothing in a 10km radius? And even if the answer is yes, even that I'm a bit skeptical of. The nature reserve attracted us because it was a place without adults and it was a little bit dangerous, not because it was set up with activities or playgrounds. In my mind, the distance wasn't a barrier to playtime. The fact that our parents would let us out to explore, and we subsequently went within about a 10km radius of our homes unsupervised on our bikes and without cell phones WAS the playtime. The changing variable isn't the distances: its the supervisory culture and the fact that everything is now streamed conveniently into our homes on demand, and the fact that many of these products are now specifically engineered to try to turn people into screen viewing zombies.
chongli 8y ago
social problem of neighborhood culture Yes it is, but you aren't going to solve it without rolling back women's rights. Neighbourhoods are not communities anymore because there aren't enough adults around during the day. With both parents working 9-5, there aren't any moms around to keep an eye on the kids playing during summer break. It was bad when we as a society told women they're not allowed to work. Now women have to work just to be able to afford a house on two incomes which previously cost only one.
- anoncoward111 8y ago
  And boy all those private investors are thrilled to keep nearly all of the productivity gains from having double the labor pool available!
  - cpach 8y ago
    And lots of women enjoy having a professional career.
    - anoncoward111 8y ago
      No doubt about that one :) It goes without saying that their financial security is thoroughly important. Still, all workers in 2019 have diminished purchasing power compared to the amount of hours worked (and commuted)
    - dawidw 8y ago
      Yes, but someone needs to raise the children.
      - cpach 8y ago
        We fathers can also take time off from work to stay at home with the kids and many of us do exactly that.
        dawidw 8y ago
watersb 8y ago
Cars. Get rid of cars. And maybe bicycle helmets; more kids will die from lack of physical activity than from a fall off a bike.
- ndnxhs 8y ago
  Get rid of helmet laws but keep reccomending them. Riding a bike with a helmet is best but riding without one is better than sitting at home.
rlue 8y ago
Last Child in the Woods is also a landmark book on this subject, and highly worth a read
freeflight 8y ago
> neighborhoods are very boring What changed to make them boring? Couldn't it rather be that neighborhoods are now considered boring due to highly interactive electronic entertainment being available, as an alternative, pretty much everywhere, at any time? Mind you: I'm not saying these things are equal, but by now electronic entertainment has been designed to be as appealing as possible, in contrast to that, the alternative of going outside to look for stimuli, has become quite unappealing and bothersome to many. Why go out in the world, to get sensual and intellectual stimulation, when you can just click away on the Internet or in Fortnite to get your "fix"? Particularly with the news cycles constantly bombarding everybody with FUD these days, making parents less likely to give their children unsupervised "outside time" even if the kids actually want to go outside.
darepublic 8y ago
I remember neighbourhood play at seven years old when my friend's older brothers donned us with boxing gloves and had us fight each other. Good memories.

Mr_RobRoy 8y ago

I think you're right. Just unplugging and kicking the kids out the door just isn't effective, ultimately. I think that's true mainly because it takes all of the parents in the neighborhood doing the same thing. Otherwise, your kids end up outside with no one to play with because all of the kids their age are still inside attached to their electronic devices. I think it's much harder today to create alternative activities than it used to be.

aylmao 8y ago
I think siblings play an important role here. More than a few times I remember going out and having no one to play with but my brother, only to be joined later on by other kids. Moreover, I can only assume that it was through me that my brother got introduced to the "social scene" of the neighborhood. I was the older one, so when we came out to play, I was in charge of him, and that meant always inviting him to play and introducing him to all my friends. Siblings are like friends you have no option but having (and playing with). Incredibly reliable, in that sense (:
- Mr_RobRoy 8y ago
  I think that parents who help their kids understand that their siblings have the potential to be their best, life-long friends are doing a wonderful thing for their kids. My sisters and I (2 years between each of us) spent a huge amount of time playing together even up through Jr. High school. We're still very close today.
  - aylmao 8y ago
    Same with my sibling and I. Unfortunately were far apart-- he's in college, I'm abroad, so interestingly enough the only way we can play together now is through video games. I care so little about League of Legends I've never played a match outside the ones we play together, but I always prioritize any planned League time over any other leisure activity (:
feistypharit 8y ago
Or worse, one family kicks their kids out, and they float around to all the neighbors. Eventually, neighbors learn to avoid them because it's everyday and they misbehave. /Rant

irrational 8y ago

The problem I see is that people simply don't have children anymore. We are surrounded by couples in their 20s-50s living in houses without children. When my kids want to visit friends they have to ride their bikes 1+ miles to the next family with kids (and we don't live in a rural area, we live in a densely populated suburban area) and from their those 2 kids will ride another 1+ miles to the next family with kids. I suppose the real culprit is people can't afford to have kids anymore (though we managed to have 7 kids on a single income, so it is possible).

sevensor 8y ago
I don't know how to identify them ahead of time, but there are definitely pockets that are densely populated with children, and I lucked into one. My kids have loads of neighborhood kids to play with. The place we moved from across town has no kids to speak of. I'd draw the same conclusion as you, if I still lived on the other side of town.
ACow_Adonis 8y ago
Keeping in mind I am no way a necessary fan of raising children in suburbia: My own parents moved from acreage into suburbia when I was 10 or so, but its not like distances were shorter out in the semi-rural area. And its not like many of us have a practical choice. But of all its problems, what's the problem with kids having to ride 1+ miles to their friends? When I was about 10-11, I was riding 2kms by myself (and then with my younger sister) in the Australian summer holidays down to a tennis camp. Sometimes it ran late and the sun went down, so my parents would come and pick us up in their car...just kidding, they bought me a generator to put on my bike and a reflector and I rode home in the dark. When we moved again, I had a regular neighbourhood friend and we'd go and play networked computer games and nintendo during school holidays and after school during my teenage years (having two pc's you could network was quite advanced for the 1990's). But putting this into google, his place was 1.4 kms away from my house. There was a video store 5 to 6 kms by car that had some rental games and videos, but of course we couldn't drive. But it must of been 4-5 kms by taking a shortcut through a nature reserve with our mountain bikes. And that's what we did. After a year or two, another store opened up a few kms in the other direction and we went there as well. Even back then, video games were a huge part of my life...we were nerds in the absolute sense, but so were the mountain bikes and the exploring. Maybe we were lucky backing on to some nature reserves, but even in the staid morass of suburbia, are there too many places with nothing in a 10km radius? And even if the answer is yes, even that I'm a bit skeptical of. The nature reserve attracted us because it was a place without adults and it was a little bit dangerous, not because it was set up with activities or playgrounds. In my mind, the distance wasn't a barrier to playtime. The fact that our parents would let us out to explore, and we subsequently went within about a 10km radius of our homes unsupervised on our bikes and without cell phones WAS the playtime. The changing variable isn't the distances: its the supervisory culture and the fact that everything is now streamed conveniently into our homes on demand, and the fact that many of these products are now specifically engineered to try to turn people into screen viewing zombies.

chongli 8y ago

social problem of neighborhood culture Yes it is, but you aren't going to solve it without rolling back women's rights. Neighbourhoods are not communities anymore because there aren't enough adults around during the day. With both parents working 9-5, there aren't any moms around to keep an eye on the kids playing during summer break. It was bad when we as a society told women they're not allowed to work. Now women have to work just to be able to afford a house on two incomes which previously cost only one.

anoncoward111 8y ago
And boy all those private investors are thrilled to keep nearly all of the productivity gains from having double the labor pool available!
- cpach 8y ago
  And lots of women enjoy having a professional career.
  - anoncoward111 8y ago
    No doubt about that one :) It goes without saying that their financial security is thoroughly important. Still, all workers in 2019 have diminished purchasing power compared to the amount of hours worked (and commuted)
  - dawidw 8y ago
    Yes, but someone needs to raise the children.
    - cpach 8y ago
      We fathers can also take time off from work to stay at home with the kids and many of us do exactly that.
      - dawidw 8y ago

watersb 8y ago

Cars. Get rid of cars. And maybe bicycle helmets; more kids will die from lack of physical activity than from a fall off a bike.

ndnxhs 8y ago
Get rid of helmet laws but keep reccomending them. Riding a bike with a helmet is best but riding without one is better than sitting at home.

rlue 8y ago

Last Child in the Woods is also a landmark book on this subject, and highly worth a read

freeflight 8y ago

> neighborhoods are very boring What changed to make them boring? Couldn't it rather be that neighborhoods are now considered boring due to highly interactive electronic entertainment being available, as an alternative, pretty much everywhere, at any time? Mind you: I'm not saying these things are equal, but by now electronic entertainment has been designed to be as appealing as possible, in contrast to that, the alternative of going outside to look for stimuli, has become quite unappealing and bothersome to many. Why go out in the world, to get sensual and intellectual stimulation, when you can just click away on the Internet or in Fortnite to get your "fix"? Particularly with the news cycles constantly bombarding everybody with FUD these days, making parents less likely to give their children unsupervised "outside time" even if the kids actually want to go outside.

darepublic 8y ago

I remember neighbourhood play at seven years old when my friend's older brothers donned us with boxing gloves and had us fight each other. Good memories.