It's Really All About Them
It’s Really All About Them
I have been trying to understand an alarming epidemic of parental anxiety about how one’s kids perform, how they measure up to peers as early as preschool. This contagion of worry is mainly focused on academics, but it often includes other things, such as sports and social success. A preoccupation with our kids’ standing is not that new, having been with us for a number of years now; but it does seem to have become more and more intense, with the crescendo paralleling political focus on children’s carefully measured, overscrutinized academic functioning. What does seem different lately is that we have unequivocally tied kids’ achievement or lack of it to the adults in their lives. Suddenly, it’s all about us. Teachers’ jobs are in jeopardy when kids don’t make the improvements expected; and parents’ self esteem is all tied up with their kids’ grades and test scores.
Maybe there’s a bit “too much of a good thing” going on here. Research has suggested that kids whose parents are actively involved with their children’s schooling are likely to do better than the children of less involved parents. But, of course, there is “involved” and then there is “over-the-top involved.” I’m not talking about asking, “Have you done your homework?” or offering, “If you have any questions about the homework, I’ll try to help you to answer them.” Rather, it’s about at least one parent being at the elbow of each child while he or she unwraps the assignment, never leaving until the last “i” is dotted. It is no longer “your” homework; it is now “our” homework. Schools are encouraging this despite the fact that it can cause a lot of tension and angst all around. Too much is riding on a 2nd grader’s weekly spelling tests or a kindergartner’s name writing. It makes everybody tense and defensive. Kids are not as free to learn, stumble, then master, and achieve independently. The learning situation is contaminated with generational power struggles. Not good. There is a rolling snowball effect since goading to do better is coming from all directions. One of the things at stake seems to be parents’ own sense of having parented correctly, whatever that means. And that’s where my new theory comes in.
I have begun to wonder whether all this hovering and pressure-cooker climate about academics may have gained steam from a silent struggle between working and stay-at-home moms; or perhaps more accurately, a silent struggle within each individual mom. Both the Stay at Homes and the Working Moms may be enduring their own silent struggles. It could go something like this: “Did I do the right thing to stay home — am I making a contribution to the world, living up to the expectations my own teachers and mentors had for me? If my kids are successful, then it could turn out to have been the right choice.”
Or: "Am I shortchanging my kids by pursuing my own ambitions? Sure, it shows up in our better standard of living; but I had better spend evenings doing homework with them to make up for my daytime absences. If they succeed, I can feel less guilty.”
Of course, both of these positions are dangerously oversimplified and wrongly focused on the adults. We can’t seem to shake the exaggerated assumption that parents make or break kids. It’s a short-sighted view since it misses the two most important factors in how well children will do: who they are to begin with (the DNA factor); and the degree to which they feel understood, valued and loved as they are. It’s really all about them.
October 23, 2007
