Lenore "Free Range Kids" Skenazy talks about the insanity of sex-offender registries, citing the case of two fourteen year olds who sat on some other kids' heads and are now on the registry. For the rest of their lives, they'll have to register with the police four times a year, turn off their lights during Hallowe'en, live a set distance from bus-stops, schools and libraries and every potential employer will know that these people are on a list of "sexual predators" but will not know why. — Read the rest
A cafe in Nunawading, Australia is being forced to stop toddlers from drawing with chalk on its sidewalk, despite the fact that the kids, the cafe, the townspeople and the mayor all like the drawings. The drawings contravene the town's anti-graffiti laws, and the mayor says he can't grant a permit because someone might trip over a child, fall into traffic and die horribly. — Read the rest
An "A" student at a Virginia middle school was given a one-day suspension for holding open a door for a known adult who had her hands full. This violated the school security policy, which holds that the doors may only be opened centrally after visitors are vetted by a CCTV camera. — Read the rest
Lenore "Free Range Kids" Skenazy brings us the story of the Moorestown Children's School in New Jersey, a school that opened in 1981 on farmland, where kids are invited to learn by playing with logs, splashing in the mud, taking care of the cat, and messing around in a barn. — Read the rest
On the Free Range Kids blog, a senior at a New England high school writes in to discuss the petition she's circulating to protest her school's "appropriate touch" policy ("the only appropriate touch is a handshake"). As she says, "As a college-bound 17-year-old, I am insulted by the presumption that I am too immature to decide which kind of touches are appropriate for school. — Read the rest
A group of kids in Brisbane, Australia came together to build a spectacular, 4-storeymeter treehouse. It's the center of neighborhood life, site of block- and birthday parties. The kids' parents helped them ensure that the treehouse is structurally sound. — Read the rest
Channel 4's documentary-style drama, The Execution of Gary Glitter, imagines an alternative Britain that reintroduces the death penalty. Celebrity sex offender Paul Gadd—AKA glam rock star Gary Glitter—is re-tried for his crimes and hanged. It's a story about the moral quandary of capital punishment, generously garnished with the British media's obsession with pedophilia.
On the news that Bobtown, Pennsylvania has outlawed Hallowe'en to "keep kids safe," Lenore "Free Range Kids" Skenazy points out that there has never been a single substantiated incident of a kid being sickened, hurt or killed by doctored candy handed out during trick-or-treating in the history of America. — Read the rest
(Ed. Note: We recently gave the Boing Boing Video website a makeover that includes a new, guest-curated microblog: the "BBVBOX." Here, folks whose taste in web video we admire tweet the latest clips they find. I'll be posting periodic roundups here on the motherBoing.) — Read the rest
From the Free Range Kids blog, the story of Lori from a small town in Mississippi, who sent her 10-year-old on foot to soccer practice, only to have him picked up by the cops, who reported "hundreds" of 911 calls by curtain-twitchers who were horrified at the thought of a 10-year-old walking a third of a mile to a local school. — Read the rest
I know Lenore Skenazy's terrific blog, Free-Range Kids, has been mentioned on BB before, but IMHO it's relevant, especially when our kids are home from school for two weeks and we as parents have to choose between letting them zone out for hours with the new videogame Santa brought them, or giving them the opportunity to explore the world around them and perhaps push their abilities with a difficult project. — Read the rest
