Why Free Play and Risk Are Essential to Childhood

I’ve been in the youth development field for over 30 years, and if there’s one truth that keeps showing up again and again, it’s this: kids need to play. Not just structured play. Not just enrichment activities, sports leagues, or afterschool clubs. I’m talking about real, unstructured, child-led free play—the kind where kids lose track of time, scrape a knee, get into arguments, build a fort out of trash, or climb a tree a little higher than we’d like.

Free play matters. And it matters more now than ever before.

If you’ve read anything by Dr. Peter Gray, (TedEx) especially his work on the decline of play and the rise of anxiety and depression in children, you’ll know where I’m headed. His research shows a direct line between reduced opportunities for free play and the mental health struggles we see in our youth today. That decline, as outlined in his book Free to Learn, has been replaced by well-meaning adult-led programming and constant supervision—but at a cost. We’re seeing less resilience, more anxiety, and a generation that’s growing up with fewer coping tools to handle life’s messiness.

Jonathan Haidt’s new book The Anxious Generation echoes this call. It’s a wake-up call for all of us—especially those of us in youth development. Haidt doesn’t just talk about screen time or helicopter parenting; he points to the removal of real-world childhood experiences like walking to a friend’s house alone, negotiating playground politics without adult interference, or learning how to handle pain (both emotional and physical) without a safety net at every turn.

Here’s the tough truth: By stripping away risk, we’ve unintentionally stripped away resilience.

As professionals, we often find ourselves caught between policy and practice. There’s an unspoken pressure to bubble-wrap childhood—to avoid complaints from parents, to reduce liability, to never let a child feel anything remotely uncomfortable. But here’s the thing: discomfort is a teacher. Scraped knees heal. Hurt feelings mend. But the skills learned from those moments—the ability to self-regulate, to advocate, to recover—those are what shape capable, confident, and compassionate adults.

We have to reclaim free play for kids. And we have to train our staff to see the power in it.

Let’s start with what free play really is: it’s child-initiated, open-ended, and self-directed. It isn’t scheduled or structured. It’s not about outcomes or metrics. It’s about kids being kids—imaginative, wild, sometimes chaotic kids. It’s about cardboard boxes becoming castles and soccer balls becoming currency in an invented game that only the kids understand. In these spaces, children develop the executive function skills we try so hard to teach them in a classroom: decision-making, impulse control, collaboration, creativity, conflict resolution, and empathy.

But here’s the kicker: it only works if adults back off.

That’s where the challenge comes in. As youth development professionals, we want to help. We want to mediate, support, and guide. But sometimes, the most supportive thing we can do is observe, not intervene. Unless a child is in real, imminent danger, we need to give them the space to figure it out. Let them argue. Let them feel left out. Let them solve it. Let them climb the monkey bars upside down and misjudge the distance to the ground. Let them cry, brush off the dirt, and get back to playing.

We don’t build confident, emotionally intelligent adults by solving every problem for them as children. We build them by giving them chances to practice being human.

It’s okay for kids to get mad at each other. It’s okay for kids to take physical risks. It’s okay for kids to push back on rules and norms—they’re learning how to navigate the world. And yes, it’s even okay for them to get hurt sometimes.

These aren’t signs of dysfunction. These are signs of development.

We talk a lot in our field about creating “Happy, Healthy & Safe” environments. But those three things are often misunderstood as meaning “comfortable, clean, and conflict-free.” That’s not real childhood. Real childhood is messy. It’s emotional. It’s physical. And if we want truly happy, healthy, and safe adults, we need to let kids experience the world fully while they’re still young enough to process it with a sense of wonder, not fear.

So what can we do?

First, we need to model and advocate for this mindset within our organizations. Talk about free play in your staff training. Share research from Peter Gray and The Anxious Generation with your teams. Show them that play isn’t just filler time—it’s core to development. Help them understand that stepping back doesn’t mean ignoring children. It means giving them room to grow.

Second, reframe risk in your program culture. Not all risk is bad. Climbing trees is risky. So is confronting a friend who hurt your feelings. Risk is how children learn about limits—of their body, of their emotions, of their environment. Instead of eliminating risk, teach staff how to manage and monitor it wisely. Create spaces that allow for exploration while still watching for true hazards.

Third, talk to parents. That’s a big one. Parents have been conditioned to expect constant supervision, emotional protection, and a kind of programmed enrichment in every moment. It’s up to us to help them understand why their child might come home with dirt on their knees and a story about a disagreement—and why that’s a good thing.

And finally, hold the line. Our field is full of competing pressures: safety checklists, lesson plans, outcome goals, grant deliverables. But we can’t forget the bigger picture. We are in the business of growing people. And people learn best through experience—real, unfiltered, unpredictable experience.

Let’s not be the generation of youth professionals that looked back and realized we made everything too safe, too scripted, too sterile. Let’s be the ones who trusted kids with their own growth.

I believe in play. I believe in risk. And I believe that if we can teach our staff to support those values with confidence and care, we’ll raise a generation of happier, healthier, and safer adults who remember how to solve problems, take chances, and play their way through the toughest of challenges.

Now go out there and let them play.

I have created a lesson plan for staff training on this topic. Go to HERE to download!

Michael Garcia, Youth Development Pro, LLC

04.08.2025