Let Go and Let Grow: Raising Confident, Independent Children with Lenore Skenazy
The St. John Parent Association, in partnership with ParentMap, provided an opportunity to hear Dr. Lenore Skenazy speak to our community on May 6, 2025. Skenazy, author of “Free-Range Kids” shared her personal journey raising confident, independent kids and the growing movement to resist the pressures to be a hyper-involved parent in favor of a more laissez-faire approach.
Key Takeaways
Risk vs. Reward in Parenting
Modern parenting often equates any potential reward with an associated risk of harm—even death. This distorted risk assessment discourages everyday childhood experiences that were once considered normal.
- Example: The odds of a child being abducted by a stranger are so low that a child would have to be left outside, unattended, for 750,000 years for it to statistically occur. Yet, many parents still act as if this is an imminent threat.
Cell Phones: Trust vs. Surveillance
The issue isn’t how many hours kids are on their phones—it’s what they’re missing because of them: unstructured play, exploration, and meaningful real-world experiences.
- Phones have become tools of surveillance, allowing parents to micromanage their children from afar.
- In the past, kids walked to and from school alone. Parents didn’t obsess over their whereabouts—they practiced trust.
- Trust grows with experience: when kids go out into the world and come back safe, both child and parent gain confidence.
Tracking every move undermines this. It tells children the world isn’t safe unless someone is watching, which weakens their sense of security and self-reliance.
Learning Through Experience
Safety-focused parenting often prevents children from doing the very things that help them grow.
- Nervousness about trying something new is normal—and accomplishing it builds self-esteem.
- Even failure is a teacher. Getting lost in the grocery store and figuring it out fosters resilience and calm under pressure.
- Overprotective parenting and the “everyone gets a trophy” mindset stem more from a parent’s discomfort with failure than a child’s inability to cope.
“The only way for kids to refrain from intervention is for us, the adults, not to be there.”
The Joy in Parenting
There’s a unique joy in witnessing how children grow. But when you’re up-close and involved in every moment, you may miss the bigger picture—the transformation that comes from space, independence, and self-direction.
The Let Grow Movement: Restoring Childhood Freedom
Skenazy’s Let Grow initiative encourages schools to help bring independence back to childhood through two simple programs:
- The Let Grow Experience
Teachers assign students to go home and do something on their own—without a parent’s help—and write about it. This builds confidence and self-reliance in both kids and parents. - The Let Grow Play Club
Schools open early or stay late to provide time for unstructured, child-led play. No coaches, no scheduled activities—just kids managing their own games, solving conflicts, and making decisions together.
This is one way of reintroducing curiosity, autonomy, and the kind of play that fosters real-world skills—like negotiation, creativity, and cooperation. Parents and families can also play a big part in cultivating these experiences for their kids.
Additional Resources
Click below to access the recording of the event. Use the password: ed*talks*replay