Our Over-Controlled Society is Damaging Children’s Social Skills | Intellectual Takeout

Our Over-Controlled Society is Damaging Children’s Social Skills | Intellectual Takeout
"Have you ever wondered what happened to the days when children could roam through the neighborhood, building forts in empty lots, walking to the store a half mile away, and inventing all sorts of games to play up and down the block?

According to Angela Hanscom’s column in today’s Washington Post, well-intentioned caution has caused adults to exert a damaging overabundance of control on children’s time.

“Most children today are spending a majority of their time indoors and under the direct supervision of adults. We are dictating how children spend every waking hour both in school and outside of school. Even their play opportunities are often regulated and controlled by well-meaning adults. Hour-long recess sessions have been reduced to 20-minute rule-infested movement opportunities...

Hanscom, a pediatric occupational therapist, believes that such control is damaging children’s social behaviors and attitudes, for they increasingly exhibit negative qualities such as:  

• Entitlement
• Dependence
• Inability to resolve conflict
• Lack of confidence

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