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To: Lane3 who wrote (3425)	3/18/2002 7:24:22 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 21057

I meant "we" to mean anyone who is not a kid now. But I understand how growing up in the 70s can be different then growing up earlier decades. Now kids are overscheduled and pressured. I mentioned that idea, but you fleshed it out a lot better. I didn't realize that there wasn't a lot of homework back then. I agree that the safety concern is a lot greater now. Partially, perhaps mostly because things are more dangerous for unsupervised kids now, but also because parents and others are more aware of dangers even when the actual threat is not so high. Its interesting that you prefer your time as a kid both to the generations before and those who came after you. ("My parents had to work when they were kids. Now kids are overscheduled and pressured. I think my peer group had the "real" childhood.") I think that when I grew up it was in-between your experience and that of kids today. We had homework in elementary school buy probably not as much as they get today (I think with the parents helping the kids through all the homework now it becomes homework for the parents as much as it is for the kids) Things where more relaxed then they are now, but not as much as the picture you paint of your childhood. I did play organized sports, but not when I was really young, and not enough to prevent me from having time to just hand around the neighborhood and play. There was less concern about strangers, and a lot less fear about the neighbors hurting children so we did wander around the neighborhood without supervision. We didn't hitch rides much but this was not only due to fear, but also due to the fact that cars where more common every family had at least one. I never really skated much. There was some fear that if you skated on the pond you would fall through the ice, and I don't think I had the best balance in the world so skating really wasn't my thing. I spent a lot of time reading as a kid. The local library had a contest where you could get points for reading different books or stories. The points could be exchanged for McDonalds gift certificates. I read a lot and I also figured out the way the rules would make it easy to get points with less effort (for example 4 short stories gave you as many points as a Novel so I read a book with 50 short short stories). I earned 17 McDs gift certificates (and my big sister earned 4 or 5), but they library had only bought 5 (and the area it covered had about 20,000 people) because they figured so few kids would read enough to earn any. I think they may have thought I was lying because they didn't give me any. Tim

To: Lane3 who wrote (3425)	3/18/2002 10:47:41 PM
From: J. C. Dithers	Respond to of 21057

We just played. I have a lot of grandkids to observe in the 2 to 7 range. One of the most striking things to me is that kids do not know how to play. They need to have adults set up play activities for them, and then to actually participate in the play with them. If you say to one of these kids, "We're talking, go play by yourself," they look at you clueless. The younger ones just wail when they are left alone. I think there is a pattern here, that the young parents cannot stand any wailing, so they entertain and amuse the toddler, and then as the kid gets a bit older, they expect that adults will be their playmates. Along with that, I observe that there is no longer anything like a kids table for meals, and that kids expect to eat with the adults. Then, the whole table becomes a kiddie-talk table. Once upon a time, there was saying, "Kids should be seen and not heard." Maybe that went out with Dr. Spock. I agree that you fear being an old coot when you start too many sentences with, "Well, in my day..." But there were things about our day that made a lot of sense, one of which was learning to amuse yourself. That developed a lot of imagination and creativity, especially without the help of TV and computer games. I had hardly any toys that required batteries or did things by themselves. Whatever my toys did, I made them do it. The same idea carried over into group play and sports, where kids created their own games and teams and didn't have adults planning everything out for them. All I know is that had a great time as a kid, and I wouldn't want to trade places with the kids I see now, no matter how many cool toys an gizmos they may have. (Which is many too many). JC

To: Lane3 who wrote (3425)	7/22/2005 7:57:46 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 21057

"NO RUNNING ON THE PLAYGROUND!" [Michael Graham] Why not just ban playing, too? Whenever I read one of these stories about governments ordering kids to stop playing tag, or removing swings and sandboxes from playgrounds, I always ask myself: “Who is dumb enough to defend these policies in public?” Thanks to this article in the Sun-Sentinel of Florida, now I know. It’s Safety Director Jerry Graziose, the Broward County, FL official who ordered kids to stop running at county playgrounds: How about swings or those hand-pulled merry-go-rounds [being allowed on playgrounds]? "Nope. They've got moving parts. Moving parts on equipment is the number one cause of injury on the playgrounds." Teeter-totters? "Nope. That's moving too." Sandboxes? "Well, I have to be careful about animals" turning them into litter boxes. Cement crawl tubes? "Vagrants. The longer they are, the higher possibility that a vagrant could stay in them. How about sanity? Common sense? Are these allowed in Broward County, FL? Posted at 09:59 AM corner.nationalreview.com sun-sentinel.com