> It seems that, in recent decades, the role of parent has expanded to include the role of personal entertainer
I feel like a missing part of the puzzle here is declining family sizes. It is a lot easier for kids to play without an adult when there are other kids around.
Nowadays kids are more likely to be only children. So no siblings to play with. Fewer kids in the neighbourhood because of demographic changes (older population, lower fertility rates). So no neighbours to play with.
Totally agree- we live in an urban area in a university city, just outside downtown- there are grad students and older couples on our block, but no other kids to play with! I really wish we’d thought more about living close to a neighborhood park or playground that would serve as a connection for kids. We love our house and our neighborhood close to both jobs- low commute times- but kids just play with their siblings (we have 3 kids) because neighborhood kids aren’t an option. Even their school has a lot of transfers in rather than neighborhood kids. Makes me sad!
Hmm, not sure if this is the case in all situations. I have 4 kids ages 7 and under. I live in a cul de sac and allow my kids lots of independent outdoor play time. They still ask that I join them in play often. In the past year I’ve been more selective about when I say “yes” and it’s only when it’s something I enjoy or want to do in that moment.
My guess is that declining fertility is the dominant cause of kids not being able to play without parents. They don’t have as many brothers and sisters! And of course this is a macro trend happening all over the world with enormous forces driving it. It ain’t gonna reverse barring a total collapse of modern women’s rights. We are clearly going to need new infrastructure for kids to have that alone free time with other kids in the absence of having 2+ siblings like Ms. Martinko’s kids. (Also they left the city and moved to a small town, which is usually only doable if you have remote work)
Luckily there are lots of people working on exactly this, with Let Grow and the other urban free play movements.
I’ve posted in other threads about this, but it is worth repeating here though: until we get a handle on the (relatively small number but still very influential) number of people undergoing drug-induced psychosis in North American cities and suburbs, European parenting isn’t going to take off. It just isn’t.
I live in Toronto where the bussing policy, to the public school board’s credit, is the same as it has always been: kids are bussed up to grade 5 and in grade 6 they’re expected to take public transit to school. I always loved that and never doubted that my kids would be able to be independent on the bus and subway. But you know what? I ride the subway to work every day and since the lockdowns ended in 2021 there are unpredictable addicts on at least 5% of the train cars I get on. Will my 11 year old daughter be street smart? Yes. She’d learn to go to the other end of the car or change cars. Does that reduce the chances of something happening to an acceptable level? Hell no.
There are unreported incidents all the time. I see serious verbal assaults and threatening movements — aimed at random people of both sexes but of course the impact is different if the guy screaming at you is double your size — at least once every 2 weeks or so.
Same with kids getting to do free street roaming etc. The public safety situation is genuinely different than 10 years ago. We have to fix it. Otherwise kids in small families who can’t play independently with their numerous siblings in their quiet small town streets are going to be stuck with their exhausted parents trying to entertain them.
I wish more of the anti-screen writers (what I call the Haidt-o-Sphere) would write about this more openly.
I'm with you! I'm not worried about my kids getting kidnapped; I'm worried about the drug addicts and people with untreated mental health issues wandering the street outside my house every day (I'm in Portland). I've learned to give them freedom when we go to safer neighborhoods or on vacation, but I agree this is a huge, under-discussed challenge when it comes to giving our kids the freedom to roam and grow up like we did.
Thanks, Katherine. I like your writing a lot (and Haidt’s, and his guest writers, and Freya India’s… the whole intellectual salon you all have built up around the anti-screen/anti-social-media movement.)
I do find one blind spot though is for urban (and even suburban) parents. Haidt often features writers who have moved to intentional Jewish religious communities, you’ve written about your move out of Toronto to a smaller town, etc.
I fully admit that European parenting, traditional hands-off parenting, screen-free living, etc. is easier in these places! So much of it has to do with security and community (what Haidt and Rausch call step 0 in the creation of phone-based childhoods) But you’d be doing those of us who remain in the city an enormous favour by thinking and writing about the constraints we face. A lot of people still live in cities and probably will for the foreseeable future. (And I’m hoping current depressing stats can be reversed again like they were in the 1990s.)
Same impression after several years in NYC. Before moving to the US I thought people who refused to use public transport were snobs, but after experiencing it, I understand why. After covid, the city has gotten increasingly aggressive and unsafe
Thanks for sharing this! We feel the same way here in Olympia, WA. We encounter drug addicted, mentally ill people daily in our town and have seen and experienced multiple aggressive situations. This is a huge problem on the West Coast, wish we could just let him roam a bit more, but it's just too sketchy.
We have an only child not by choice, and as much as I feel the physiological and psychological wear down of having to add in play - there’s only so much my son can yield a sword and attack the air!
I am also in the only child boat. My son just turned four, and I think I am going to start just setting a timer and saying that I will play for 10 minutes and then you're on your own. The worst is when he asks to play with me when we are at the park. That's what I brought you here for!
I find parenting much harder in the US because there are hardly any comfortable, pleasant urban/suburban spaces to hang out, like benches, parks, fountains, modern urban design structures etc, sometimes even no sidewalks. The parks available are often just football fields. The lack of walking culture also, that kids need to be driven everywhere and when they are it is usually a mall. So tweens can’t wander by themselves, get ice cream, sit in the square etc. Everything has to organized and arranged, like the kids need animation and a theme at all times. I find the children very overscheduled, with hardly any time for free play in a natural setting like a park. Since moving out of the city there are no places conducive to free play, which seems like a big part of the problem - they can’t just show up and mingle with peers in a parental hands-off setting.
The overscheduling is a great point I hadn't consciously thought about before. But my toddler kids definitely have some former-friends that we don't really see anymore because their parents overschedule them and seeing them requires making a booking three weeks in advance and I'm just not interested in doing that very often.
I’m glad I’m not the only one that feels this way! I cringe so hard at scheduling for kids three weeks out like it’s a damn senior vice president of a Fortune 500 company. Makes me just want to be like, nah, they’ll just hang out with the kids on the street who have nothing to do on a Saturday.
My kid is in middle school and it feels like by then most have mindboggling agendas and no free afternoons at all on weekdays or sometimes even weekends. The weeks in advance booking also puts me off, feels like such pomp and a whole process
Really good article. I think it's about balance. You can completely neglect chores, hobbies, and friends to spend all day adventuring and playing with your children, or you can neglect your children in favor of your own priorities.
I think what's important is that you *connect* with your children in some way (whether its play, conversation, shared activity - up to you). As the dad I love to throw them around, wrestle, run, go outside with them, but I don't enjoy the "crafting" activities my wife does with them.
You can also do a sort of a compromise by involving the child in your chores and hobbies. You get interaction with the child and making progress in the chore/hobby. The child gets interaction, an activity, learning hiw to do stuff and maybe even a bit of a pride in managing to do an adult thing.
My mom was great at this. She has always been very crafty and would find ways to involve me and my siblings in her hobbies sometimes. I learned fine motor skills and some practical life skills (e.g. sewing) this way
Love it. It should apply to teachers as well. I can’t recall how many times as an educator that I felt the need to entertain students to help them engage and learn. It’s exhausting. That may be my decision and my problem but it seemed so many other teachers were doing the same shtick.
Students get bored and the educational system is taxing physically and mentally on students and teachers alike. But the underlying expectation was/is keep the students engaged. You’re the problem if you don’t and complaints will be made: “That teacher is boring”; “He/She doesn’t care”; “They’re unprepared”, etc. Seldom does the student, parent or administrator step back and take a serious look at how they are engaged and withhold critical observations and blame.
When I was a toddler, my mum was juggling me, my newborn brother, and her aging parents (and grandparent) and my dad was doing long stints working overseas. She didn't['t always have time to play with me but she never felt bad about it. Figuring out my own games and entertainment was something she knew would be important for my long term development and creativity. Of course there was no technology like iPads in the 80s but she rarely dropped us in front of the telly either. We have an only child (partly by choice and partly not) and while I felt awful leaving her to play by herself (even though I was in the same room) because I either had to answer an email or make dinner or whatever, my mum reminded me that it was OK and she needed to learn how to entertain herself. She was right. Last weekend she asked me to play with her and her dollhouse which I gladly did but later in the day she was absorbed in another version of the dollhouse narrative just by herself. I don't see it as a form of neglect at all and I am so grateful that my mum took her own experiences and shared them with me on my parenting journey.
"Adults playing with children for extended periods of time on a regular basis is not a natural state." So so true!
I knew from the start I did not want to be my kids' playmate. My son was an only child for 5 years and he quickly got used to figuring out his own entertainment, though he still does want to constantly show me things.
Sometimes I tell them "I play by watching you" or that adults aren't allowed on the playground equipment (should be a rule if it isn't!). I like your script, I'm going to borrow that.
That parenthetical about babies caught my eye -- I'm an Infant and Toddler Education Specialist and definitely think babies also benefit from hands-off, uninterrupted play. When we double-down on language rich, interactive caregiving during feeding, diaper changes, sleep routines, and transitions, we can pull back during play and allow them to do their thing, in their own way, at their own pace.
I'm 100% with you on this one; I don't really play with my kids either. I read to them, do crafts or the occasional board game if I feel like it, and of course we do plenty of outings to the playground, pool, etc. At home though, they generally keep themselves occupied and I do my thing. It helps that there are three of them and we are out of the baby/toddler stage. But even when they were babies, I was a big believer in letting them spend most of their time on the floor and figure things out themselves. Never touch a running system, as my husband always says. If they're happy, let them be! And when they do get bored, my message is consistent, firm, and cheerful: "You'll figure something out!" And they always do!
I’m expecting my first in January and this is exactly how I hope to parent. My mom remembers a time when I was about 4 and was entertaining myself in some other part of the house. It had been a long while and she started to wonder what was up. Finally I came out to wherever she was with my nose painted red. I’d been painting my nose to look like Rudolf! (My mom is an artist. We did a LOT of art projects. Paints were encouraged). If my kid ever does something like that, I’ll know I’ve succeeded as a mom. I think it will be so fun to see what my kid does to entertain themselves when they get bored.
It is fun! I should say it also takes a lot of work in a way, holding the line of "It's not my job to entertain you, you'll figure it out," even in the face of whining and complaining, over and over for literally years on end. But you're giving them a great gift! At my kids' preschool they have a "toy-free time" where all the toys go "on vacation" for a few weeks. The explicit purpose is to teach kids to deal with boredom, and ultimately it's understood as addiction prevention, which I think is spot on!
I've just spent 18mo living in rural village communities in Africa and South America, researching child physical development. Couldn't agree more with your article. Children don't even have toys there. As a result, they are incredibly motivated to help adults and learn skills.
I wonder if this truly kicks on at a certain age? I have two, 1 yo and almost 3. Seeing as how they don't understand phrases like "don't pee on that!" Haha I don't think they can fully understand free play, or alone play yet. When it happens naturally I let it happen and never interrupt. I play sometimes, I say no sometimes, but he doesn't seem to understand yet. Anyone else?
Omfg, thank you! I have HUGE GUILT over this. I was an only-child and I entertained myself for hours / days / weeks / years! I have 3 kids all very close in age and they play so well together and have now formed a little gang with other kids on our street where they ride their bikes, go to each other’s houses and just noodle around. But, ever since they were little, I have this huge guilt that I wasn’t actively “playing” with them, but honestly, I just don’t enjoy it! I find it boring. 😂😂 I love to kick a ball with them sometimes or play some kind of sports, but that’s it. I feel better know I’ve probably done them a favour 😅
I agree that parenting mostly doesn't involve playing. Of course, my children are older (the youngest of 8 is 11) but they get far more satisfaction of helping with real grown man work or real grown woman work than useless stuff, and they'll figure out that it's useless. A few years ago my 13 year old helped my wife build a rabbit hutch, which not only provided a practical place to keep rabbits, built also built an emotional bond and let my wife pass on some skills. Same with helping in the kitchen. They don't just build relationships and do something practical, they also build confidence and competence.
I suspect the idea of "playing" comes from the reality that we learn best when there's no pressure. And that's true, but the presence of a supervisory adult eases that fear.
> It seems that, in recent decades, the role of parent has expanded to include the role of personal entertainer
I feel like a missing part of the puzzle here is declining family sizes. It is a lot easier for kids to play without an adult when there are other kids around.
Nowadays kids are more likely to be only children. So no siblings to play with. Fewer kids in the neighbourhood because of demographic changes (older population, lower fertility rates). So no neighbours to play with.
Totally agree- we live in an urban area in a university city, just outside downtown- there are grad students and older couples on our block, but no other kids to play with! I really wish we’d thought more about living close to a neighborhood park or playground that would serve as a connection for kids. We love our house and our neighborhood close to both jobs- low commute times- but kids just play with their siblings (we have 3 kids) because neighborhood kids aren’t an option. Even their school has a lot of transfers in rather than neighborhood kids. Makes me sad!
Hmm, not sure if this is the case in all situations. I have 4 kids ages 7 and under. I live in a cul de sac and allow my kids lots of independent outdoor play time. They still ask that I join them in play often. In the past year I’ve been more selective about when I say “yes” and it’s only when it’s something I enjoy or want to do in that moment.
My guess is that declining fertility is the dominant cause of kids not being able to play without parents. They don’t have as many brothers and sisters! And of course this is a macro trend happening all over the world with enormous forces driving it. It ain’t gonna reverse barring a total collapse of modern women’s rights. We are clearly going to need new infrastructure for kids to have that alone free time with other kids in the absence of having 2+ siblings like Ms. Martinko’s kids. (Also they left the city and moved to a small town, which is usually only doable if you have remote work)
Luckily there are lots of people working on exactly this, with Let Grow and the other urban free play movements.
I’ve posted in other threads about this, but it is worth repeating here though: until we get a handle on the (relatively small number but still very influential) number of people undergoing drug-induced psychosis in North American cities and suburbs, European parenting isn’t going to take off. It just isn’t.
I live in Toronto where the bussing policy, to the public school board’s credit, is the same as it has always been: kids are bussed up to grade 5 and in grade 6 they’re expected to take public transit to school. I always loved that and never doubted that my kids would be able to be independent on the bus and subway. But you know what? I ride the subway to work every day and since the lockdowns ended in 2021 there are unpredictable addicts on at least 5% of the train cars I get on. Will my 11 year old daughter be street smart? Yes. She’d learn to go to the other end of the car or change cars. Does that reduce the chances of something happening to an acceptable level? Hell no.
There are unreported incidents all the time. I see serious verbal assaults and threatening movements — aimed at random people of both sexes but of course the impact is different if the guy screaming at you is double your size — at least once every 2 weeks or so.
Same with kids getting to do free street roaming etc. The public safety situation is genuinely different than 10 years ago. We have to fix it. Otherwise kids in small families who can’t play independently with their numerous siblings in their quiet small town streets are going to be stuck with their exhausted parents trying to entertain them.
I wish more of the anti-screen writers (what I call the Haidt-o-Sphere) would write about this more openly.
I'm with you! I'm not worried about my kids getting kidnapped; I'm worried about the drug addicts and people with untreated mental health issues wandering the street outside my house every day (I'm in Portland). I've learned to give them freedom when we go to safer neighborhoods or on vacation, but I agree this is a huge, under-discussed challenge when it comes to giving our kids the freedom to roam and grow up like we did.
You raise good points, Geoff. I'm going to think more about these.
Thanks, Katherine. I like your writing a lot (and Haidt’s, and his guest writers, and Freya India’s… the whole intellectual salon you all have built up around the anti-screen/anti-social-media movement.)
I do find one blind spot though is for urban (and even suburban) parents. Haidt often features writers who have moved to intentional Jewish religious communities, you’ve written about your move out of Toronto to a smaller town, etc.
I fully admit that European parenting, traditional hands-off parenting, screen-free living, etc. is easier in these places! So much of it has to do with security and community (what Haidt and Rausch call step 0 in the creation of phone-based childhoods) But you’d be doing those of us who remain in the city an enormous favour by thinking and writing about the constraints we face. A lot of people still live in cities and probably will for the foreseeable future. (And I’m hoping current depressing stats can be reversed again like they were in the 1990s.)
Same impression after several years in NYC. Before moving to the US I thought people who refused to use public transport were snobs, but after experiencing it, I understand why. After covid, the city has gotten increasingly aggressive and unsafe
Thanks for sharing this! We feel the same way here in Olympia, WA. We encounter drug addicted, mentally ill people daily in our town and have seen and experienced multiple aggressive situations. This is a huge problem on the West Coast, wish we could just let him roam a bit more, but it's just too sketchy.
We have an only child not by choice, and as much as I feel the physiological and psychological wear down of having to add in play - there’s only so much my son can yield a sword and attack the air!
In the same boat with an only child, and totally agree!
I am also in the only child boat. My son just turned four, and I think I am going to start just setting a timer and saying that I will play for 10 minutes and then you're on your own. The worst is when he asks to play with me when we are at the park. That's what I brought you here for!
I find parenting much harder in the US because there are hardly any comfortable, pleasant urban/suburban spaces to hang out, like benches, parks, fountains, modern urban design structures etc, sometimes even no sidewalks. The parks available are often just football fields. The lack of walking culture also, that kids need to be driven everywhere and when they are it is usually a mall. So tweens can’t wander by themselves, get ice cream, sit in the square etc. Everything has to organized and arranged, like the kids need animation and a theme at all times. I find the children very overscheduled, with hardly any time for free play in a natural setting like a park. Since moving out of the city there are no places conducive to free play, which seems like a big part of the problem - they can’t just show up and mingle with peers in a parental hands-off setting.
The overscheduling is a great point I hadn't consciously thought about before. But my toddler kids definitely have some former-friends that we don't really see anymore because their parents overschedule them and seeing them requires making a booking three weeks in advance and I'm just not interested in doing that very often.
I’m glad I’m not the only one that feels this way! I cringe so hard at scheduling for kids three weeks out like it’s a damn senior vice president of a Fortune 500 company. Makes me just want to be like, nah, they’ll just hang out with the kids on the street who have nothing to do on a Saturday.
My kid is in middle school and it feels like by then most have mindboggling agendas and no free afternoons at all on weekdays or sometimes even weekends. The weeks in advance booking also puts me off, feels like such pomp and a whole process
Really good article. I think it's about balance. You can completely neglect chores, hobbies, and friends to spend all day adventuring and playing with your children, or you can neglect your children in favor of your own priorities.
I think what's important is that you *connect* with your children in some way (whether its play, conversation, shared activity - up to you). As the dad I love to throw them around, wrestle, run, go outside with them, but I don't enjoy the "crafting" activities my wife does with them.
You can also do a sort of a compromise by involving the child in your chores and hobbies. You get interaction with the child and making progress in the chore/hobby. The child gets interaction, an activity, learning hiw to do stuff and maybe even a bit of a pride in managing to do an adult thing.
My mom was great at this. She has always been very crafty and would find ways to involve me and my siblings in her hobbies sometimes. I learned fine motor skills and some practical life skills (e.g. sewing) this way
This!!!
Love it. It should apply to teachers as well. I can’t recall how many times as an educator that I felt the need to entertain students to help them engage and learn. It’s exhausting. That may be my decision and my problem but it seemed so many other teachers were doing the same shtick.
Students get bored and the educational system is taxing physically and mentally on students and teachers alike. But the underlying expectation was/is keep the students engaged. You’re the problem if you don’t and complaints will be made: “That teacher is boring”; “He/She doesn’t care”; “They’re unprepared”, etc. Seldom does the student, parent or administrator step back and take a serious look at how they are engaged and withhold critical observations and blame.
When I was a toddler, my mum was juggling me, my newborn brother, and her aging parents (and grandparent) and my dad was doing long stints working overseas. She didn't['t always have time to play with me but she never felt bad about it. Figuring out my own games and entertainment was something she knew would be important for my long term development and creativity. Of course there was no technology like iPads in the 80s but she rarely dropped us in front of the telly either. We have an only child (partly by choice and partly not) and while I felt awful leaving her to play by herself (even though I was in the same room) because I either had to answer an email or make dinner or whatever, my mum reminded me that it was OK and she needed to learn how to entertain herself. She was right. Last weekend she asked me to play with her and her dollhouse which I gladly did but later in the day she was absorbed in another version of the dollhouse narrative just by herself. I don't see it as a form of neglect at all and I am so grateful that my mum took her own experiences and shared them with me on my parenting journey.
"Adults playing with children for extended periods of time on a regular basis is not a natural state." So so true!
I knew from the start I did not want to be my kids' playmate. My son was an only child for 5 years and he quickly got used to figuring out his own entertainment, though he still does want to constantly show me things.
Sometimes I tell them "I play by watching you" or that adults aren't allowed on the playground equipment (should be a rule if it isn't!). I like your script, I'm going to borrow that.
I’ve never felt so seen! I call my parenting a form of benign neglect because I just CAN’T add playing to the list!
Benign might be wishful thinking
That parenthetical about babies caught my eye -- I'm an Infant and Toddler Education Specialist and definitely think babies also benefit from hands-off, uninterrupted play. When we double-down on language rich, interactive caregiving during feeding, diaper changes, sleep routines, and transitions, we can pull back during play and allow them to do their thing, in their own way, at their own pace.
Yep! Been sayin! Great post that should be shared far and wide.
I'm 100% with you on this one; I don't really play with my kids either. I read to them, do crafts or the occasional board game if I feel like it, and of course we do plenty of outings to the playground, pool, etc. At home though, they generally keep themselves occupied and I do my thing. It helps that there are three of them and we are out of the baby/toddler stage. But even when they were babies, I was a big believer in letting them spend most of their time on the floor and figure things out themselves. Never touch a running system, as my husband always says. If they're happy, let them be! And when they do get bored, my message is consistent, firm, and cheerful: "You'll figure something out!" And they always do!
I’m expecting my first in January and this is exactly how I hope to parent. My mom remembers a time when I was about 4 and was entertaining myself in some other part of the house. It had been a long while and she started to wonder what was up. Finally I came out to wherever she was with my nose painted red. I’d been painting my nose to look like Rudolf! (My mom is an artist. We did a LOT of art projects. Paints were encouraged). If my kid ever does something like that, I’ll know I’ve succeeded as a mom. I think it will be so fun to see what my kid does to entertain themselves when they get bored.
It is fun! I should say it also takes a lot of work in a way, holding the line of "It's not my job to entertain you, you'll figure it out," even in the face of whining and complaining, over and over for literally years on end. But you're giving them a great gift! At my kids' preschool they have a "toy-free time" where all the toys go "on vacation" for a few weeks. The explicit purpose is to teach kids to deal with boredom, and ultimately it's understood as addiction prevention, which I think is spot on!
I've just spent 18mo living in rural village communities in Africa and South America, researching child physical development. Couldn't agree more with your article. Children don't even have toys there. As a result, they are incredibly motivated to help adults and learn skills.
I wonder if this truly kicks on at a certain age? I have two, 1 yo and almost 3. Seeing as how they don't understand phrases like "don't pee on that!" Haha I don't think they can fully understand free play, or alone play yet. When it happens naturally I let it happen and never interrupt. I play sometimes, I say no sometimes, but he doesn't seem to understand yet. Anyone else?
Omfg, thank you! I have HUGE GUILT over this. I was an only-child and I entertained myself for hours / days / weeks / years! I have 3 kids all very close in age and they play so well together and have now formed a little gang with other kids on our street where they ride their bikes, go to each other’s houses and just noodle around. But, ever since they were little, I have this huge guilt that I wasn’t actively “playing” with them, but honestly, I just don’t enjoy it! I find it boring. 😂😂 I love to kick a ball with them sometimes or play some kind of sports, but that’s it. I feel better know I’ve probably done them a favour 😅
I agree that parenting mostly doesn't involve playing. Of course, my children are older (the youngest of 8 is 11) but they get far more satisfaction of helping with real grown man work or real grown woman work than useless stuff, and they'll figure out that it's useless. A few years ago my 13 year old helped my wife build a rabbit hutch, which not only provided a practical place to keep rabbits, built also built an emotional bond and let my wife pass on some skills. Same with helping in the kitchen. They don't just build relationships and do something practical, they also build confidence and competence.
I suspect the idea of "playing" comes from the reality that we learn best when there's no pressure. And that's true, but the presence of a supervisory adult eases that fear.