Chua Chatter

"A lot of people wonder how Chinese parents raise such stereotypically successful kids. They wonder what these parents do to produce so many math whizzes and music prodigies. " "Well, I can tell them because I've done it." writes Amy Chua in her new book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.

No doubt you've read something about this recently published book by Yale professor, Amy Chua because it continues to make the news. Believe me, plenty of people have weighed in on it too. Maybe out of fear that their own parenting skills are questionable and wonder if the Asian kid will always do better. Or maybe out of conviction that their own parenting skills are exemplary and that the Asian kid may be a prodigy, but couldn't possibly be happy.

I was fascinated by some of the examples in Ms. Chua's book of parenting which a typical Western parent might consider harsh. Like when her daughter made a birthday card for her at the last minute with nothing more than a smiley face and happy birthday on it. Ms. Chua rejected it saying it wasn't good enough and that she wanted a card the child had put a little more time into.

Ouch.

In her opinion, Western parents seem much more concerned about their child's self-esteem, respecting their individuality, and positive reinforcement. While the Chinese parent assumes the child's strength, overrides their preferences, and emphasizes hard work.

She also believes in total respect for the parent and was raised by typical Chinese parents as well. She gives an example from her own childhood when she won 2nd place in a history contest. Her parents came to the ceremony where another child won first place for all-around student. Her father said afterwards "Never ever disgrace me like that again."

We American parents may gasp at that, but Ms. Chua said it didn't knock her self-esteem at all. In her defense, she doesn't claim to be the perfect parent and agrees there are many ways to be a good parent. She doesn't see pushing children to work hard and be the best they can be as Chinese values, but American values.

Hard work. Nothing wrong with that.

Another example in her book, Ms. Chua insists her young daughter practice a particular piano piece late into the night without stopping for dinner, water, or even a bathroom break until the piece is perfect.

I'm thinking 'quality of life issue' here. Does she ever get to ride her bike or make mudpies? I'm sure she does. Doesn't she?

Years ago, Alanis Morissette recorded a song entitled Perfect.

Don't forget to win first place.

Don't forget to keep that smile on your face.

Be a good boy/girl. Try a little harder.

You've got to measure up. And make me prouder.

We'll love you . . . just the way you are . . . if you're perfect.

Certainly no parent can argue that expecting your children to be and do their very best is pretty basic. I can't remember ever hearing a parent say they'd like their children to strive toward mediocrity. Here's the thing though, where does encouragement end and insistence begin?

My own children were encouraged to participate in a lot of different activities and encouraged to stick it out for the duration, but in the end we let them choose the ones they wanted to continue. Ms. Chua might say we didn't push them enough. Maybe we didn't.

What if you happen to choose the wrong instrument or sport or subject to push? There are only so many hours in a day - in a childhood. Are we making the most of it or making too much out of it?

Does it really matter as long as they are doing what they enjoy and also happen to be good at it?

In addition (and maybe most important) to these measurable skills, there's a lot to be said for social skills you simply can't achieve sitting on a piano bench. Might these be more beneficial somewhere down the road?

You may remember the series of incidents several years ago referred to as the "strip search prank call scam" when a man called a fast food restaurant claiming to be the police and convinced managers to strip search female employees or perform other crazy acts on behalf of the police. It was amazing to me that not only the young female employees obeyed, but even the adult managers did too! I remember thinking our children would have said "Are you crazy? I'm not about to do that."

Sometimes it's okay to question authority.

In Ms. Chua's book, she mentions that if a child does poorly in school, a Western parent may question the teacher or the curriculum. She states when she did poorly on a test, her father would say to work twice as hard next time.

I completely agree. With her father.

However, when a child believes their answers on a test are in fact correct, I see nothing wrong with respectfully asking the teacher to take a second look. Unfortunately, not every teacher is as good as the next. Even the great ones are human like the rest of us.

I'd hate to think I had to teach something like computer skills to a high school student. I'm reminded of an incident when one of our kids was in high school. The teacher for the computer class was instructing the students on how to use the Word program. He told the students "to indent a paragraph, just hit the spacebar 5 times". That still makes me laugh. Bless his heart.

There's certainly a lot more to parenting than producing a violin prodigy or a math whiz. I think Amy Chua would agree as well. The examples from her book are probably the most extreme and were by no means a daily occurrence. Even she agrees love and understanding go a long way.

I did ponder the fact that there are about 4 Chinese for every 1 American. Eight for every 2. Twelve for every 3. Sixteen for every 4. Aside from all those Chinese in China, another 2.5 million Americans are Chinese-Americans.

You get the picture.

Is it possible that it only seems like there is an inordinate number of Chinese prodigies because there's just so many Chinese? I had really good parents, but I'm no math whiz so I'll leave it at that.

I think Ms. Chua is pretty brave to write a book on parenting. We American and Chinese parents do the best we can and with a little luck we sometimes raise awesome adults.

I may be biased, but I think ours are pretty awesome.