Would you let your children play with a pocket knife? Glue their fingers together with Super Glue? Put metal objects in the microwave? Yeah, we thought not. But you should!
That's the advice of Gever Tulley, co-author with Julie Spiegler of "50 Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do)." He says kids should be allowed to do "dangerous" things with parental supervision because this way they learn how the world works. By doing unsafe things, kids not only learn about safety, but also how to assess risk and take responsibility.
"It's a guidebook for overprotective parents," Tulley told The San Francisco Chronicle. "It will help them think more rationally about danger and risk. And it's also a source book for adventurous parents who are looking for new things to do with their kids."
5 dangerous things kids can do at home:
1. Play with fire
"Learning to control one of the most elemental forces in nature is a pivotal moment in any child's personal history," Tulley told the Chronicle. "It's the first time we get control of one of these mysterious things. And the open pit fire is a laboratory. By playing with fire, children learn about 'intake,' 'combustion,' 'exhaust.'" Fire stimulates the imagination, so kids who play with fire keep thinking of new ways to experiment with it.
2. Throw rocks
"Our brains are wired for throwing things," Tulley explained to the Chronicle. "And like muscles, if you don't use parts of your brain, they tend to atrophy over time. When you exercise them, any given muscle adds strength to the whole system and that applies to the brain. Children need to practice throwing things because it activates the frontal and parietal lobes of the brain, which help with visual acuity, 3-D understanding, reasoning and structural problem-solving. Throwing is a combination of analytical and physical skills, so it's good for whole-body training."
3. Deconstruct appliances
"Children grow up with these magical boxes all around them," Tulley said to the Chronicle. "The dishwasher washes dishes. The microwave cooks things. By taking the appliances apart, kids realize that these things weren't built by magic. They were built by people. Even if they don't know what all the individual parts are, they can puzzle out what they might be for. They get a sense that they can take things apart, and no matter how complex the thing is, they can understand parts of it."
4. Drive a car
Tulley insists kids should drive the family car in a big, empty parking lot long before they turn 16. Why? It helps them realize the responsibility of driving. "Driving a car is an empowering act for a young child. It gives them a handle on the world in a way that they don't often have access to," Tulley told the Chronicle. He recommends kids as young as 5 or 6 years old sit on a parent's lap while pulling out of the driveway.
5. Put strange stuff in the microwave
"Every day you do a scientific experiment in your kitchen," Tulley advises. "You put stuff in the microwave and ding! Your food is cooked. But no one ever thinks about what a microwave is and how it works. By experimenting with it, children learn boundaries for what's safe and what's not safe to put in the microwave." For this experiment, Tulley recommends putting a CD in the microwave by placing it on a paper towel and running it for three seconds. "It creates a spark pattern for one second," Tulley told the Chronicle. "It's a beautiful visualization for why you shouldn't put metal in the microwave."
--From the Editors at Netscape
