Reflect

This week, much of Wednesday Wisdom is guest authored by Dr Geoff Newiss, a policy and research professional who specialises in policing, crime, criminology, missing persons and child abduction. He runs a charity called Action Against Abduction and, five years ago, launched a campaign called Clever Never Goes, a modern, child-friendly alternative to the out-dated and fundamentally flawed ‘stranger danger’ message. It's a great campaign, which teaches children how to stay safe from abduction whether they are outside or online. Over to Geoff…

The long summer holiday is a time of year which can prompt a degree of inter-generational bemusement. Older parents, and certainly grandparents, are frequently left scratching their heads wondering how did this all become so difficult? Wasn’t there a time not so long ago when children just did their own thing, when they entertained themselves, mostly by exploring their outdoor environments? When did childhood become so structured? So supervised? So indoors?

Ask anyone born before the mid-1970s about ‘children’s independent mobility’ and they may well presume that reference is being made to the unfortunate effects of disability. For previous generations, childhood was inextricably bound up with independent mobility.

An influential Policy Studies Institute study published in 1990 found that in 1971, 80% of 7 to 8 year-old children were permitted (or given ‘licence’ as the authors put it) to travel home from school on their own. By 1990, this figure had fallen to a remarkable 9%. Repeating the same analysis in 2010, researchers found the trend towards supervision had continued, with just 6% of children travelling to school on their own. A similar pattern has been found in many other Anglosphere and western countries including the US and Australia. In the space of just twenty years, children’s independent mobility had practically disappeared.

It's not just travelling to and from school. When children do get to enjoy their own time, they do so increasingly at home or inside, under supervision, rather than through playing outside. A poll of 3,000 children, parents and adults commissioned by Play England, found that just over a quarter of children (aged 6 to 16) regularly played outside in 2022, compared to four-fifths of adults (aged 55 and 64) who were asked about their experience of playing outside growing up in the sixties and seventies.

There are myriad factors behind this dramatic shift in the experience of childhood. However, two concerns that parents give to explain their reluctance to loosen the reins stand out: the increase in traffic and the fear of strangers and abduction.

Leaving traffic aside for now, it hardly seems coincidental that in the UK, this sharp decline in children’s independent mobility immediately followed the government’s release of the first ‘stranger danger’ public information film in 1971. ‘Never Go With Strangers’ offered young audiences 20 minutes of dramatised abduction, prompting the British Film Institute to ask, ‘Is this the scariest public information film ever made?’. In many respects, the government’s foray into ‘stranger danger’ serves as one of the starkest reminders of the perils of poorly thought out public policy. Resting on a clearly erroneous premise – that all sexual predators are strangers – the approach not only didn’t work, but it unleashed a wave of unintended consequences that continue to shape childhood to this day.

‘Stranger danger’ should also serve as a warning to everyone involved in child safety. Inculcating fear is rarely (if ever) an effective strategy for equipping children to navigate whatever particular concern it is we are trying to address. Child safety has to be ‘net positive’. Our big challenge is to ensure that gains in avoiding one specific hazard (e.g. abduction) do not come at the expense of the overall quality and experience of childhood.

Motivate

And, indeed, the need does arise to have these conversations. Mercifully, abductions that result in serious harm or even murder – the type that dominate the headlines for extended periods – are very few and far between. Yet, local news stories of attempted abductions or suspicious incidents – a man hanging around a playground, someone taking photographs who doesn't seem quite right – are pretty much an everyday occurrence.

At times like these, parents and teachers need practical advice to give to children in their care. Above all, advice that keeps things in perspective, that gives our young people confidence rather than makes them fearful, and which builds their resilience.

The charity that I run – Action Against Abduction – launched Clever Never Goes five years ago as the replacement for stranger danger. So far, over 4,000 schools have signed up for free teaching resources, and the programme is referred to in the latest version of the Department for Education’s Keeping Children Safe in Education.

So, educators, if you’ve got time before term ends or at some point next term, try to squeeze in a Clever Never Goes lesson. And parents – good luck juggling the demands of the summer. Check out our Clever Never Goes resources for parents, and let’s try to restore some of the fun and adventure that childhood should be all about.

Support

The problem is particularly acute in middle-income countries, where rapid road expansion often outpaces safety measures. The road traffic death rate of children in low- and middle-income countries is nearly three times higher than in high income countries. Even in the UK, where accident rates are comparatively low, children don’t necessarily feel well prepared to navigate roads, either as a pedestrian or on their bike. A survey by RoSPA (The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents) asked 319 seven to nine year olds to choose a word that described how they feel when they are crossing the road without an adult. The most popular choice was ‘unsafe’. Only 13% said that they felt ‘safe’.

Wherever we live, there are simple, practical things we can do to help keep our children safer near roads. The World Health Organization has outlined ten key strategies for improving road safety. Whilst some require action at a policy level, others are easy for families to put into practice; supervision being one of them.

Whilst gradually developing independence is crucial, children obviously need guidance and supervision as they learn to navigate busy roads. We can play a vital role in helping our children make sense of what’s happening around them, reading signals, spotting hazards and learning safe habits. Reminding them to use helmets and seatbelts, helping them understand and stick to school drop-off zone rules, and encouraging them to keep any phone or digital device in their bag or pocket when they are walking can all make a big difference to their safety.

Another important area highlighted is helping children to see and be seen. Children can be harder for drivers to spot and may struggle to accurately judge the speed and distance of traffic. Small actions, like encouraging them to wear light or bright-coloured clothing, especially in low light, can make a real difference. Adding reflective strips to school bags or coats can help too, and so can making sure bikes are fitted with working lights and reflectors.

Of course, being seen is only half the picture. Children also need to look where they’re going. That means not having their nose in TikTok or Snapchat whilst they try to cross the road. Helping them stay alert and aware of their surroundings is just as important as making sure others can spot them. A survey of 2000 secondary school pupils carried out in 2024 by insurance company Churchill found that almost one in five young people who use their phone while walking (18%) had either been hit by or involved in a near miss with a vehicle. Whilst the vast majority (84%) of those asked admitted using their phone when walking near roads, 10% said they weren’t aware of the dangers of doing so, and 45% wanted more education about the risks. Globally, a systematic review of studies investigating the influence of mobile phone distraction on road crossing behaviours found that it plays a major role in risky road crossing, and that this behaviour is more common in males than females. In the UK alone, 1,200 children are injured in traffic related collisions happening within 500 metres of school grounds each month.

Given that numerous children will be getting their first phone over the next few weeks, perhaps in preparation for their move to secondary school and a new walk to school, there’s much that we can and should do during the summer break to help scaffold their understanding of road safety. This means having conversations about the risks of distracted walking, practising the journey to and from school, making note of any tricky sections, and making a habit of putting devices away (theirs and ours - modelling is key here) when walking near traffic.

We know that for teens, the need for social acceptance can sometimes outweigh safety concerns. Acknowledging these pressures, whilst setting clear expectations can help them to feel understood, rather than lectured. We can talk about risk more generally, and how becoming better at managing it is part of growing up. We might explore together why it sometimes feels hard to ignore a notification, or why it can feel embarrassing to challenge a friend who’s walking into the road while scrolling. Work together to come up with strategies that feel realistic. Framing road safety as a shared responsibility, which we all need to work on, can make children more open to these conversations.

If you are a teacher considering road safety in your setting, it’s well worth reading the advice in RoSPA’s guide to School Site Road Safety, having a look at their analysis of child pedestrian training and how to make it most effective (potentially by including both classroom-based and on-road training), and browsing through the free road safety classroom resources on the Think! website.

Summer in general can feel like a bit of a whirlwind, with everyone heading off in different directions, particularly if your children are older. Your child might be home alone more often, spend a lot of time out with friends, or head off to a camp or activity during the day. It helps to agree on a simple check-in routine in advance, so that you both feel reassured. This might be a quick, “I’m home!” text, a call when they arrive somewhere, or even a short message to say their plans have changed. Whatever works best for your family, making the plan together helps keep communication open. With the right support, we can start to create environments where children are not only safer, but freer to play, explore and enjoy the world around them.

Thanks to all of our readers for engaging with Wednesday Wisdom this year. We absolutely love receiving your thoughts and feedback. We’ll be taking a bit of a break over the summer holidays. If there are any subjects that you’d like us to cover when we restart at the beginning of September, please let us know! We hope that you all have a great few weeks.