<p>An educator for many years now, focused on healthy happy kids and right fit schools, I very much agree with you. Bravo!</p>
<p>shrinkrap, I too wondered about the “two push here dummies”…especially it sounded as if it was considered desirable?! But the image is so amusing I sort of hate to disturb it with reality.</p>
<p>“Push here dummy” refers to having a Ph.D. (Push Here Dummy) IMO, there are a lot of degrees and careers to be proud of that don’t necessarily require a Ph.D. Certainly advanced degrees are wonderful, and I have one myself as it was necessary for the career I wanted, but again, it was the career I wanted, not one that was selected to please my parents. </p>
<p>For us, whe we did right was to help our kids develop a love of learning, a love of life, and the joy received from helping others. Both kids have been very active in volunteer/community service activities since they were in middle school. Seeing that our kids have a good value system and make good decisions for themselves is what, IMO, we did right. We, too, value education, but it is what they do with their education and what they do as a person that is what makes us proud.</p>
<p>^^ Forgot to mention, the term “push here dummy” is usually used when referring to an automated camera that doesn’t require a lot of manual lens adjustments, focus, etc… meaning you don’t need a Ph.D. to operate the camera.</p>
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<p>What more needs to be said. Healthy happy + right fit = success for the kids and the parents. The hard part is to find the right fit among tens of schools (not 3000).</p>
<p>att159 is correct. All the perfect parenting in the world cannot compensate for the lack of certain qualities in a child. Inner motivation is a biggie. I think we encouraged its development in our children by not offering bribes for achievement and by not focusing on the external rewards that may or may not come to a kid for achievement. Still, my kids seemed to just have an innate drive to work hard and do their best. Several friends of mine insist their chidlren simply don’t have that much motivation. I’m sure some of these parents are telling the honest truth. But I’ve seen others of them consistently make parenting choices that reinforced values or demonstrated attitudes that ran counter to hard work and achievement. For example. one mom always made choices for her child in favor of the child’s comfort and happiness. Now, I’m not saying we should deliberately make our children unhappy. But our wisdom about what is important needs to come into play. I’m talking about things like the child is placed in advanced math, but none of his friends are in the class and he thinks the material will be tough. He’s not happy about either prospect, so Mom has him moved down to the lower level where his friends are so he will feel socially comfortable and won’t have to work so hard. That wouldn’t happen in my house. I’d expect my son or daughter to make new friends and give it a try first.</p>
<p>^Great post!</p>
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<p>Correct. A lot of parents of high-achieving kids recognize this, which is why you see many on this thread crediting the kid rather than themselves. They could see that the real drive was coming from their kid and not from anything they did. Good parenting cannot create this drive in a kid, but bad parenting can destroy it.</p>
<p>Great post, GFG. (Post #167) </p>
<p>From what I observe, it’s a general attitude among parents not to push their kids. If the family is financially okay, it’s easy to provide the kids with material comforts. But very often it is hard work to make them understand things they don’t see as a young person. Then the parents say I won’t push them do things they don’t want to, it will make them unhappy. Only if they knew how much their children will enjoy the result of hard work when they are older and can judge by themselves. And, actually working with a kid and bring out their inner potential is such a pleasant (by no means easy) process. Your parenthood is a much enjoyable experience when you do that. </p>
<p>Some kids never develop their drive and good working/study habit because their parents never tried to point out something to them, or they tried, and didn’t work the first time, then they gave up and found themselves some excuses like “I don’t want to make him unhappy.” “let him be himself”… I don’t know if the parents honestly believe that’s good for their kids, or just because it is too much work to push them - by pushing I don’t mean to an extreme. If you’re lucky you get a kid who is motivated from day 1. (even in that case I think early childhood education most likely play a role.) Otherwise, for most parents, if the kids seem to be not having the drive, it can definitely be nurtured if the parents are willing to work with them.</p>
<p>It is a little early to be sure that we did things right as we have one college freshman and one HS junior, but things seem to be breaking in the right direction. However, a little humility is in order as a lot of who are kids are is genetic. The college freshman was born with a desire to win that is fierce. The HS junior was born very anxious. Both are bright, but the freshman is unusually so, probably even among Top 10 school students [I say that having attended three of what the OP would say are Top 5 schools and taught at one]. He was also born with serious learning disabilities that affected reading, writing, speaking and processing speed, which required that we negotiate with school systems and alter his education to enable him to be able to get input and produce outputs that were commensurate with the underlying horsepower. The junior’s anxiety seemed to morph into ADD and she reads slowly as well.</p>
<p>I think we did a few things that worked, though they may not be the things that others should do.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>We always ate dinner as a family until late in HS. I travel a lot, but am always home for dinner when I am in town.</p></li>
<li><p>I am a business owner and work pretty hard [normal work schedule is 8 AM until midnight or 1 AM, but I always took off after dinner to help kids with homework and read to them.</p></li>
<li><p>My wife and I read to each kid, and especially the older one, for hours a day. He says it was the stories we read (e.g., The Chronicles of Narnia when he was 4, The Hobbit in kindergarten, all three volumes of the Lord of the Rings in 1st grade (talk about hours of reading), … ) that caused him to push through the physical pain of reading to learn to read.</p></li>
<li><p>No commercial TV in the house until this past year. I offered an unlimited budget for books, audiobooks, sports equipment and art supplies. I told the kids that boredom was a choice. No prohibition in watching at grandparents’ or friends’ houses.</p></li>
<li><p>Take the kids on trips all over the world. One cool trip a year. I plan to continue this as they grow older and do it with their families as well.</p></li>
<li><p>Negotiated with the school system and/or move schools to help my son develop his brain. This meant partial homeschooling in HS, which had never been done in our school district before. Find and work with specialists who could help him, but also recognize that an awful lot of the help actually came from us and him. He had not learned to write well in HS (he got A’s because his ideas were good) until he chose Moot Court as an EC and his hypercompetitiveness meant that he wanted to learn to write short, compelling, persuasive briefs with no fluff and he asked my help. I worked with him on his briefs that year – going over the logic, the sentences, the word choices, etc. in detail – and by the end of the year, his writing had catapulted from mediocre to pretty good. Did 99+ percentile on SAT writing (an odd standard of writing) but also got the highest grade in Harvard Summer School’s version of Expo 20, the expository writing course required of all Harvard freshmen. His deep inner drive to succeed (be at the top of his class) has enabled him to compensate for severe learning disabilities and perform at a high level. My job was to help him find an environment in which he can play to his strengths and not one that emphasizes his areas of deficit. There have been bumps in the road and there will be again, but so far so good.</p></li>
<li><p>Keep working with my daughter to figure out how to boost her confidence and reduce her anxiety so her basic intelligence can shine through. It is starting to gel.</p></li>
<li><p>Recognize that one size does not fit all. Son needed to be in a school that a) had kids as bright as he was (as he thrives with intellectual stimulation) and b) was flexible enough to accommodate his learning disabilities. Even though he is in a top school, he is not sure there are enough smart kids. I think he will find them. Daughter needs a place where she is confident she will succeed. Sending her to a Top 10 school would be a failure and abdication of parental duty. She will develop better in an environment that is less competitive and where, overcoming her anxiety, she is likely to perform at her top level (which is pretty high according to IQ tests).</p></li>
<li><p>Letting kids know that the prize and my focus is that they have the skills, knowledge, and mindset to be happy, successful adults. Though there is the game of getting into college and there will be probably another game of getting into grad school or med school or B-school or …, getting good grades/performing well is only an instrumental goal and the intrinsic one of learning and learning how to learn and how to be effective is often not positively correlated with grades. How each kid gets there is different. I loved and benefited from my 15 years or so at what are probably top 5 schools on the OP’s list and still maintain an affiliation with one, my route is clearly the only path to successful adult life and I want to make my kids understand that.</p></li>
<li><p>I thought paperchaserpop’s post was excellent. Listen to your kids. Let them know that you love them and not just for their accomplishments.</p></li>
<li><p>You never know what will work. When they were really little, I would sing to them every night when putting them to be (several times a day when they were babies). My daughter loves music and still sometimes asks me to sing “Love Me Tender” to her when she is going to bed. My son finds music jumbles his brain. He always asks her to turn it off. Although he is a little better now, at age 13, he put the capital T in Tone Deaf. Except for the masterfully incompetent folk they bring out in the first round of American Idol, I’ve never heard worse. But, he loves audiobooks and can listen to an audiobook and read another book or do math proofs and fully absorb both sets of activities. Our kids are wired differently and what works for one will not work for another.</p></li>
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<p>Sorry this is so long. I hope it is helpful to others.</p>
<p>3 major factors in D’s academic success (so far, college junior):
- Telling 5 years old in kindergarden that doing Homework every day will quarantee and “A”. Result: no “B”'s so far
- Going to HS that fits best. Result: group of very close friends, graduating #1 in class, great college prep.
- Going to college that fits best. Result: remains to be seen, but so far on a way to achieving her goal.</p>
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<p>Well said, coureur. A person’s behavior is typically shaped by a combination of external incentives and internal drive. Motivation should have a healthy balance of enjoyment of the goal, the activity and outcome. Soem drive themselves too hard or set either unrealistic goals or goals that may be achievable, but at a high price. Sometimes the bar should be reset so that there is satisfaction as well as success.</p>
<p>I think its important to recognize that kids aren’t machines that churn out athletes or geniuses- otherwise, look out for recoil damage.</p>
<p>In my point 9 above, I omitted a critical “not.” It should have said, “my route is clearly not the only path to successful adult life and I want to make my kids understand that.”</p>
<p>By the way, how do you make words bold on this board?</p>
<p>a couple ways: after typing the word, highlight it and hold down “control” while typing “B”.</p>
<p>or type [B ] **word ** <a href=“eliminate%20the%20spaces%20I%20placed%20in%20the%20brackets.”>/B </a></p>
<p>Thanks to paperchaserpop (#150) and shawbridge (#171) for your wonderful posts. With the devoted and thoughtful parents like you, I am sure your kids are doing well.</p>
<p>My kids know that I have high expectation of them, but they know when chips are down, no matter what we would always love them and be on their side. It has given them a sense of security to take on tough challenges and not be afraid to fail.</p>
<p>It is something I am seeing over and over again with so many parents on CC. They could be tough as nails (at least on the forum) - must get certain GPA, no spending money, self supporting after college… - but they would hop on the next plane if they thought their kid is in trouble or need them in any way. I think their kids must feel that love everyday.</p>
<p>There are many, many good posts on this subject. I especially agree with #43 and #51 - kind of scanned the ones after these.</p>
<p>1- Teaching and modeling the joy and importance of reading and learning. If a child can learn from books and has access, the results of inadequate schools and lack of opportunities are diminished considerably.</p>
<p>2- Didn’t rely on wealth. We intentionally became less wealthy trading high-stress, long-hour businesses to become a one, much lower income family with TIME to spend with our children. We traveled extensively by car, tent-camped, and cooked most of our meals on a camp stove. We bought a local museum membership for cheap and visited science museums all over the country for free, spending the day, not just a few hours. Our children work for their spending money and to help pay for college. They’ve had very few paid lessons, but have learned to glean knowledge and experience from the most unlikely places. They did go to good camps, but always paid half themselves.</p>
<p>3-Love, praise, time, encouragement, more time, more love, more encouragement - especially in pursuing activities that aren’t necessarily cool or the norm. Help discovering areas in which to stand out and shine. An admissions person called this “creating opportunities” and seems to be a highly desirable trait. </p>
<p>4- Administrative support - again: TIME. Most successful business people have administrative support - we help our kids dot i’s and cross t’s. Some may view this as a negative, but it’s worked for us. We’re a family and a team.</p>
<p>5- Extremely limited access to video games (game system was kept at grandparents home until kids were teenagers). Limited TV - only one set in our home. Time killers and potentially brain cell destroyers. They also seem to negatively impact attention span in the kids H teaches.</p>
<p>6- Taught and modeled caring for others. We volunteer and share our resources. Our kids have learned how personally rewarding and satisfying this is. That colleges seem to appreciate good citizens is a side benefit.</p>
<p>“I think its important to recognize that kids aren’t machines that churn out athletes or geniuses”
-Yes. However, most of them can perform very well in any activity, including academics if they are taught reasonable work ethic and reassured time and agian that if they apply themselves, they will achieve their goals. However, it is important to point out that the kid is not super human and cannot do above best of their personal ability. Having great academic success is within reach of everybody, given reasonable effort and positive attitude.</p>
<p>Well, the other point is, going to a top 10 school doesn’t mean someone’s “successful.” It just means they went to a good school. That’s all. Plenty of losers with fancy degrees, plenty of people who are jerks or just not really worth the time of day emerging from everywhere, because that’s just life.</p>