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I guess I don't see how playing half the night and falling asleep then waking up with people in a different house---is some right of passage for children.... I think going to sleep with OUR Families is Always a good thing and helps build stronger families and eleminates much of the social battles we face with 16--17--18 year olds....Its just real simple--here is your bed be in it.
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Anna, with all due respect and assuming that the child in question doesn't have emotional or attachment issues, I think seeing how another household works is really important for children. I know I liked experiencing the casual, haphazard way my best friend's family threw dinner together, but it also made me appreciate my family's more traditional dinner. Spending the night with friends also prepared me for sleep away camp, which was one of the most life changing experiences I ever had.
I've been wracking my brains trying to remember how old I was when I spent the night at a friends--7 maybe. I think in the early days my parents used friends as babysitters--we would spend the night so they could go to a party with the parents. Our folks were friends and socialized together. The parents were teachers, so there was the assumption that they were safe.
I don't think I spent the night with a family that wasn't close to my parents until I was in junior high.
I just think kids need to see what it's like to sleep away from their parents -- their first night away from home shouldn't be the first night they're at college.