How do you define success for your kids? This is what the Tiger Mom debate boils down to. What do we want for our children, and what does their success (or lack thereof) mean for our own identities? No matter how you feel about Amy Chua, author of "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" and ground zero for the current battle over the best way to parent, you have to give her credit for being willing to ask these hard questions, and you have to really examine her answers.
Chua readily acknowledges how she defines success in her children: accomplishment. She says that Chinese mothers assume that their children are strong rather than fragile, as Western moms assume, and that they know that there's "nothing better for building confidence than learning you can do something you thought you couldn't." This mantra inspires a cycle by which the mother pushes the child by any means necessary to succeed (these means are the most controversial points of Chua's book), and then that success makes the child work harder and become even more accomplished.
You can't argue with her results. Despite -- or perhaps because of -- not being allowed to watch TV, play video games, see movies, attend playdates, participate in theater or get any grade less than an A, and not to mention being yelled at, threatened and slapped by their mother, Amy Chua's daughters Louisa and Sophia are both well on the path to being prodigies. Sophia has already performed at Carnegie Hall, and she's not even out of her teens. Louisa, or LuLu, is the "rebellious" one whose disobedience is manifested by cutting her own hair and quitting the violin to become a tennis star. Many parents would give their left arm for kids like those.
Chua, writing in her characteristic humorous and engaging style that "the understanding is that Chinese children must spend their lives repaying their parents by obeying them and making them proud" seems particularly invested in the idea that her children's success is an integral part of her own identity. If they fail, then she is a failure. If they succeed, it is to her credit. For me, following a more stereotypical Western mindset, I see my job as being the catalyst to my children's growth, but not the driving force. From the second they were born, I have seen them as independent beings that would shape their own futures.
For my own children I define success a little differently: the only thing I want them to achieve is true happiness. Granted, that's a pretty nebulous concept, and there are many different paths to happiness, but if their road doesn't take them through Carnegie Hall, I'm okay with that. As a former sort-of child prodigy (I was reading at a college level by second grade and skipped that grade, starting University classes at 15), I am acutely sensitive to the pressures heaped upon young achievers. My own breakdown came in graduate school as a two-time valedictorian giving my university-wide valedictory address with an IV tube still taped to my hand. I'd had to go straight to commencement from the hospital, where I was being treated for a variety of stress-induced maladies ranging from a severe kidney infection to panic attacks to an ulcer. So when my young son was tapped for an accelerated class at school and he said he didn't want to do it, I simply said, "Fine."
Clearly Chua's authoritarian style does exactly what she promises it will, but the question becomes: Is achievement really the best measure of success? A quick run-down of some famous child prodigies and what became of them later in life brings up some interesting points:
And what of Asian child prodigies in particular? Recent statistics show that "Asian-American women ages 15 to 24 have the highest suicide rate of women in any race or ethnic group in that age group. Suicide is the second-leading cause of death for Asian-American women in that age range." Pressure from family and parents in particular is noted as a large factor in this. Researcher Eliza Noh explains, "In my study, the model minority pressure is a huge factor. Sometimes it's very overt -- parents say, 'You must choose this major or this type of job' or 'You should not bring home As and Bs, only As. And girls have to be the perfect mother and daughter and wife as well."
Certainly not all child prodigies end up prematurely dead, engaging in prostitution or isolated in foreign countries, and all children experience trauma and disappointment in their lives, but there does seem to be a greater risk for those who are pushed the hardest.
Chua would say that I'm settling for mediocrity with my kids. What would you say? Is being achievement-oriented a bad thing, especially in our culture that so rewards high achievers? What's your personal parenting philosophy?
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I didn't grow up in a Chinese-American household but I experienced similar parenting with my grandparents. I couldn't watch TV or play video games. We only ate home cooked food and instead of having slumber parties, I was competing in different states for piano and swim team. Anything lower than an A was not an option and I didn't get rewarded or bribed with money for achieving these things. Because my accomplishments were expected.
You can use the downfall of these aforementioned child prodigies as examples of strict parenting, but think about all the young adults in America that sleep in their parents' basements smoking pot and never getting a job or finishing college. I'm sure their parents settled for mediocrity too, just wanting them to be happy and feeding them autonomy at too young an age. So the result of their parenting is paying for rehab, unpaid credit cards, and legal fees for irresponsible behavior at bars.
I never pushed her to do a thing, and I am certain she would confirm that. I just made sure she had all the tools she would need if she chose the hard work of professional success.
My opinion - it's the luck of the genetic draw, combined with cultural norms.
It wasn't one of those things I spent time day dreaming about...because I took it seriously. Parenthood scared me. It was a commitment on a huge scale, and not something you did lightly. To put it in simple terms, I became a parent as a complete person...and somehow become MORE complete in the experience.
1. I did not expect my child to be ANYTHING...beyond healthy. Smart would be lovely (and yes, she is!) Joyous and curious...yes, they were good things, and yes, she is those as well.
2. I did not daydream about what or who I wanted her to be...not when I pregnant, and not after I had her.
3. I try not to make my love for my daughter a "transaction"...where if she does this, she gets that. (In fact, I NEVER let love be a transaction...that is the surest road to emotional disappointment.)
4. I'm a parent...which is the sum total of all the OTHER parts of myself...plus more. But I am not just a parent. I am still curious, still willing to listen to music that isn't "mine"...still able to look at things and ideas that are new to me.
5. My job was to raise a competent, decent human being...and make myself obsolete, so she can be who she is. With Love. Period.
Her children already had the potential to become prodigies.
It's how she brought it out that's the issue.
I hear this from distraught female Ivy league Pre-Med students all the time, all it takes is one A- to set them off. When I ask them why they want to be doctors, 50% say my parents choose this career path
There's nothing wrong with having standards, I have hight ones for my children but I want them to be well rounded and happy people. So I let them choose what they want to do and gently encourage them to do their best. Browbeating them and being hyper critical will just make they nervous and afraid to take chances. There's always a happy medium.
I was a teacher of at risk kids for many years. My kids almost all passed the district-wide exams every year. People asked me how I did it. I re-defined "do your best" to mean the best you can do at this time. I explained that they needed to discard the notion that they had to do everything they could or their effort was not worthy. I told them to just pass, and when something important came along, something important to them, they could be perfectionist then. But for now, what they needed to do was pass. That's all.
Many of those kids have come back to thank me for that advice.
My father was a Tiger Father. At the age of 86, when he was dying, he told me that he regretted his parenting approach, and that he had come to realize that there is no such thing as constructive criticism when it comes to one's children.
It's time for parents to wake and realize that high expectations towards success are going set their children apart from their peers. Most of my friends from high school spent too long a time to finish college or get a full time job. Instead, their parents let them party, get arrested, and put their families in debt for their foolishness. That reflects poorly on the family, not just the individual.
My mother made me tour colleges during high school spring break, not engage in underage drinking. If your family has a stern and sincere belief in challenging a child to rise above the competition, good things will come from the hard work.
However, the bedrock of my parenting strategy is RESPECT. Respect for each child. Respect for their individual strengths and weaknesses. I also enjoyed their education. From the days they started talking or putting blocks on top of each other or learning colors or shapes, I was delighted to involve myself in their education, always fascinated and in awe of the process of watching human intelligence grow.
I'd say that's the combination I'd advocate: Respect + parental enthusiasm + high standards + unwavering, unconditional love.
I view my role as a mother in much the same way. I have two child prodigies and I spend my time finding ways that they can dig deeply into their passions. I don't push. I observe and find the best resources to support them in their development of interests and talents.
That creates a state of natural flow for them which accelerates their development. I sort of clear the path for them and just sit back and watch what happens.
But like the Chinese mom, I am aware that practice and discipline are key to succeeding on any level, so we work through those issues as well, unless it is something they completely hate, and then they can quit.
Great topic. Lovely post and I can't wait to read the book.
Kim Bauer
www.confabulicious.com
Gates' success with Microsoft had mroe to do with his father than is publicized. Another individual (not Bill) had written a groundbreaking operating system, DOS. With the legal maneuvers engineered by his father the lawyer, Bill was able to buy DOS for $50,000. Bill then licensed DOS to IBM and made a fortune that way.
Bill Sr and Mary Gates did not abuse their children or force them to practice instruments or micro-manage their lives. Mary gave her children lots of love, affection and positive attention. Freedom is much more important in children reaching their potential than parental coercion.
My youngest is at a school with a very high proportion of Asian students and, as a result, his 4 closest friends are Chinese, Japanese and Korean. All of them are Engineering students and 3 of the 4 are absolutely miserable. They didn't want to go into Engineering but they were forced by their parents. All 3 are struggling and getting the lowest marks of their lives. My son had to go to a counselor because one of the boys was threatening suicide. He's not sure that the boy is out of the woods yet and he's still in a panic because of it. My son is a History major and he's getting the best marks of his life and he's loving University with a passion. He's minoring in theater and loving that also. I'm so proud of his choices and of his independence. To have raised him to 18 without a day of worry or disappointment and to see him growing into an amazing adult shows that we laissez-faire parents can raise great kids too. I've never had to spank him, only grounded him about 5 times in his life and I never had to yell or belittle him.. I did have to parent but I did it by giving him choices.
I would not define true happiness as a goal, there are many unethical and deceitful people who sleep just fine every night and are truly happy in their lives. (I suspect most of their children and spouses are happy as well). Just because I would not be happy with their life does not mean they are not. And it absolutely does not mean that one individual’s happiness is a positive thing for society at large.
Success through achievement has the same limitation, many immoral people hurt others without thought, yet achieve much material and professional gain.
I would rather my child live a life of integrity, have a deep core of empathy and achieve a balance of joy and passion in their lives with true sorrow at the undeniable pain and suffering around them in the world.
Likewise, too many don't take an active interest in SPOUSES -- and the high divorce rate in the USA vis a vis China points to that problem. And it becomes a downward spiral -- broken or disfunctional families lead to under-achieving kids with emotional problems. If you go to many under-performing American school systems, you'll also find a high rate of broken families.