Modern schooling, if left to its own devices, generally has the unwanted effect of making kids far more passive than we’d like them to be. School tends to reward following orders and compliance more than independence, active curiosity, and drive. And that’s an issue that can have far-reaching consequences, one of which is the fear of doing what you want or trying new things.

“When a seventh-grade teacher friend of mine asked her students—aged 12 and 13—what new things they wanted to do on their own, but were still a little hesitant to try, the responses were rather shocking to me,” Lenore, the founder of Let Grow and the Free-Range Kids movement, shared with Bored Panda.

“One kid wanted to walk the dog—but was afraid it would get off the leash. Another said he wanted to go to the store—but he’d never been inside one without his mom, and he was worried about being surrounded by strangers. A few said they wanted to take a bike ride or even climb a tree, but they were afraid of hurting themselves.”

Lenore explained that “our catastrophizing culture” has scared parents so much, they’re anxious about letting their kids do pretty much anything and everything. While there are exceptions, of course, many parents veer sharply towards being overprotective and overbearing because they fear for their munchkins’ safety.

Ironically, the result is the opposite of what they want. “The result is not safety, it’s anxiety—kids who absorbed the message that everything is too much for them to handle. When you’re anxious, a simple slip-up doesn’t seem so simple. It seems huge—even life-threatening. How can you avoid those awful threats? That part is simple,” Lenore detailed. “You avoid doing anything.”

Doing nothing is exactly what the seventh graders that Lenore mentioned up above ended up doing. That fear spread to other parts of their life in the classroom, from taking tests (“what if they got a bad grade?”) to asking the teacher which side of the page they should write their name on (“they wouldn’t dare just choose their own!”).

“The teacher told one girl who came to class late and hadn’t had time to get lunch, ‘That’s ok—just go grab something from the cafeteria and come back!’ ‘By myself?’ the girl asked. She was afraid to walk down the halls of her safe school, in a safe neighborhood, in suburban New York. Everyday life is seen as filled with risk.”

This passivity isn’t making children any happier, Lenore put it bluntly. Instead, kids are kept deep inside their comfort zones fully believing that it’s all that they can stand and that this is all that life has to offer. Fortunately, the students that Lenore mentioned had an awesome teacher who didn’t want them to go into high school and then adulthood with so much fear in their lives.

“She wanted to break the shell growing thicker around them every day. And so she assigned The Let Grow Project—a homework assignment that tells kids to, ‘Go home and do something new, on your own.’ At last, the kids were given a push to get out of their comfort zone—and so were their parents. After all, now school was telling them to let go of their kids and give them a little independence,” Lenore said.

“You can see the results in this 2-minute video. That teacher made them do twenty Let Grow Projects. And the result was kids blossoming like crazy—riding their bikes, joining sports programs, piercing their ears, making dinner, walking to town with their friends, and discovering how great it is to do rather than to hide.”

Lenore stressed that any school can do The Let Grow Project and all of their materials are available absolutely for free. You’ll find the project right here and the Independence Kit right over here.”It works for kids aged 5 to 14 or so. And by the way, if you or your school do The Project, drop me a note—I’d love to hear about it! You can write to me via Info@LetGrow.org,” Lenore added, saying that she wants you, dear Pandas, to reach out to her.

In an earlier interview with Lenore, the president of Let Grow, and the founder of the Free-Range Kids movement, told Bored Panda about how kids can keep their curiosity burning and their desire to learn bright and well-honed as they grow.

"I’ve been wondering this myself: How to stay curious when hit by 'the blahs?' Next to Covid (and in great part thanks to Covid) the blahs are the most catching virus around. You get tired and bored by being tired and bored, talking about being tired and bored, and succumbing to them,” Lenore said about how the pandemic is making all of us feel less energetic, physically and mentally.

“Unfortunately, the whole thing is self-reinforcing: A feeling of listlessness leads you to scroll through your social media of choice, which makes you feel more blah, leading you to scroll some more, etc."

Lenore put it bluntly: if we want to be curious about life again, if we want to be constantly learning, we have to start off by getting off the couch. “Force yourself out the door. Why? Because beyond your four walls, things are never exactly the same. Weather, animals, people, sounds, smells, clouds—they’re all swirling about."

She continued: "Ask yourself to start noticing new things. I did that this morning with a friend. We took a walk around our neighborhood and started looking for interesting details in the homes and buildings we passed. It went from a walk down streets we’d seen a million times to a sort of treasure hunt. And the big thing we were really hunting for? Curiosity! When you’re curious, you’re alive again—noticing, thinking, making connections. You can’t do that if there’s no new information coming in. So your first step is to force yourself out of a rut by leaving the house (harder during the pandemic, but not impossible)."

If you look at the pandemic from a different perspective, it might motivate you to start learning new things. For instance, think about what you’d wish you’d learned or a skill that you’d like to have honed by the end of the pandemic.

“Think of something you’d like to be able to say you’ve been working on, especially once life returns to normal: 'Well, I wasted a lot of that free time I had, but at least I started...' Or, 'At least I learned…' For my sister, she’s taking ballet online. For my husband, he’s learning film editing. For me, it’s… oh God! I better come up with something fast! Um…let’s say I will learn how to create a Clubhouse program. Ok?" Lenore quipped that even the best of the best can struggle with this during the lockdowns.

Even leaving the house to get your blood flowing is a great step toward learning a new skill. What’s more, feeling envy toward someone who’s good at a particular skill or particularly learned is a good way to get yourself motivated to strive for more.

“Do not worry if you are taking that first step as simply something you’re doing thanks to social pressure, or for someone other than yourself. Change is change—the motivation doesn’t matter,” Lenore told Bored Panda.

Lenore believes that we should always be questing to learn more about the world while verifying whether or not something is actually true. That means navigating the world of false claims and fake news.