At What Age Do You Let Your Kids Go To Play Solo?

Parenting

by Lamar Tyler | on June 16th, 2011 | 9 comments

Over on the blog that we write for Kmart’s Playdate Place site we’re having an interesting discussion on how old is old enough for your kids to go out and play alone. Numbers have been ranging from the single digits to the double digit ages and a lot of the responses say that it depends on where you live and how mature your child is.

Check out this excerpt:

In our household we’ve been having a debate of sorts lately. We’ve been discussing if it’s OK for our 9 year old to go on her own to a friend’s house who lives in the neighborhood. Her friend lives only about a quarter of a mile away and the walk is only about five minutes. But every time she goes, we walk her halfway and her friend’s parents walk halfway and we do an exchange.

Now before you answer, the thing that is extremely weird about this is a year ago when she was 8 years old and before we moved to Georgia she went all around our Maryland neighborhood on her bicycle. She would stick her head in the door every now and then to say, “Hey I’m going to so and so’s house to play in the sprinklers” or “Can I go inside of so and so’s house to play Barbie”. She was Ms. Independent.

To read the entire blog post you can go here.

BMWK family, at what age can your kids go out to play without you?

About the author

Lamar and Ronnie Tyler are the creators of the award-winning blog BlackandMarriedWithKids.com . They also are behind the Amazon.com bestselling DVDs Happily Ever After: A Positive Image of Black Marriage, You Saved Me and Men Ain’t Boys that explores manhood in the African American community. The Tylers are also the proud parents of four children.

http://www.charismatickid.com/tv Anthony from CharismaticKid

Honestly, the real age is seven or eight… but my safety alarms go off when I even think about that. So my paranoia opinion is ten.
Ronnie_BMWK

I agree with you Anthony…my alarms are going off..so I am being conservative. However, when I was 7 or 8 years old…my sister and I roamed our subdivision and the adjacent ones too.
Ronnie_BMWK

I agree with you Anthony…my alarms are going off..so I am being conservative. However, when I was 7 or 8 years old…my sister and I roamed our subdivision and the adjacent ones too.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1186017440 Laci MissParis Duke

im sorry but my child can’t go out alone until she is 22. this world is crazy and i am such a hover mother. it frightens me to think of what happens to 7 and 8 year olds every day. In the news recently a couple in NY let their 8 year old go somewhere alone for the 1st time and he never came home. He was cut into multiple pieces by someone from their neighborhood. So, 22 it is!