I have had a growing sense of alarm about this for several years now. I worry about what sort of world we're turning into and what happens when the rest of the "analog generation" starts disappearing and I get older and am surrounded by younger people who just don't relate to the world the same way I do.

I am an odd combination of early adopter and Luddite. There are some technologies I have jumped into and I've made my career in digital and mobile marketing. On the other hand, when I have kids I will want them to spend as much time outdoors learning about the natural world as possible, just as I did. I hate when people, kids or otherwise, can't go anywhere without being attached to an electronic device. I think free time and even boredom are important ingredients of a child's development. Having a whole free day ahead of you and being "bored" are things that lead to invention, imaginative play, creative projects and cooperation with other kids. I am highly drawn to the German-style 'forest kindergartens' where children play outdoors in the woods with light supervision and not a whole lot of props year round in all weathers but the most extreme. Children learn all sorts of social skills with each other this way and they of course learn both gross and fine motor skills learning to manipulate their world.

Long periods of playing with other kids without adults intervening mean that children have to figure out the social order themselves, negotiate, make decisions, take turns, practice persuading others that one's plan is the best one, etc. This is one of the things that I miss seeing - groups of kids playing on their own with each other in an unstructured way, without an adult organizing and dictating the activity. I remember walking around my neighborhood looking for other kids who might be up for doing something. We'd find other groups and different people would suggest things to do and sometimes we'd all decide pretty quickly on what that was. Some days we would debate different activities and locations. But we didn't appeal to an outside authority to settle it. That's the funny thing - with so many parents and grandparents now identifying with the whole 1960s "question authority" mantra there seem to be more parents than ever who think they should supervise their child's every activity.