Your child has their hands at their throat and is unable to breathe. There are tears running down their face, their mouth is open, but there is no sound. They are standing in front of you waiting for you to help. What would you do? It is a frightening question for parents and one that many are unprepared to answer. Despite our best efforts, our children are exposed to choking hazards that could put any one of us in this situation. We try our best to keep the house clear of small toy parts, reachable coins, and balloons. But what about the foods we choose to feed our children? Are there any potential threats there? According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, hot dogs are the most frequent choking hazard with children aged one to eight years. The circular-shaped sausage wrapped in a gooey bun makes a perfect blockage for small airways.

Children are at particular risk of choking for a few reasons. Physiologically, the small diameter of their airway is easily blocked. And if something does get wedged into their airway, they may lack the strength to dislodge an object with the force of their cough. Infants and young children lack molars needed for properly grinding their food or may still be learning to use them properly. Behaviorally, toddlers are often too distracted and active to focus on the task of eating.

Like hot dogs, any round, firm foods like carrots, nuts, or grapes should be concerns for choking. It doesn’t mean these foods are completely off-limits. Foods that are a potential hazard due to their shape can be chopped into pieces. In logger’s terms, make sure you rip (cut lengthwise) and crosscut these foods before serving. On the other hand, peanut butter and marshmallows are a special concern because of their stickiness and are not recommended for children under three years old. Supervise your child’s mealtime, and make sure they stay seated while eating. Teach them to chew their food and swallow before talking. This time, teaching good manners is good preventative medicine as well.

It is impossible to prevent all choking cases in children. Sometimes it is necessary to take action to save a life. As taught in American Red Cross CPR courses, back blows are alternated with abdominal thrusts in a “five and five” rotation when trying to dislodge an airway obstruction in a conscious child or adult. To learn to perform this skill properly it is essential to get certified by a Red Cross instructor. The last place you want to ask if you are doing the techniques correctly is when you are doing it for real.

As a former director of Health & Safety and Instructor Trainer for the American Red Cross, I realize how overwhelming the idea of your child choking can be. Sometimes it seems easier to ignore the possibility, believing that “it will never happen to me.” But there is good news for those that acknowledge their fears and get trained.  When I taught courses, I would often ask the participants if they had ever used CPR skills in the real world. I found that nearly everyone has a story about choking. Some in my classes were the rescuers, others were the rescued.  Some witnessed a rescue happen right in front of them and didn’t know what to do. Though I certainly heard of tragedies, using the skills to save a choking victim’s life is where I most often heard of lives saved.

To sign up for a CPR course, contact your park and recreation department, fire department, or visit the American Red Cross website to locate your closest local chapter.

Yesterday NPR’s Here and Now re-aired an interview with Lenore Skenazy, once labeled the “Worst Mother in the World” by public critics across the country. What does a mother need to do to garner such virulent disapproval across America? She dropped her nine year old son off at a department store in New York, and challenged him to return home safely.

At his pleading, Skenezy left her son inside a New York City Bloomingdale’s. He wanted the challenge of finding his way back, alone, one subway ride and a bus connection from their home. Mom gave him a subway map, a Metro card, a twenty dollar bill and some change for a phone call. She told him what to do if he got lost. Then she returned to their home and waited. He found his way back without incident, mother and child both thrilled by his accomplishment.

When Skenazy mentioned the event to friends and acquaintances she was met with unrestrained condemnation. She was reminded of a recent abduction of a young girl in Florida.

“How would you have felt if he didn’t come home?”

“I don’t want to be the one on TV explaining my daughter’s disappearance.” And that was before Skenazy put it in writing. As an opinion columnist with a typically humorous slant, she hardly expected the massive reaction that was coming when she documented it in her weekly New York Sun column.

As the controversy grew, Skenazy started a blog and message board where opponents and supporters gather to debate. Some visitors embrace her parenting decision completely, some agree philosophically but are unable to engage in the practice, and others outright condemn the experience as criminal.

The debate spawned a new parenting approach; or rather, a return to an old one. The Free Range Kid Movement was born. Despite accusations to the contrary, Free Range Parents don’t discourage bicycle helmets, car seats, or airbags. They don’t encourage running with scissors. They want a return to the lifestyle that existed before the information age—including the risks that come with it. They believe it is essential to training children’s independence and decision-making abilities. Free range parents allow their pre-teen children to walk to school alone. To ride their bicycles to the library. To play in the woods unsupervised.

Free Range Parents also come armed with their own counter-statistics. That a child is 40 times more likely to die in a car accident than be abducted. That, contrary to statistics broadcast on the Today Show, the US Justice department shows a decline in child abductions since 1988. And since 1980, death rates dropped by about half for children between the ages of five and fourteen.

Even for parents that agree with the philosophy of the movement, they don’t find it quite so simple to practice. “I think there is a generalized feeling that the open spaces are wonderful in a supervised situation, but that unsupervised there is too much potential for a predator to be lying in wait, whether it be one of the human or animal.” Says Heather Quaal, a mother in Ventura California.

Natasha Morisawa, a Bioterrorism and Emergency Preparedness Analyst,  remembers walking her dogs for hours with her sister. They toured local parks, learning the neighborhood along the way. “Not just our street or block, but details about the blocks between our house and the park; details that we would never know if we rode in the car.”

Still, she recognizes fears for her own children. “I think I would like to be more of a ‘free range parent.’…But for now, I will acknowledge my vulnerability and do what I can so that I can raise these boys in the best world I know.”

One side will argue that the reason the numbers are down is because their children are better protected from the threats. The other side will argue that the threats never existed in the first place. With many parents, the risk is too great or too frivolous. Some make little distinction between free range parenting and the criminally negligent.