Our Children Need Human Moms

Amy Chua's "Tiger Mom" article in the WSJ prompted this blog post.

I'm (an Asian/Indian) mom and there are some guiding principles of her parenting style that I totally agree with:

• Nothing is fun until you're good at it (and I believe when you're good at something, the sense of achievement does wonders for your self-esteem)
• As a parent, one of the worst things you can do for your child's self-esteem is to let them give up
• The best way to protect ... children is by preparing them for the future, letting them see what they're capable of, and arming them with skills, work habits and inner confidence that no one can ever take away

That said -- I totally disagree with her ways of actioning these principles.

Every child does NOT have to be good at the violin, piano and math. Children have varied talents. Instead of forcing a child to be good at something that YOU the parent care about, figure out where your child's aptitude lies. It's not that hard -- expose your child to a variety of activities (including academic ones), watch the keenness with which he participates in them and *listen* to what he tells you about them. From personal experience, I can vouch for the fact that a child will enjoy the practice and challenge in subject matter that  aligns with aptitude.

If your child is involved in an activity that isn't working -- *help* him ease out of it, without letting him feel that he isn't "good enough" for it.

If you are able to discover the aptitude of your children and help them get good at it -- then you are truly preparing them for the future, letting them see what they're capable of, and arming them with skills, work habits and inner confidence that no one can ever take away.

Let tiger moms bring up tiger cubs. Human children need human moms :-)

P.S.: Quora has an interesting discussion of Amy Chua's article.

Let School Days Be School Days

The Ayodhya verdict. A public fight between CM and Governor of the state. A state language "sammelan". What do they have in common? No prizes for guessing -- forced closure of educational institutions by state diktat.

We are ruled by a government that publicly proclaims it will not be able to protect the safety of our children as they travel to school in their *well-marked* school buses and sit down to study in their classrooms. By a government that suddenly decides it is better for schools to shut down because a state language "sammelan" is being held.

Maybe (and there is no evidence of this) the government wins brownie points with it's electoral constituency -- but what about the impact on children? Parents?

Sudden school closures force working parents to stay away from office as well. Is anyone tabulating the economic loss? Un-planned school holidays also result in weekend school days to complete "syllabus". That's extremely taxing on children AND parents, not to mention disruptive of any weekend activities and plans.

The current CM seems to believe his opponents are driving him out of power and is resorting to mumbo-jumbo to fight their "black magic". I don't know about the black magician opponents, but voters like me certainly will -- during the next election.

Do Marks Matter?

In today's non-overtly-competitive educational environment, children get graded (based on mark bands) for their performance in assessments. Most often, grades are only made available to parents and are not shared with the children. No mark-based class ranks.

Therefore, no real anxiety and/or seriousness towards "assessments". No anxiety is good. No seriousness?
Let me explain. When marks are lost due to careless mistakes or overlooking things that a child *does* know -- it makes little difference to the child. The typical reaction in a non-marks-hyped environment is "so what?"

That's as far as the child is concerned. But ... how does this impact people around the child? Most importantly -- how do teachers react? Teachers who have been in the field from before the "new-age" schools became popular find it hard to let go of the judge-the-child-by-the-written-word syndrome. They continue to put tremendous emphasis on the written word -- using it as the final benchmark to judge the child.

When will our education system truly change to embrace the child for what he or she is instead of beating around the written-word bush?

Attitude Matters

Today was a day of trying to locate a Nintendo DS "repair shop". Googling the Nintendo website took me to a Japan address when I clicked the India link!

Some amount of studying the problem of the non-working Nintendo pointed to a battery issue. Now the place where one can find batteries is a watch shop, so we headed off in that direction. There was also a separate agenda of buying a wall clock to replace one that had died recently.

While waiting for the shop assistant of the watch shop to finish attending to another customer, we browsed and located a clock that was quite nice.


Finally it was our turn. As the shop assistant turned the screw to try and understand what kind of battery was housed in the Nintendo, the owner of the shop walked in.  He took one look at the Nintendo and said disinterestedly, oh I'm pretty certain we wouldn't have what is needed (without even looking at the battery) -- told the shop assistant to "leave it", in a tone that clearly implied that I wasting their time. In a shop where I was the only potential customer. I asked where would get the battery and the shop owner replied that he didn't know in the same "don't-waste-my-time" tone.

I left without buying the clock that I had intended to pick up and went to another shop -- this time a departmental store that also carried batteries. I showed the shop assistant the Nintendo and he asked if the old battery was still inside. When I confirmed that it was, he pulled out his tool set and opened the battery case. He looked at the Nintendo battery and said he didn't have batteries of the kind. I asked him if he could confirm that it was indeed a battery problem, and, *even though he KNEW there was no sale to be made*, he tested the battery and confirmed that it was dead. He even ventured a guess of where I would possibly get the battery (not a camera store, madam, please try an electronics repair shop).

What I find amazing in this cut-throat retail economy is that the owner of the "mom-and-pop" watch shop, whose USP is supposed to be personalized service and customer relationships, couldn't care less about helping someone -- who save for his you-are-wasting-my-time attitude, would have bought a clock from him.

No prizes for guessing where I finally bought the clock from ;-).

Fleece While You Can

As I a turned at a red light to take what I thought was a free-left, I was pulled over by a cop, who was part of a group of three and told sternly that I had run a red light. I politely pointed out that there was no board saying  "No Free Left" -- which is when one is supposed to stop at a red light for a left turn.

No, the cop insisted, if the left turn is regulated by a light, then there is no need for a board. Please hand over your license. I did -- he looked it over and then said -- since this is an out_of_state_license i'll offer you a discount (50%!). I politely declined the discount and said I would pay the entire amount in return for a receipt. And I did.

"Courtesy" to state guests apart, here's my point. A fundamental traffic rule changed overnight -- no free lefts allowed any more at signals with traffic lights. If I reach a traffic light that is already red, I have no way of know whether the traffic light governs the free left or not.

Neither was the rule socialized, nor was a "No Free Left" board placed at the junction. The method of communication was to stop me and fleece me (pay a bribe or pay a fine).

The cops were lying in wait precisely because they knew that drivers were not aware of the change. Once people get to know, there will be no cops at the junction. Which basically means -- the purpose of a traffic cop is to fleece unsuspecting drivers, not punish habitual rule-breakers.

Isn't this totally unethical?