Experts advise never allowing a child under 10 to cross the street alone. King agrees and goes a step further, suggesting parents not knuckle under even if they're tempted by signs of maturity from the child. In some situations children have demonstrated that they can handle the experience in a very limited way. But if you give the child lots of options, then sometimes the child is not able to handle all the options. Professor King believes it's important to allow kids to develop their independence, but not if it puts their well-being at risk.
Parents assume that they are very logical.
And sometimes they're not. And so, we assume that they can do things that they can't do. Parents need to be very much aware not only of what children say, but where they are in terms of their logical thinking about the way things work or the way the world works.