It’s summertime…biking riding time! As kids we spent the summer swimming and riding our bikes.
At what age should your son or daughter begin to ride their bike independently? When can they ride their bike to friend’s house or school without you tagging along?
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If you have ever made this decision, you know it is not an easy one. Our job from the time our children are born is to guide, protect, care for, and nurture.
Children begin developing independence from us as babies. They start walking and rely less on us for mobility. As parents we celebrate these milestones. We are beyond excited when they toilet train and start dressing themselves.
As parents, our inclination is to hold them back, keep them safe and us reassured. We rode our bikes all over as kids. So why do we hesitant to allow our kids this same independence? Turn on the nightly news or open a newspaper.
However, we want them to be independent, responsible adults when they leave for college.
How do we do this? We slowly let go while keeping them within the our safety net. We take baby steps.
We took their training wheels off and taught them to ride their bike independent of training wheels. Now we are teaching them to ride independent of us, but within our rules and boundaries.
How do we know when they are ready?
Maturity~Does your children make good decisions. Can they look at various options and arrive at a good decision? Do they follow rules?
Bike riding safety~Does your child understand traffic laws? Does your child know which side of the road to ride on? Do they wear their helmet? Do they know to stop at intersections?
Stranger danger~At this point you have probably taught your children not to talk to strangers. Have you taught them not to take anything from a stranger or offer a stranger help? Have you taught them how to get help?
You have accessed that they are ready. They can make good decisions. They understand bicycle and stranger safety. They are almost ready?
We need to look at who, what, when and where?
Who will be going with them on this bike ride? There is strengths in numbers, but friends can also be distracting and convincing in making poor decisions.
What does your child want to do on this bike ride? Are they using it as a means to get to and from their friend’s house? Do they want to go out with their buddies and do tricks?
When will your child be riding their bike? Do they want to ride their bike mid morning when traffic is light and the sun is out? Do they want to ride their bike home from school when the area is congested with traffic? Do they want to ride in the evening after the sun has gone down?
Where is your child riding their bike? Do they want to ride their bike to their friend’s house two blocks away on the same street? Do they want to ride their bike to a friend’s house on the other side of town that would require crossing a busy street?
Our experience~
Our son will be nine at the end of summer. We started out with him riding his bike to friend’s house around the corner. I initially walked halfway with him. I also texted the parents to let them know when he left and they texted me when he arrived (we still do this practice). We then began letting him ride his bike around the block. (I should note that we live in a very small town and know a lot of the people who live here.)
This last school year, he started asking to ride his bike to and from school. Honestly, this worked out great for us. He has younger siblings, who sometimes sleep late. We live four blocks from the school on the same street. I could see him until he got near the school. The area is not as congested in the mornings with everyone arriving at different times. Students and staff are not nearly as excited to arrive at school as they are to leave at the end of the day, so we felt mornings were at good starting point.
Before he was able to do any of these, we went over our rules, expectations, and consequences.
I would love to hear about your experiences.
