Did you have a "free-range" childhood? Where you a latchkey kid?

[Lucini]

I wasn't quite free range, not quite latch key.

We lived in an apartment complex not too far from my best friends house, it was gated so we could basically run wild in there until it got dark. It also helped that two of my aunts lived in that same complex a bit further back. Only permission needed was to go outside the gate and it needed to be a specific place. Baseball park? Sure. Best friend's house? Also fine as long as his Dad and grandma were fine with it.

If I was over at my grandparent's house, basically around the block and maybe to a small restaurant a block or two away. Maximum. It was an older neighborhood that unfortunately fell into gang violence and the drug trade.

Contrast this with the time I would spend with my Dad, growing up in the SF Bay Area/Oakland/East Bay. I would ride public transit to karate lessons, from one grandparent to another, regardless of if it was in the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood or a "better" one. Same went for Oakland. I was basically free to get lost in the city with no cell phone (they weren't common when I was 7-9 years old) and no real money for pay phones.

 

[SigSig]

6yo+ I was basically spending the whole day outside going anywhere in a ~5km radius on my bike until it was dark, unless the weather was shit and I was playing videogames inside. this only stopped when I picked up MMOs at age 16 and never left my room again.

 

[andymcc]

god i am so glad i didn't grow up with a smartphone. i'm very glad that there was still a very big "disconnect" between my life irl and online.

 

[Deleted member 17210]

Born in 1975, free range kid. I still have my house key from 1986 and still use the same keychain today. The key is broken but I keep it on there for tradition.

There was one time where my friend and I were walking through a nearby wooded area and some creepy dude walked past us. We looked back and he was masturbating. We never told our parents back then because we feared losing our freedom to roam.

 

[entremet]

Born in 1975, free range kid. I still have my house key from 1986 and still use the same keychain today. The key is broken but I keep it on there for tradition.

There was one time where my friend and I were walking through a nearby wooded area and some creepy dude walked past us. We looked back and he was masturbating. We never told our parents back then because we feared losing our freedom to roam.

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So finding porn in the woods was not a made up thing lol.

 

[Replicant]

Grew up in the 80's/90's. Just had to be home for dinner and bedtime

 

[Chucker]

Was literally talking to my daughter about this yesterday as we went to my parents house to swim. Drove her around the neighborhood, showed her where my friend/her friend's dad used to live and we just hung out all day. Told her we were up at 9 in the summer and out the door until the parents came home around 5ish. Making forts in woods, fishing, swimming in the river.

It's tough because I grew up in a suburb and we currently live on a rural road where people really open up on since it's got a good amount of straightaway. She understands that but says she wishes she grew up when I did since she could just go out and do things all day. She then told me the one time she was able to do that at a friend's house she rode on dirtbikes and did ding dong ditch. I told her there are certain things that you shouldn't tell your mom, that is one of them lol.

 

[Trouble]

Born in 1975, free range kid. I still have my house key from 1986 and still use the same keychain today. The key is broken but I keep it on there for tradition.

There was one time where my friend and I were walking through a nearby wooded area and some creepy dude walked past us. We looked back and he was masturbating. We never told our parents back then because we feared losing our freedom to roam.

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Go team 75.

Not a latchkey key, but definitely free range. Summers and weekends the only real rule was to be back home for dinner or call and ask if I could eat at a friends. Lunch was at whoever's house we were at. There was a very communal parenting thing going on in my neighborhood. All the parents were friends, so someone was always looking out that we weren't doing anything too stupid.

So finding porn in the woods was not a made up thing lol.

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Very real. I know of 3 separate instances of it from my childhood.

 

[bsigg]

90s/00s kid, free range like 80% of the time. During whatever sport season it was it kinda made it a little harder because it was school, practice and then home for dinner/homework.

In the summer though we would be gone all day on our bikes at pools or just riding around if the weather wasn't bad. Some summers ended up being packed with tournaments though so we spent a lot of time traveling and then sitting around between practices and games.

 

[Brinbe]

Yep. Born in 86. From the time I was in 3rd/4th grade, which would've been in the early-mid 90s, I walked home myself or with friends from school that lived in the same complex. I definitely enjoyed that freedom and independence.

 

[greenbird]

Yeah, it was dope. I had tons of freedom growing up in the 90's, and was entrusted from a young age to roam or stay by myself. If I was out all day, I was expected to be home for dinner, which was pretty much my "check in", unless there were already known plans for staying at a friends house or something. If it wasn't a school night, then I would go back out after dinner and do whatever until it was late. Pre-cell phone days, so there was no contact from the time I left the house until I came back. Needless to say, I had a lot of fun. Mostly the good kind, a bit of bad, but nothing dumb enough to fuck up the whole arrangement.

 

[smurfx]

I was able to stay out pretty late. Although most times I was busy playing videogames. My friends and I would go riding pretty damn far on our bikes.

 

[Geeko]

I was born early 80s and was free to do as I pleased until dinner.

 

[deimosmasque]

A little of both. I was latchkey until my mom got home and then free range after that.

 

[UraMallas]

39 years old.

It is strange to me. I grew up in Iowa in the late 80s and early 90s so there were several high-profile kidnappings in and around my community. Every single parent knew about it but that still didn't actually change anything. We were all out and about from sunup to sundown just roaming backyards, down towns, woods and streams. There was "make sure not to get in cars with strangers" but there was never even an attempt to keep any of us in structured play date environments. I honestly don't know that I ever even HAD a playdate. If you weren't within close walking distance to me, you might as well have not existed as far as friendships go.

As for how I would raise children? I guess I would have to conform to the norm now but I definitely think something is lost in today's incredibly structured and chaperoned play. I don't know how much of a difference there truly is in the amount of children being kidnapped, either.

 

[LProtagonist]

Grew up in the 90's mostly. Had a key and would get home from school with no one home. If I wanted to I could just go wander the neighborhood with friends. Lived in a small town so before getting a license (late middle school/early high school) someone's parent would drive us to the mall area and drop us off there for a while. Got a cell phone around the end of high school.

 

[crimsonECHIDNA]

Absolutely was not a free-range kid. My mom was overprotective as all hell despite me and my siblings often having to be home until she got back from work late. lol

 

[UraMallas]

So finding porn in the woods was not a made up thing lol.

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You joke but no it was not made up. I found porn in the woods twice with my friends.

 

[ArtTeitlebaum]

Totally free range. Like all the kids in our neighbourhood. Working class moms had better to do than look for their kids lol. On our bikes we were free to go all day till the evening meal and then again till sunset.

 

[bob1001]

I had a huge extended family and they were spread out very evenly across the village I grew up in so safety wasn't an issue because I was always within range of someone I knew. On one hand I had a lot of freedom but on the other I was constantly being surveiled by busybody family members who I'd never met but were willing to give my parent's a call if they saw me misbehaving.

 

[Auros01]

As I grew up in the early 90s, my dad moved us into a gated community. I was able to freely roam the neighborhood, ride my bike, go to people's houses, and I never really had to check in too much. Just home by dark.

I wasn't allowed to go outside the gates of the neighborhood, though.

So, I wouldn't say that was full "free range" but at least partial.

 

[KeyBladerXIII]

I was allowed outside without supervision in the early 2000's. Not free range, technically, I grew up on a big military base but because of that all the kids in my school came from the same 3 or 4 neighborhood divisions so there was never any fear of me being snatched up.

 

[Baji Boxer]

I was a limited range kid. Could roam around some if I were a part of a pack of kids, but also had rules about which streets we couldn't cross, and were supposed to go home (or to certain other parents' homes) if we saw some specific shady people in the neighborhood.

 

[captive]

I told her there are certain things that you shouldn't tell your mom, that is one of them lol.

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god i can't wait for my kids to understand this. They're still in the you tell them *not* to say something and the first thing they do is go tell that person exactly what you said, stage.

"dont tell your mom"
*immedietely runs telling mom everyhing*

 

[Chucker]

god i can't wait for my kids to understand this. They're still in the you tell them *not* to say something and the first thing they do is go tell that person exactly what you said, stage.

"dont tell your mom"
*immedietely runs telling mom everyhing*

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My 11 year old gets it. My soon to be 7 year old makes a beeline straight to whoever you said to maybe not talk about it and just spills the entirety of the beans.

 

[Layla]

full on free range, could go wherever I wanted, just expected to come back when it got dark
we didn't have a car so I walked 2 miles to school on my own starting age 5
also started going into town at night to see gigs etc when I was 15, could get in anywhere cos I was quite tall for my age
thinking about all this freedom and trust, I'm going to thank my parents next time I call them for all this haha

 

[Fuhgeddit]

I wasn't free ranges and my wife wasn't either. We just had a kid and we've been letting her wander around the house and look for things, but we've been helicoptering so we make sure she doesn't hit her head on the tile or wood or make sure she grabs a piece of glass furniture and breaks it.

I'm not sure what we'll do as she gets older but my wife and I have been discussing it very minimally. We'll see how it goes. Parenting is complex for sure.

 

[Pygrus]

I was born in 91 and was totally free range as soon as I hit like 6. I do remember my Mom getting pretty pissed at me and my friends for exploring really deep in the woods and after that point we still did that sort of stuff but just wouldn't say anything about it.

 

[teruterubozu]

I grew up in Tokyo. Took the subway to school and back solo as an elementary kid. I think about that today and no way would I let my daughter do that. lol.

 

[Parch]

90% of child abduction is done by a parent in a custody dispute. They're not really in any danger. I'd be curious to see stats proving that kids are less safe now than decades past.

 

[hobblygobbly]

free range, norm in europe and still is, every day i see tonnes of kids out and about in the city themselves

here in germany it is normal for kids to go to school themselves using public transport from age of 7 up, that's how the majority of kids get to school and back

 

[Supreme Bean]

I'm aware that I am worried about my own kids doing things that were mournful to me as a child.
By age 10 I was going out on my bike, playing in the woods, going shopping etc and I would not feel relaxed about my own kids doing the same thing.
At secondary school (11+) I didn't have a mobile, and I might take hours to get home because I would stop over at friends houses etc, and my parents where never worried.

 

[Lego]

My parents didn't pay attention at all. I do wish they were stricter.

 

[DeliciousSunnyD!]

I was pretty "free range". I grew up in hilly Appalachia, on top of a forested, hilly landscape neighborhood and I basically had free reign to go out and explore and do stuff at my leisure. I also didn't have really any strict restrictions on things I did/content I consumed indoors either. So, little in the way of "parental boundaries" in most phases of my childhood life yeah.

I was a quiet, fast learning kid who mostly kept to myself and didn't cause trouble for anyone which also helped enable my "lack of oversight" I'm sure.

 

[Lupo]

Free Range, but a lot of kids would willingly stay indoors to play video games a lot. We'd travel to each other's houses but mostly stay inside to play the games that the other didn't have. It was actually during high school that a lot of people my age dropped that behavior in favor of physically going to the beach, or malls, or skate park, or goofing off somewhere.

Speaking of games, I'm sure we're all familiar with the stories of Shigeru Miyamoto wandering around nature as a child, and venturing into caves and forests, and discovering small lakes and what not. If he wasn't raised in such a free range manner he wouldn't have been able to incorporate all that into the games that kids my age willingly glued ourselves indoors to play.

 

[Rhaknar]

I had free range, I just chose not to exercise it because I was a ultra nerd (as opposed to just a...regular nerd now that im an adult) and just stayed home playing with toys or videogames instead of going out.

In fact, it's probably the reason I love stuff like Stranger Thigns / Goonies / Adventures in Babysitting / It, because I never had that "kids going out and shit happens" experience when I was a kid.

 

[thewienke]

I wasn't technically free range from like 5-12. There were busy neighborhood boundary roads that I wasn't allowed to cross or navigate mostly because drivers be crazy. The boundary was only a couple of blocks from ages 5-7. It got a lot bigger from 7-12.

On a map it was about a 2 mile x 3 mile rectangle within a very large neighborhood that included the lakefront, the public pool, and nearly the entire footprint of my local school so I could visit basically anyone.

From like age 12 onward, there wasn't a boundary. I was lucky to have a car for my own use when I turned 16 and I basically just had to tell my parents where I was generally going to be that evening. After my mom died and it was just me and my dad, I would just write on a post it note where I went off to which was a habit I carried into my early 20s.

 

[amusix]

Once I started walking/riding a bike to school (3rd grade) I was open to do whatever after school. Call before dinner.

 

[kamineko]

80s. Just had to be home for dinner.

My parents thought being outside was healthier than staying in (and it was in terms of exercise). They encouraged it

 

[Bane]

I grew up on a 60 acre horse farm in the 80's so I was pretty free range. During summer or when I was home from school I just kinda did whatever I wanted. Be it go out and play with other kids there, play video games, watch stuff, or just walk over to the barns and talk to people. Usually it was this until later in the evening when my mom was done then it became a bit more structured, dinner, homework, bed. That stuff.

I could never see letting my kids outside unsupervised now. They want to play in the yard, I'm sitting out on the porch just in case.

 

[riotous]

Free Range / Grass Fed / Shade Grown / Single Source according to my Twitter bio.

 

[Poeton]

I was basically free range. After school we could basically go anywhere in the neighborhood until dark. Towards the end of the summer of 1991, my older sister and I started staying home alone with the caveat that we were forbidden to go outside. We soon became latchkey kids and little by little we were able to go out in our neighborhood, while home alone, and mess about, basically until dark.

 

[Ernest]

Also, when I was around 10 years old to my early teens (in the mid-1980s), my mom would go to the mall, take me, and let me wander around on my own, and we'd meet at a predesignated area when it was time to go home. Back then, malls were basically social-hubs for people my age - especially if you wanted to run into a girl you liked.

 

[Reinhard]

Free range in the 80s, just had to let my parents know sort of where we were going in advance. It seems like free range would work even better today with cell phones so parents could keep track of their kids location.. But the scare 24/7 news cycle changed everything.

 

[crazillo]

I'm making a pretty big comic-style 90s-themed childhood game in Dreams right now that will release this summer and this is actually a big topic and inspiration for it, because I noticed the big difference for my own childhood to my nephew today :) Title will be Those Childhood Summers.

 

[Parch]

It seems like free range would work even better today with cell phones so parents could keep track of their kids location.. But the scare 24/7 news cycle changed everything.

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It's a government conspiracy. Keep the people paranoid and scared. There are pervs hunting your children. They need more tax money to keep your children safe.

 

[GangWarily]

You know that new show on Netflix where little Japanese kids are sent on errands? That was pretty close to my childhood in Japan. With that being said, you're able to get places walking in Japan unlike here in the US.

 

[Mammoth Jones]

When I was small? Like 5/6? No. When I was 10/11? Yea, I was allowed to walk around the neighborhood to visit friends houses. Had to call and ask if they could have company. My parents talked to and met their parents just to get a feel for the people they'd be sending me to. Rode my bike two blocks over. We rode our bikes all over the place. Usually to a park, a store, or to someone else's house to play some video games/chill out.

My friends would bring their "kid" siblings who were younger 7/8, we'd do the same stuff. Kid stuff. Just go to the park and run around, play some ball, play some games somewhere.

But young like 5? Absolutely not. To be fair, my parents didn't have access to an online database showing all the rapists and pedophiles that lived in our area. Now, I do and I know I've seen a few of those faces around town so nah. Won't be letting kiddo run wild at 7 years by herself.

 

[Lupo]

An interesting thing I remember is how I saw the progression of technology already begin to change my parents behavior. My parents were the type to let me out from morning until sun down, as long as they had a general idea of where I was going to be, but I remember when pagers first appeared. They bought my sister one, who was in high school, as she wanted to be one of the few people then to have one. From then on though, every time I went out, I had to take her pager too, so they could keep better tabs on me at all times. I'm sure if cell phones were ubiquitous like today, they would've constantly wanted to know where I was and what I was doing at all times. The opportunity to moniter us through technology immediately shifted my parents behavior from completely free range towards helicopter parenting even though they didn't start out that way.

 

[Mammoth Jones]

It's a government conspiracy. Keep the people paranoid and scared. There are pervs hunting your children. They need more tax money to keep your children safe.

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To be fair, sometimes pervs do hurt children. I'm not shocked parents choose to err on the side of caution during early years. But I don't recall 5 year olds rolling out alone where I was. They would roll, but usually with an older sibling around to keep an eye.

An interesting thing I remember is how I saw the progression of technology already begin to change my parents behavior. My parents were the type to let me out from morning until sun down, as long as they had a general idea of where I was going to be, but I remember when pagers first appeared. They bought my sister one, who was in high school, as she wanted to be one of the few people in her high school then to have one. From then on though, every time I went out, I had to take her pager too, so they could keep better tabs on me at all times. I'm sure if cell phones were ubiquitous like today, they would've kept constant tabs on me as well, since the opportunity was there. The opportunity to keep closer tabs through technology immediately shifted my parents behavior closer towards helicopter parenting even though they didn't start out that way.

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There was no choice since the tech didn't exist. But now that it does, why wouldn't a parent want their kid to have the ability to reach them/911 in an emergency? I don't see that as a bad thing.