Feeling insecure about my lack of education

[Anonymous]

DH has a PhD. I have a high school diploma and a year of college. I work as a personal asst. I am starting to feel scared and apprehensive about when our children will ask me things I don't know. My nieces and nephews already do it- they ask me science questions, math questions, cultural questions, etc that I just do not know the answer to. It is one thing when they ask me but I am starting to feel scared and ashamed that when my own children (they are still little right now) ask me things I will not be able to explain to them much because of my own lack of education. I see DH explain and talk about current events, art, even politics to the children in our extended family. When my nephew asked why the ocean has waves, DH carefully explained to him in scientific terms the reason for tides, something about the moon etc. I feel if asked the same thing, I would just look blank. Any advice?

[Anonymous]

Listen to NPR. Watch the Discovery Channel. Subscribe to National Geographic. There are lots of ways to learn about things besides school (and btw, the ocean movement is usually taught in HS, so you probably learned it but just forgot). I have a bachelor's degree but most of my knowledge comes from being actively involved in the area - I work in clinical research, so I know a lot about what my studies are researching. But I can't remember for the life of me how to do calculus, and I took it for a year in HS, and a whole year in college. Education does not equal smart. Your hubbie is likely just more apt to remember 'stuff' - good at trivial pursuit, I'd imagine - but that doesn't mean that you're dumb or necessarily have anything to do with his education. My parents couldn't help me with homework past 9th grade, and I did just fine. My mom has the same exact level of education that you do, and followed a similar career path (and was a SAHM for 5 years), and she is just as smart as I am, if not more so since she has more life experience. My dad never went to college but is at the VP level of a large company. They have both taught me many, many things that book smarts couldn't touch. So don't be down on yourself in the DC land of higher education (the most in the nation, at that). Experience is priceless, and intelligence is not taught.

[Anonymous]

Being able to explain the science behind waves doesn't make you an intelligent person. I have a degree from a well known college and there are LOTS of things I don't know that my DH does. I am quite sure there are things you know that your DH doesn't.

When my nephews ask me questions I don't know I reply honestly 'I don't know, lets look it up!'. And then we learn together.

[Anonymous]

Don't stress about it. A more important tool is to teach your children how to figure out an answer they don't know the answer too. For example, why do the ocean have waves?--- you can say "let's go to the library or internet to figure it out." If you want to go to extreme, take them to the museum and learn why as a follow up lesson I bet you they will retain the information better than have someone else spew out the answer. It will be a life skil and teach them to be self sufficient.

[Anonymous]

I have a Ph.D. in a humanities field and can't answer lots of those science questions either! I tell you, though, I've learned tons by reading my kids non-fiction books from the library. If they ask me a question I can't answer, I do tend to say, "Ask Daddy!" However, I can also look it up online to explain it to them, and then at the library we'll check out some relevant kids' books learn it together.

Don't feel that you need to be a master of every subject, no one is. But if there is a particular area that you're more interested in, it's not too late to learn it.

And if you wish that you had had more college, that's fine to admit to the kids as well--it helps show them the value and importance of education.

[Anonymous]

First lets dispell the myth that having a college degree will mean that you will be able to answer all questions that you will face. Heck I have an advance degree and I could not carefully answer a question on why the ocean has waves, unless I go look it up on google. I am sure that I studied it at some point in school, but I certainly do not remember.

My second point is that just because you lack formal education does not mean that you cannot educate yourself. If you are that insecure, then I think that you should start the learning process, you do not have to enroll in school. Read books, read the paper, once your children or the other children in your family start showing interest in a certain topic go look it up - the internet has a wealth of information right at your fingertips. Also, you have a great resource right there under your roof - your husband - pick his brain as much as you can.

Good luck and also remember that there is nothing wrong with saying "I don't know" initally and then coming back with an answer later.

[Anonymous]

Give me a break, OP, I have 2 very shiny degrees (including a JD and a poly sci degree from a prestigious instituteion) and the only reason I know anything about tides is I scuba dive! I cant think of a single thing I learned at either of those institutions that would be interesting to a young kid. Agree with PPs that being creative about learning stuff is important,. Also, if you dont already have a few hobbies or interests that make you an interesting person, you should start there - classical music? sports? travel? unless you use all your free time to read trashy novels or magazines, I'm sure you know some interesting things.

[Anonymous]

Agree with the PPs. It is actually better for the kids if you don't answer the question, but help them find the answer. That way they are learning two things, the answer to that question, and the skills to find the answers to future questions.

I have a BA from a well-respected university, but my mind is like a sieve with respect to names and dates. Just cannot remember 'em.

For current events, make a point of listening to NPR and WTOP. Read the paper (or online news) every day. These habits will help you in lots of conversational settings, and will be good models for your children.

And it is never too late to get your degree, if that's what you want. My mother, who had one year of college, felt inferior to my dad, who had a master's. She went back to school when her youngest was in kindergarten and eventually graduated with honors the month she turned 40. My SIL just got her BA a month after turning 50. I am proud of both of them and I think they got a lot more out of college as older students than I did at the "normal" age.

Chances are pretty good that you are smarter than you give yourself credit for. Smart people generally hang out with smart people. Since your DH is smart, I'd wager that you are pretty smart too, regardless of diplomas earned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Listen to NPR. Watch the Discovery Channel. Subscribe to National Geographic. There are lots of ways to learn about things besides school (and btw, the ocean movement is usually taught in HS, so you probably learned it but just forgot). I have a bachelor's degree but most of my knowledge comes from being actively involved in the area - I work in clinical research, so I know a lot about what my studies are researching. But I can't remember for the life of me how to do calculus, and I took it for a year in HS, and a whole year in college. Education does not equal smart. Your hubbie is likely just more apt to remember 'stuff' - good at trivial pursuit, I'd imagine - but that doesn't mean that you're dumb or necessarily have anything to do with his education. My parents couldn't help me with homework past 9th grade, and I did just fine. My mom has the same exact level of education that you do, and followed a similar career path (and was a SAHM for 5 years), and she is just as smart as I am, if not more so since she has more life experience. My dad never went to college but is at the VP level of a large company. They have both taught me many, many things that book smarts couldn't touch. So don't be down on yourself in the DC land of higher education (the most in the nation, at that). Experience is priceless, and intelligence is not taught.

Totally agree. You learn things by partaking in intellectual pursuits - traveling, reading, watching international events unfold, conversing with other intellectually-inclined people. I have a BA and my husband has a law degree. From an IQ standpoint he is objectively "smarter" than I am, also. And I'd never say this to him but, frankly, I come across as "smarter" than he does because I'm just more, I don't know, intellectual/interested(?) in current events than he is. I can speak far more intellegently about things I read/discussed yesterday than most things I (likely) daydreamed through in a college lecture.

[Anonymous]

Please don't worry about those things. PPs had great ideas about TV and radio programs, etc., to keep up to date on things. But stuff like science? Watch out. Some of it changes generation to generation as we learn more. So even if you had the best and most education for your generation, your knowledge could still be outdated. My mother stopped helping me with science homework in elementary school, for example, when I insisted the moon was "captured" by earth's gravitational pull (that's what I had just been taught in the 70s). She insisted that it broke free from the earth because of the rapid rotation of the earth when it was just forming (that's what she had been taught in the 50s). The current theory is that something huge hit the "proto" earth and the moon broke free and got trapped in orbit. So you just never know. Things change.

Something like Time or Newsweek is a nice weekly overview of current events, with a little more analysis than what you see in the papers, and definitely more than what is provided on the evening news. Time trends a bit conservative. Newsweek trends a bit liberal. But they might be nice to subscribe to for a while if it interests you.

[Anonymous]

Don't be scared or ashamed. Just say: "I don't know but this is a great question, let's look it up, go to the library....."

whatever your degree is there are a million things that you don't know. What you want to teach your kids is the fun in learning things. You want to show them that learning is fun and interesting and that looking for questions whose answers you don't know is fun, not something that you are scared of.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't be scared or ashamed. Just say: "I don't know but this is a great question, let's look it up, go to the library....."

whatever your degree is there are a million things that you don't know. What you want to teach your kids is the fun in learning things. You want to show them that learning is fun and interesting and that looking for questions whose answers you don't know is fun, not something that you are scared of.

Exactly. I have a doctorate degree and I often feel as if I don't know jack! ; )

[Anonymous]

Echoing others with a couple of anecdotes. I have a PhD in physics with an astrophysics focus. My uncle wrote me to ask something about planets (his son was studying it) and I had to look it up because I never learned much about planets. I hadn't taken an intro astronomy class as an undergrad and as a PhD it wasn't relevant to my research. So even an advanced degree does mean one knows everything even in that subject matter.

I also did some work in science outreach and I remember reading or hearing somewhere that when a kid asks his Dad a question, the Dad launches into an answer which may or may not be correct. They don't want to look like they don't know (same thing with asking for directions). Moms are more likely to say I don't know and then try to find the answer.

My mom didn't finish a college degree until I was in my late-20s but she was the driver for my love of learning. If she couldn't answer our questions off the top of her head, she would help us find the answers. I remember lots of museum trips, library visits, and pouring through the encyclopedia set we had at home.

[Anonymous]

I agree with everyone above!!!

It's not about the formal education or the advanced degrees. More broadly, it's not even about having the "right answers". It's about encouraging your childrens' curiosity, having a conversation with them about what THEY think and why, and then having fun looking it up and learning together.

For what it's worth, my father knew a lot about science growing up (he started as a chemist), and he was the last person I would turn to with my questions because he was kind of a know-it-all about it and would go on and on, well above my level of interest or understanding.

I think the most important thing is that YOU feel good about YOURSELF! Having a fancy education or an advanced degress is not what makes a person smart or interesting. If you're eager to learn more because it's interesting to you, I'd say start with whatever appeals to you. Maybe get a magazine on the topic (science, art, politics, goegraphy/travel etc.) for a year. Or just read that section of the NY Times. Or take a class at a community college for a semester.

All of us should be continuing to learn and grow as we get older, regardless of how much formal education we had or did not have when we were younger.

[Anonymous]

You don't learn this stuff in college (you often learn it in highschool). I know some very very ignorant people who are college educated. The common denominator is being well rounded vs. ignorant is books. If you seek knowledge, go to the library and take up reading.