Being average when you know they can do better

[Anonymous]

I'm with you, OP.

I don't know how to safely get my kid some perspective on self-motivation and discipline.

[Anonymous]

Another one here. Kid is now in HS.

[Anonymous]

You should expose your kids to more competitive environment. They think that all people of their age are like their hs friends. There is CTY at Hopkins, for example. Or competitive summer programs, language camps in another country. Push them out of their comfort zone. It is so easy for them to live in the NOVA bubble.

[Anonymous]

OP,

The truth is, there are no guarantees.
You can try to instill work ethic and resilience, and run the risk of them hating you even while they climb to the top. You can keep going within the parenting norms, and get happy normal kids who may not have the comfy lifestyle you have. Wires may cross and you may end up with successful kids who never strove! Or you might end up with kids driven into the ground.

All I can tell you is that I'm pushing my kids to what I think their limit is, because I would never forgive myself for not showing them, and myself, what they can really do.
I realized I had to parent this way when my first was born premature with delays, which later turned into ADHD and learning disabilities. Despite all this, he is quite intelligent, but has had to work 10 times as hard as an average kid to show it. I have told him since preschool that all this work is worth it, and will pay off in work ethic and resilience.
And then I have a competitive high-achiever, who when encouraged, can excel even more. So there's no way I'm letting her float along. She wouldn't develop any resilience that way.

[Anonymous]

Posted too soon - note that this requires risk, and parenting techniques not generally included in the current child-rearing practices, except sometimes as examples of "what not to do". The key is honest and loving communication. When I push too hard, my kids tell me, and I back off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The problem with American kids isn't over scheduling - no matter how many nyt and WaPo articles tell us otherwise. Kids need to be busy. Idle time is terrible for young kids. And for gods sake throw out the video game systems.

It is when it comes to internal motivation. When kids just schlup from one activity to another, especially when it's a parent-determined activity, there is no "need" to be motivated. There's just a need to get through the day. Give kids a little boredom and they will find things that interest them. And that's what will motivate them.

[Anonymous]

average is over people.

force your kids to read tyler cowen's book "average is over".

if they still are 'ok' being average afterwards, you can atleast have a clear conscience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Posted too soon - note that this requires risk, and parenting techniques not generally included in the current child-rearing practices, except sometimes as examples of "what not to do". The key is honest and loving communication. When I push too hard, my kids tell me, and I back off.

+1. I do this too. My DH and I are very motivated, and have pretty much always been that way (according to our parents). Meanwhile, two of our three kids seem content to do what's necessary to get by. My DH and I do feel the need to push them to do things out of their comfort zone. The grandparents think we should let our three kids have all the free time in the world, but the kids seem to benefit from a little pushing and being challenged to do things. We hope it will prove to have been a good decision in the long run.

[Anonymous]

I am not a teacher, but I married into a family full of teachers. My in-laws have always spoken, at length, about many of their observations. One that they've mentioned over the years is how, sometimes, when you have two superstar parents, you end up with with a meh kid, or even a dumb kid. They attribute this to a few different things:

- Parents over scheduling and helicoptering because there's a lot of pressure on superstar parents to produce a superstar kid. This isn't child-led and leaves the children with little opportunity to build confidence in themselves and find things at which they are good. This can also lead to a sort of quiet rebellion on the part of the kid, on some level. I'll bet you give a lot of attention to your kids for NOT excelling. On some level, they know this gets a rise out of you. If a parent isn't possible to please, why bother?

- Parents being more focused on their careers than on developing their child academically. Frankly, your kids might think you both work all the damn time, and they might have opinions about that. High pressure careers come with stress. You're very quick to assume that your kids see your work ethic as noble, and you seem confused as to why they don't want to emulate you.

- Parents conceiving with sub-optimal genetic material, since they're older. Superstars rarely crank out kids in their reproductive prime. They're still in school, getting established, making a name for themselves. Their egg and sperm might be able to get the job done (with or without assistance), but still isn't at its prime. This might not apply to your case, since you said your kids are talented. However, by your own admission your kids don't have much to show for their supposedly high level of talent. Have you considered that they might just be talented only in your eyes? Who knows? They might actually not be as smart as you think.

- Children spending a disproportionate amount of time in their early years with people who aren't as intelligent as the parents.

- Parents' high ability to farm out basic household tasks to outside support, which they need to do in order to save their sanity. This leave leaves the kids with minimal real world responsibilities beyond school/sports/whatever. This is a big one. In some of these households, there are many people waiting on the kids (often indirectly, so they parents don't think it is a problem). The result is that the kids don't have to take really any degree of responsibility for steering the family ship. If you have a lawn guy, your kids don't have to mow the lawn in the hot summer. They also don't learn that manual labor is tough, and that a great white collar job might be a ticket out of a lifestyle where you have to do crap like that. If you have a house cleaner, your kids probably don't know that toilets really start to smell and that they need to be scrubbed thoroughly. If you've got a meal prep service, or you get a lot of takeout from Whole Foods, Larlo never learns that meal prep can take all day on Sunday, and that it cuts into other things he'd rather be doing. My in laws have found that career oriented, "power couple" type households with robust help can often churn out shockingly incapable kids, because the damn kids have never had to troubleshoot anything, screw in a light bulb, and so on.

Your kids probably have absolutely no idea what is involved in the responsibilities of day to day life, or just how much money is involved in running a household such as yours. Good luck to them. There are many partners at my husband's firm who had ONE successful parent (one partner's Mom had a job at Lehman, another partner had a Dad was a partner at another firm, and so on). However most of them had an at home parent, or at least someone who was very part time and added some balance to the household. Believe me, there is no balance in households like yours. And the sad thing is that you probably think you set it up perfectly. ("Hey! If I just outsource as much as possible, we will have tons of time for family!!") You can't spend all day grinding away, come home to a hot meal prepared by Esmeralda, have all house and lawn work done by someone else, and expect your kids to have a damn clue. You just cant.

[Anonymous]

They don't have to work for anything. You said so yourself, they have every advantage. If kids aren't self motivated then motivate them by taking shit away. They might not develop intrinsic motivation but at least they'll be working.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am not a teacher, but I married into a family full of teachers. My in-laws have always spoken, at length, about many of their observations. One that they've mentioned over the years is how, sometimes, when you have two superstar parents, you end up with with a meh kid, or even a dumb kid. They attribute this to a few different things:

- Parents over scheduling and helicoptering because there's a lot of pressure on superstar parents to produce a superstar kid. This isn't child-led and leaves the children with little opportunity to build confidence in themselves and find things at which they are good. This can also lead to a sort of quiet rebellion on the part of the kid, on some level. I'll bet you give a lot of attention to your kids for NOT excelling. On some level, they know this gets a rise out of you. If a parent isn't possible to please, why bother?

- Parents being more focused on their careers than on developing their child academically. Frankly, your kids might think you both work all the damn time, and they might have opinions about that. High pressure careers come with stress. You're very quick to assume that your kids see your work ethic as noble, and you seem confused as to why they don't want to emulate you.

- Parents conceiving with sub-optimal genetic material, since they're older. Superstars rarely crank out kids in their reproductive prime. They're still in school, getting established, making a name for themselves. Their egg and sperm might be able to get the job done (with or without assistance), but still isn't at its prime. This might not apply to your case, since you said your kids are talented. However, by your own admission your kids don't have much to show for their supposedly high level of talent. Have you considered that they might just be talented only in your eyes? Who knows? They might actually not be as smart as you think.

- Children spending a disproportionate amount of time in their early years with people who aren't as intelligent as the parents.

- Parents' high ability to farm out basic household tasks to outside support, which they need to do in order to save their sanity. This leave leaves the kids with minimal real world responsibilities beyond school/sports/whatever. This is a big one. In some of these households, there are many people waiting on the kids (often indirectly, so they parents don't think it is a problem). The result is that the kids don't have to take really any degree of responsibility for steering the family ship. If you have a lawn guy, your kids don't have to mow the lawn in the hot summer. They also don't learn that manual labor is tough, and that a great white collar job might be a ticket out of a lifestyle where you have to do crap like that. If you have a house cleaner, your kids probably don't know that toilets really start to smell and that they need to be scrubbed thoroughly. If you've got a meal prep service, or you get a lot of takeout from Whole Foods, Larlo never learns that meal prep can take all day on Sunday, and that it cuts into other things he'd rather be doing. My in laws have found that career oriented, "power couple" type households with robust help can often churn out shockingly incapable kids, because the damn kids have never had to troubleshoot anything, screw in a light bulb, and so on.

Your kids probably have absolutely no idea what is involved in the responsibilities of day to day life, or just how much money is involved in running a household such as yours. Good luck to them. There are many partners at my husband's firm who had ONE successful parent (one partner's Mom had a job at Lehman, another partner had a Dad was a partner at another firm, and so on). However most of them had an at home parent, or at least someone who was very part time and added some balance to the household. Believe me, there is no balance in households like yours. And the sad thing is that you probably think you set it up perfectly. ("Hey! If I just outsource as much as possible, we will have tons of time for family!!") You can't spend all day grinding away, come home to a hot meal prepared by Esmeralda, have all house and lawn work done by someone else, and expect your kids to have a damn clue. You just cant.

Exactly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Your kids sound like great, well-adjusted, happy people. Why do you feel compelled to push them for "more"? Ask yourself honestly - is this need to compete for you or for them?

Another question: does discomfort with the competitive nature of the parents contribute to this? What I mean is, how do you act when the kids try something new and seem to show a bit of promise? Would your kids say "mom goes crazy and dad goes bananas. They ruin all the fun"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am not a teacher, but I married into a family full of teachers. My in-laws have always spoken, at length, about many of their observations. One that they've mentioned over the years is how, sometimes, when you have two superstar parents, you end up with with a meh kid, or even a dumb kid. They attribute this to a few different things:

- Parents over scheduling and helicoptering because there's a lot of pressure on superstar parents to produce a superstar kid. This isn't child-led and leaves the children with little opportunity to build confidence in themselves and find things at which they are good. This can also lead to a sort of quiet rebellion on the part of the kid, on some level. I'll bet you give a lot of attention to your kids for NOT excelling. On some level, they know this gets a rise out of you. If a parent isn't possible to please, why bother?

- Parents being more focused on their careers than on developing their child academically. Frankly, your kids might think you both work all the damn time, and they might have opinions about that. High pressure careers come with stress. You're very quick to assume that your kids see your work ethic as noble, and you seem confused as to why they don't want to emulate you.

- Parents conceiving with sub-optimal genetic material, since they're older. Superstars rarely crank out kids in their reproductive prime. They're still in school, getting established, making a name for themselves. Their egg and sperm might be able to get the job done (with or without assistance), but still isn't at its prime. This might not apply to your case, since you said your kids are talented. However, by your own admission your kids don't have much to show for their supposedly high level of talent. Have you considered that they might just be talented only in your eyes? Who knows? They might actually not be as smart as you think.

- Children spending a disproportionate amount of time in their early years with people who aren't as intelligent as the parents.

- Parents' high ability to farm out basic household tasks to outside support, which they need to do in order to save their sanity. This leave leaves the kids with minimal real world responsibilities beyond school/sports/whatever. This is a big one. In some of these households, there are many people waiting on the kids (often indirectly, so they parents don't think it is a problem). The result is that the kids don't have to take really any degree of responsibility for steering the family ship. If you have a lawn guy, your kids don't have to mow the lawn in the hot summer. They also don't learn that manual labor is tough, and that a great white collar job might be a ticket out of a lifestyle where you have to do crap like that. If you have a house cleaner, your kids probably don't know that toilets really start to smell and that they need to be scrubbed thoroughly. If you've got a meal prep service, or you get a lot of takeout from Whole Foods, Larlo never learns that meal prep can take all day on Sunday, and that it cuts into other things he'd rather be doing. My in laws have found that career oriented, "power couple" type households with robust help can often churn out shockingly incapable kids, because the damn kids have never had to troubleshoot anything, screw in a light bulb, and so on.

Your kids probably have absolutely no idea what is involved in the responsibilities of day to day life, or just how much money is involved in running a household such as yours. Good luck to them. There are many partners at my husband's firm who had ONE successful parent (one partner's Mom had a job at Lehman, another partner had a Dad was a partner at another firm, and so on). However most of them had an at home parent, or at least someone who was very part time and added some balance to the household. Believe me, there is no balance in households like yours. And the sad thing is that you probably think you set it up perfectly. ("Hey! If I just outsource as much as possible, we will have tons of time for family!!") You can't spend all day grinding away, come home to a hot meal prepared by Esmeralda, have all house and lawn work done by someone else, and expect your kids to have a damn clue. You just cant.

+100

[Anonymous]

All three of my kids are different. My oldest doesn't push himself AT ALL but does well at a challenging school. Middle always pushes herself, to the point of headaches and stomach aches. The youngest does well in school but breaks down crying when she doesn't win a card game! I raised them all the same and they are all different. My husband and I are successful now but not as children. I keep telling myself: they all have their own path. All I can do is support them. It's so hard to realize how little control we have now that we aren't spoon feeding them!

[Anonymous]

If I had to boil my advice down to one book recommendation, this would be it:

The Psychology of Parental Control: How Well-meant Parenting Backfires, by Wendy S. Grolnick

https://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Parental-Control-Well-meant-Parenting/dp/0805835415

Here's the background:

There's a TON of research out there on motivation in general and it's application to parenting/children/learning/achievement in particular.

One place to start is Self-Determination Theory. Started up at University of Rochester many decades ago. All backed by extensive research. (This is not woo-woo self-help stuff.)

The focus is on differentiating between INTERNAL and EXTERNAL motivation. (Grolnick's book uses the SDT research in a parenting context.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination_theory

http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/


That body of work is related to (a foundation for?) the reserarch Carol Dweck has been doing for decades at Stanford. All focused on the "effort effect" and how to cultivate a "growth mindset," which in turn drives sustainable achievement and true self-esteem.

Here's a good intro article on Dweck's work:

https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=32124

Her book is also excellent: https://www.amazon.com/Mindset-Psychology-Carol-S-Dweck/dp/0345472322

Finally, the Habits of Mind curriculum developed from Dweck's work and SDT. Our school district has integrated it into the curriculum from K-12 (which is how I learned about all of this.)

The Habits of Mind approach is about helping kids (and adults!) cultivate productive learning BEHAVIORS and MINDSETS. Basically, ways to approach school/life that gives them autonomy and motivates genuine internal effort.

List/visual of the 16 Habits of Mind:

https://78462f86-a-cdd5dada-s-sites.googlegroups.com/a/digitalhomeroom.org/www/habits-of-mind/Habits%20of%20Mind%20Chart.jpg?attachauth=ANoY7cpXK1rGqEhYZEoqiK6XN0qQQ2JiWZ4CkP_xjsHKmTDkhamequ4rC-t6MpDeMyn6j-ybKBt84LdLGvEZrBgGSr00qluALWdIHQ3ra7sP8N8-970AiJfOl7TSNgUgpmoe4Qwsf2o5I8DA9wDCxDgvu4t4GcFf69e5q0d8CVPtbgrTCkoApw-PnW4ExAWLkPRwpAvhDanvmXvIPxrf3f1HU5dNBSQKdmgwP_a8y0D3TDaQYo-N3HNeqXkKm2zJ5OK59rm0NsaR&attredirects=0


Excellent book on the subject (and good summary of it):

http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/108008/chapters/Describing-the-Habits-of-Mind.aspx

There's also a TON of good stuff on line about the Habits of Mind -- including, I'm sure, how to develop/cultivate these mindsets and behaviors at any age and through any activity.