The helicopter parents won - a look back

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

Well it sounds like your boring upbringing has inspired your adult self motivated project to live vicariously through your children. What exactly is the endgame?

DP- but all the checked out parents are saying the same things. "Boredom is good! I ran around the neighborhood not doing activities and look at me now, I'm doing great!" Everyone's upbringing inspires and influences their parenting choices.

What do you mean by “checked out” parents?

The ones who do the absolute bare minimum. They don't sign their kids up for activities b/c they don't want to drive, don't want to spend time, money, weekends, etc. Because "what's the point, they will never be great." It's a lazy cop out.

What if they read books with their kids and have deep, meaningful conversations? What if their house is the house that’s always open for friends to come hang out? What if they hike/bike/play catch with the kids, just within the confines of their own neighborhood?

Are they still “checked out”? Still lazy?

Yes, sounds pretty lazy to live in your tiny little bubble. Do you hav agoraphobia or something?

I’ll bet you’re one of those parents who doesn’t know how to actually interact with your kid. (Or you just can’t be bothered.) Watching them from the sidelines is much easier for you than engaging with them yourself.

“Oh but we have such a great relationship from our many many hours in the car!” Sure you do.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

Well it sounds like your boring upbringing has inspired your adult self motivated project to live vicariously through your children. What exactly is the endgame?

DP- but all the checked out parents are saying the same things. "Boredom is good! I ran around the neighborhood not doing activities and look at me now, I'm doing great!" Everyone's upbringing inspires and influences their parenting choices.

What do you mean by “checked out” parents?

The ones who do the absolute bare minimum. They don't sign their kids up for activities b/c they don't want to drive, don't want to spend time, money, weekends, etc. Because "what's the point, they will never be great." It's a lazy cop out.

What if they read books with their kids and have deep, meaningful conversations? What if their house is the house that’s always open for friends to come hang out? What if they hike/bike/play catch with the kids, just within the confines of their own neighborhood?

Are they still “checked out”? Still lazy?

Yes, sounds pretty lazy to live in your tiny little bubble. Do you hav agoraphobia or something?

Ok, but if the kid is happy and healthy what exactly is wrong with this? Maybe I was just a weird kid/teen, but I never felt a need to go out with friends to do anything huge. We went out all, movies, amusement parks ect and that was great, but we really were content to hang out at home.

This is DCUM. Being content does not compute. If it’s not THE BEST school or THE BEST sports team or THE BEST job, it’s nothing. If your kid isn’t a nationally ranked athlete, or winning robotics competitions or raking in the cash at some super sought after job, they you all suck. There is no middle ground. There is no being happy. There is no being content.

The sad part is, it’s not really about wanting the best for the kid. I honestly believe it’s the parents living through their kids. It’s bragging rights, pure and simple. If it wasn’t, they would be happy if their kid was happy.

This an incomplete and unsophisticated understanding of parenting. If you exclude neglect and abuse- parents do not have much effect on their children’s happiness as adults. An adult’s happiness is largely a result of thier brain chemistry, the quality of thier relationships (particularly with their spouse) and the economy.

As a parent you can only hope to play the odds - a better school should lead to a better job - a better job should lead to a happier life. Is this a guaranty? absolutely not, but your odds are better.

The other issue isn’t really about outcomes at all. It’s a recognition that highschool is much more competitive (in activities and academics) than many of us remember. So decisions not to push maybe a decision not to get the outcomes you want.

[Anonymous]

Such odd logic to say, 'well Larla might not make the HS softball team even if we do travel ball so no sense in bothering with that'... does that apply to everything? No sense in studying much because you might not get into a T50 school anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Such odd logic to say, 'well Larla might not make the HS softball team even if we do travel ball so no sense in bothering with that'... does that apply to everything? No sense in studying much because you might not get into a T50 school anyway.

Once again nuance is lost on DCUM. I haven’t seen anyone advocating to “not study much” because it won’t get you into a T50. But 12+ AP’s? Kumon starting in 1st grade? Thousands in test prep? Daily music lessons when weekly would be fine? Multiple sports when the kid would be happy with one? That’s pushing, and none of it is necessary. None.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Such odd logic to say, 'well Larla might not make the HS softball team even if we do travel ball so no sense in bothering with that'... does that apply to everything? No sense in studying much because you might not get into a T50 school anyway.

Once again nuance is lost on DCUM. I haven’t seen anyone advocating to “not study much” because it won’t get you into a T50. But 12+ AP’s? Kumon starting in 1st grade? Thousands in test prep? Daily music lessons when weekly would be fine? Multiple sports when the kid would be happy with one? That’s pushing, and none of it is necessary. None.

daily lessons or daily practice? my kids are into music and their own teachers - accomplished professionals - would never recommend daily lessons. they are supposed to build independence.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

Well it sounds like your boring upbringing has inspired your adult self motivated project to live vicariously through your children. What exactly is the endgame?

DP- but all the checked out parents are saying the same things. "Boredom is good! I ran around the neighborhood not doing activities and look at me now, I'm doing great!" Everyone's upbringing inspires and influences their parenting choices.

What do you mean by “checked out” parents?

The ones who do the absolute bare minimum. They don't sign their kids up for activities b/c they don't want to drive, don't want to spend time, money, weekends, etc. Because "what's the point, they will never be great." It's a lazy cop out.

What if they read books with their kids and have deep, meaningful conversations? What if their house is the house that’s always open for friends to come hang out? What if they hike/bike/play catch with the kids, just within the confines of their own neighborhood?

Are they still “checked out”? Still lazy?

Yes, sounds pretty lazy to live in your tiny little bubble. Do you hav agoraphobia or something?

Ok, but if the kid is happy and healthy what exactly is wrong with this? Maybe I was just a weird kid/teen, but I never felt a need to go out with friends to do anything huge. We went out all, movies, amusement parks ect and that was great, but we really were content to hang out at home.

This is DCUM. Being content does not compute. If it’s not THE BEST school or THE BEST sports team or THE BEST job, it’s nothing. If your kid isn’t a nationally ranked athlete, or winning robotics competitions or raking in the cash at some super sought after job, they you all suck. There is no middle ground. There is no being happy. There is no being content.

The sad part is, it’s not really about wanting the best for the kid. I honestly believe it’s the parents living through their kids. It’s bragging rights, pure and simple. If it wasn’t, they would be happy if their kid was happy.

This an incomplete and unsophisticated understanding of parenting. If you exclude neglect and abuse- parents do not have much effect on their children’s happiness as adults. An adult’s happiness is largely a result of thier brain chemistry, the quality of thier relationships (particularly with their spouse) and the economy.

As a parent you can only hope to play the odds - a better school should lead to a better job - a better job should lead to a happier life. Is this a guaranty? absolutely not, but your odds are better.

The other issue isn’t really about outcomes at all. It’s a recognition that highschool is much more competitive (in activities and academics) than many of us remember. So decisions not to push maybe a decision not to get the outcomes you want.

You sure about that?

https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/parent-child-relationships-and-offsprings-positive-mental-wellbei

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Such odd logic to say, 'well Larla might not make the HS softball team even if we do travel ball so no sense in bothering with that'... does that apply to everything? No sense in studying much because you might not get into a T50 school anyway.

Very few kid athletes go on to be college athletes and pro athletes. If you have a child with the internal drive, passion, will to do it, and you have the time and budget, by all means go for it. It doesn't make a lot of sense for the great majority of kids and families in terms of life balance. Same with kids who take all APs every year, constantly study, test prep and have leisure/sports time to get into an Ivy: you can do all that and still not get in. Are you willing to sacrifice for that chance? Maybe so, and maybe you truly love studying more than anything else. Would you be better off having more fulfilling teen years in other ways and getting into a top 100? Maybe. It's a personal decision.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

Well it sounds like your boring upbringing has inspired your adult self motivated project to live vicariously through your children. What exactly is the endgame?

DP- but all the checked out parents are saying the same things. "Boredom is good! I ran around the neighborhood not doing activities and look at me now, I'm doing great!" Everyone's upbringing inspires and influences their parenting choices.

What do you mean by “checked out” parents?

The ones who do the absolute bare minimum. They don't sign their kids up for activities b/c they don't want to drive, don't want to spend time, money, weekends, etc. Because "what's the point, they will never be great." It's a lazy cop out.

What if they read books with their kids and have deep, meaningful conversations? What if their house is the house that’s always open for friends to come hang out? What if they hike/bike/play catch with the kids, just within the confines of their own neighborhood?

Are they still “checked out”? Still lazy?

Yes, sounds pretty lazy to live in your tiny little bubble. Do you hav agoraphobia or something?

Ok, but if the kid is happy and healthy what exactly is wrong with this? Maybe I was just a weird kid/teen, but I never felt a need to go out with friends to do anything huge. We went out all, movies, amusement parks ect and that was great, but we really were content to hang out at home.

Ok, but if everyone isn't exactly like you, isn't that ok too? Some are high energy, like sports, hobbies, activities, and being active. It doesn't make their parents nuts or mean they are going to have mental breakdowns.

I realize that not every kid is like me. All I'm saying is kids can be fine without activities. Alot of people are looking at this like every kid wants to do them. How would you react to it if your kid didn't want to do activities? Would you think less of them? Would you think that something is wrong with them?

[Anonymous]

So it worked for parents almost a decade ago. I’m not sure that’s the case for parents now. Everybody is taking AOPS or RSM math. Everybody is learning to read or close before kindergarten. Everybody is taking multiple sports and joining private teams. It’s getting harder to stand out.

[Anonymous]

Have you asked your kids if they wishes you’d signed them up for travel this and that and tutoring etc? You should. And see what they say. I bet a million dollars that they are so happy you didn’t. I feel bad that you seem.. disappointed in their lives! Please don’t telegraph this to them. You sound like a great parent. Don’t do the regret thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So it worked for parents almost a decade ago. I’m not sure that’s the case for parents now. Everybody is taking AOPS or RSM math. Everybody is learning to read or close before kindergarten. Everybody is taking multiple sports and joining private teams. It’s getting harder to stand out.

It’s like a formula that some parents follow. Top 20 admissions rolling their eyes and rejecting these clones. There are plenty of kids who are unique, smart, interesting and follow their own path. Those ones stand out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

No one is arguing that kids should be couch potatoes. Kids should excel in school and participate in activities. That is not the same as curating a kids’ life so that they end up in an elite school. It cracks me up when DCUMers get so defensive about “achieving” and yet have minimal reading comprehension/critical thinking skills.

DP. I have often wondered why ostensibly intelligent people (such as one finds in this area) not only lack critical thinking skills but seem utterly unable to articulate the “why” of their beliefs or defend any of the values they claim to hold dear. I suspect it’s because they are always in a kind of structured activity/testing state of mind (preoccupied with doing things the “right” way, or getting to the “correct” answer). Most of them have clearly never thought deeply about any social, political, philosophical, or spiritual matters - they are just following some sort of #lifegoals checklist and congratulating themselves on checking off more boxes than their neighbors.

Or something like that.

The "why" is status.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But my kids weren't a breath away from an anxiety disorder and are happy people. I think that's worth more than going to a higher-ranked college.

OP here. I don’t think that was the choice. My kids were probably going to be happy either way.

The realization that I have come to is that I traded opportunities to improve my kids chances for easier weekends and less hectic weeknights.

At the time I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing - but that’s what I did.

If we had pushed math more would they have had a better chance at UVA and Michigan- almost certainly.

If we had done travel sports I don’t know if they would have played in college but they would’ve almost certainly made the highschool baseball team.

In the plus side I did have a lot more in the 529s than I would have if I pursued additional opportunities.

What gets me is I thought we were already doing a lot. We sat with them while they did their homework., they were always on a team I even coached a couple of their teams early on.

For the posters, who were saying that life’s a marathon, and not a sprint. I think you’re missing the point. A parent’s strategy is open as many doors as possible. It’s up to them to choose the door. I think the net results of not pushing harder in sports and academically was there fewer doors for them to go through

The doors are not exclusively located on college campuses, is the thing.

But those doors are always available. At what point are those other doors not open?

You are mistaken. Those doors are not always available.

There are finite opportunities to enter service academies, skilled trades programs (alone or as an adjunct to high-test liberal arts education), and particular niche institutions of higher education that may be better fits for a given person than the most elite colleges.

There are finite opportunities to prevent stress-mediated mental health problems that can last a lifetime (or end in death).

There are finite opportunities to be fully present in the life one is leading today, vs simply striving for a specific future outcome. This moment will be gone when that future arrives; it can’t be gotten back.

These are all doors that can and often do close while the focus is single-mindedly on college admissions.

You can't open all the doors all the time but you can't argue that pushing your kids to do their best and fulfill their potential closes any doors. And doing that doesn't close the door to service academies or trade organizations. Explain how after a parent doing their best means a kid can't go to a trade school? This makes zero sense. Sitting on the couch at home vs participating in sports, clubs, music, theater doesn't close any doors. Being a couch potato will certainly limit opportunities.

Such black and white thinking. Why are the options being a couch potato or being in travel sports/being over scheduled? It’s a continuum.

The black and white thinking is coming from the other direction with people claiming that unless kids are totally self motivated and seek out every opportunity on their own, even in 2nd grade, their parents are forcing them and are mentally unwell. Then the people come on claiming they did absolutely nothing for their kids and then went to an Ivy (decades ago). Get real. Lots and lots of people are doing the utmost to help their kids along the way and OP can see it. People are delusional pretending this isn't actually happening.

Help your child to help them maximize their potential. The problem is "helping" your child for the sole purpose of reaching some elite threshold and anything less then that is failure. Life isn't D1 scholarship+ Ivies or bust.

But without helping your kid, you'll never know what their limits will be. Point is, you definitely won't get there if you don't even try.

Y’all seem to have so much difficulty understanding this. The kid may do better, in the net, without your “help” if the “help”
is what OP is describing. Yes, you will know what their limits will be. It will be what they achieve—and it may be more than they would have achieved if you had tried to stage-manage like this.

We had a kid who used to rip off pages of her Kumon worksheets and hide them all over the house to get out of doing them. (Like there were twenty pages and she would pull off like six to make her job a little easier.) she is now an adult and occasionally we find another little stash when we get a new entertainment center or something. She turned out fine but in retrospect she was never going to be a mathematician and clearly was very strong willed. There is a limit to how much you can control another person. And we were never able to instill a love of math.

You tried to instill a move of math with kumon?!?!? Lol! I'm a scientist and we instill a love of math by watching birds hunt and explaining the mechanics of their necks, or looking buildings being built and talking about the loads on the cranes. You know, things that are actually interesting to a kid. The math is just the language to describe it. I have 4 kids that love math, physics, and BOOKS. The teens want to be a writer and a doctor, one kid is undecided, and the little one wants to be a ballerina. They all love math and are good at it but don't necessarily want to be mathematicians.

"That mom" here. For the record, neither my husband nor I are math people. We speak a bunch of foreign languages but math is not our thing. I would literally have no idea how to talk about loads on cranes with my kid. So yeah, we tried Kumon. Kid wants a phd in philosophy. no money in that. I would have loved to have had the secret sauce that makes a kid that loves math.

please don't listen to this arrogant fool. tutors can help teach subjects that are taught poorly in school. tutors were the norm, not the exception not so long ago. many great minds and scientists had nothing BUT tutors.

-1. Tutors are not the exception. You just come from a crowded, disadvantaged country, and you think it is the norm.

i said - not so long ago. darwin was tutored. einstein was tutored. von neumann was tutored. they didn't learn their foundations from your run of the mill HS or middle school teacher.

Oh my god, you all seriously think you have little Darwins and Einsteins, don’t you?

so you just realized now you are a neglectful parent? happy to provide that service.

Did Darwin or Einstein make the high school baseball team? Just think of what could have been if their parents had pushed just a little bit harder!

Interestingly Einstein credits his mother forcing him to play violin as critical to his success. Anyone saying that it's all just a highly motivated child has no idea what they are talking about and is oblivious to the world around them.

"It isn’t easy to nurture a genius, let alone raise one. In their case studies, the authors found that every child who went on to be successful had unique stories about how their were raised, but their plots were all the same: They had parents who made very strategic parenting choices."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/15/how-this-formula-that-helped-albert-einsteins-parents-raise-a-genius.html

Ah well, I already let my kid quit the violin and we both agree that we’re much happier for it.

But at least you tried. It's the parents who think the kids are in the driver's seat and must be entirely self motivated who will be left behind.

I signed my kid up for private violin lessons at age 6 and we stuck with it for about 5 years, but it was increasingly become a source of contention, and it was clear it was not really going to be a thing for him. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had never really expressed any interest music at a young age, joined the middle school orchestra, fell in love with playing the cello, and will play at least through high school. I’ve never once had to remind her to practice. She just found something that clicked and ran with it. I’ll take the latter experience any day.

And maybe if your daughter had been encouraged to take instrument lessons at a younger age, she'd have loved it. Starting in middle school with a school level orchestra is pretty low level, and she is now capped at how well she can play.

That is such a sad, sad view of life. Who gives a flying crap if a kid doesn’t end up at the very top of something? Low level? They found something that brings them joy. Fun. Joy. Do you understand the concept of having an interest bc it’s fun and enriches your life vs. just something to add to a CV or college app? You people are pathetic.

These people aren’t raising kids - they’re raising future college students.

We all are doing what we think is best for our kids. Personally I think parents just relaxing on the weekends and letting their kids be on their iPads and other screens is a huge disservice to the children. I grew up watching tv during most of my spare time. There is so much to be done. I know parents think being bored is going to create all this amazing self motivated projects from kids but this isn’t what happens. I want more for my kids. I want them to do more, achieve more.

No one is arguing that kids should be couch potatoes. Kids should excel in school and participate in activities. That is not the same as curating a kids’ life so that they end up in an elite school. It cracks me up when DCUMers get so defensive about “achieving” and yet have minimal reading comprehension/critical thinking skills.

DP. I have often wondered why ostensibly intelligent people (such as one finds in this area) not only lack critical thinking skills but seem utterly unable to articulate the “why” of their beliefs or defend any of the values they claim to hold dear. I suspect it’s because they are always in a kind of structured activity/testing state of mind (preoccupied with doing things the “right” way, or getting to the “correct” answer). Most of them have clearly never thought deeply about any social, political, philosophical, or spiritual matters - they are just following some sort of #lifegoals checklist and congratulating themselves on checking off more boxes than their neighbors.

Or something like that.

The "why" is status.

I disagree that status is the main motivation for parent behavior. Of course there’s some status seeking as parents are human and humans crave status.

But the main reason for the extreme competitiveness we see in the DMV is fear. Parents around here are locked in an arms race to have ever more competitive kids. My observation is that this fear isn’t idle. We all know people who have been sidetracked early in life and now lead sad little lives. I have friends who never got it together never married never bought a home and are pretty unhappy. I have relatives who moved back in with thier parents in their 30s. And willl probably never move out.

It would break my heart if that was my kids. How to prevent this? I have no idea - the best I can come up with is to encourage my kids to achieve in sports in school and art and hope that ambition rubs off and they carry it in to their lives.

The othe reason parents are so competitive is the way we have organized our schools. The high schools around here are 2000+ kids. That’s 1000 or more boys to compete for the 15 spots on the varsity basketball team. That’s 1000+ girls to compete for the 18 spots on the softball team. In my local school many more kids are cut from the teams than make it. When you combined this with parents who have the inclination and wherewithal to help thier kids it’s a recipe for hyper competitiveness. This trickles down to the youth activities and the arms race begins at younger and younger levels.

[Anonymous]

Just wanted to point out that midlife crises often present like this. Deep regret over choices not taken, typically filtered through seeming logic and data.

I read OP's posts, and subsequent posts, and while I sort of see the points she's making, I also recognize the pattern of thought as fairly typical midlife stuff.

It's hard. We only get one life. We don't get do-overs. We never get to see the counterfactual for the choices we made.

Wishing everyone grace in these moments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just wanted to point out that midlife crises often present like this. Deep regret over choices not taken, typically filtered through seeming logic and data.

I read OP's posts, and subsequent posts, and while I sort of see the points she's making, I also recognize the pattern of thought as fairly typical midlife stuff.

It's hard. We only get one life. We don't get do-overs. We never get to see the counterfactual for the choices we made.

Wishing everyone grace in these moments.

I’m currently in thick of it with tweens and teens and it is exhausting parenting them. I often think I should let them just quit everything and do whatever they want. Forget an elite college, my kid probably wouldn’t even get into Penn State nowadays let alone UVA or UPenn.

Just waking them up and getting them to school is a struggle and pain in the ass.