Lenore Skenazy

Also tragic.

Not getting into Harvard.

And as a result... Terrible.

I don't even like to think about it.

But the upshot is that we are spending way more time with our kids than our parents spent with us, usually helping them do things that they could do on their own.

And we call it the adult takeover of childhood because it's so vast that the University of Michigan did a study two years ago

And they found that parents want to give their kids independence.

They recognize its importance.

But the majority of parents of kids age 9 to 11, which is tweens, right, kind of old, will not let them play at the park with a friend, will not let them walk to a friend's house,

And if they're at the store shopping together, only 50 percent will let their kid go to another aisle.

OK?

That's the real statistic.

That's University of Michigan.

So sending your kid for a can of peas is like sending them to NAMM.

OK?

It's just crazy.

We've got to get braver than that.

We've got to get brave enough to send our kids to the canned food aisle or to the park before their voice changes.

So how?

Well, I've got two helpful facts and three solutions.