Tuition Fever: Madness in Singapore?

During a recent conversation with a friend, we began chatting about the tutoring frenzy in Singapore, which I've written about before here.

While it's common knowledge that local Singaporean kids engage in hours of tuition, often in all their major subjects, it may come as a surprise to some that kids in international schools attend almost as much tuition as their local peers.

Divesh Shah, of the famed Math Vision Center, tutors thousands of international school kids in math and Science. Many of his pupils are young -- they start as early as grade 2. And now, apparently, there are also a host of tutors for English, History, and Economics. High school kids, apparently, are even skipping school to attend tutoring sessions... Why would any high school student require extra tuition in every subject?

I can't help but wonder at this phenomenon. I can understand tutoring in a subject or two -- when a child is really struggling. But tutoring in every subject? How is that helpful?

Here are my thoughts on the subject:

1. If parents and teachers work together in the early years to ensure that kids have strong academic foundations/skills, then kids should not need tutors when they get to middle and high school. Much of this tutoring frenzy, particularly for international school kids who move around alot, may be the result of major academic gaps in the early years.
Parents: help your kids build strong foundations in math, reading, and writing early on, and high school will be a whole lot easier.

2. Relying on tutors can be dangerous in the long run. Kids have to learn to study and work independently at some point. They've got to be able to use resources available to them on the web and in books to help them, and they've got to be proactive about seeking extra help from teachers at school. There are no private tutors in university, and there are no tutors in the workplace. So, getting kids to rely so completely on tutors may backfire down the road.

3. Calm down everyone! If kids are attending these tutoring sessions just because everyone else is doing it, and if anxiety is fueling this tutoring craze, then parents and students need to take a deep breath and calm down! By all means, kids should get customized, individualized help in subjects where they're really struggling or the school isn't delivering at all, but beyond that, they should have the confidence and courage to study and work on their own. 

Warning: The Ivy League May Be Bad For You

I just read this interesting article in the Atlantic. In the article, titled "The Ivy League, Mental Illness, and the Meaning of Life," former Yale professor William Deresiewicz asserts that the ivy league fever that grips affluent and ambitious teenagers and their parents is a recipe for misery on many levels: kids jump through hoops, turning into "sheep" with no real depth and substance; kids have inflated but fragile egos that can't survive in the real world; kids end up depressed.

Given the intense competition that I witness around me in Singapore, I do think that Deresiewicz' argument has some value. Will going to Harvard or Yale really make you a happier person in the long run? In many ways, the answer is probably no. These brand name schools will give you definite advantages when it comes to status, networks, and getting your foot in the door. But happiness...? I'm not so sure.

As parents, there is a real danger in telling a kid that he or she "must" get into a "top school." Defining success in very narrow terms is dangerous for so many reasons: it gives kids all the wrong messages. It tells them that success is conditional, love and approval are conditional, and if the kid doesn't get in to one of these "top schools," she will feel as though she has failed terribly and let her parents down.  So right from the start, this obsession with certain "brand name schools" can lead kids to depression.

As for Deresiewicz' assertion that kids become "sheep" in this process -- there is probably some truth there too. Every kid needs to hug a tree, save a poor village, and rebuild houses in a disaster area -- not because he cares about the environment or poverty or natural disasters, but because he feels as though it looks good on a resume. That's just plain wrong.

And when you've graduated from Harvard, you feel as though you've got to do something spectacular -- you've got to make a lot of money and live a certain lifestyle. And that pressure and burden doesn't necessarily lead to happiness. And it doesn't free the imagination. It is, if anything, limiting. (Not that I feel sorry for Harvard grads. I don't. They're a privileged and entitled bunch. But, a Harvard degree is not a key to happiness, by any means.)

My thoughts on the ivy league frenzy -- it's a game, and it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. As a parent and teacher, I'd rather my own kids and my students learn because they love learning and serve because they believe in the cause they're serving. I'd rather they apply to colleges that will be a good fit for them, regardless of brand names. I want them to have a broad sense of possibility and a deep love of learning. And most of all, I want them to be physically and mentally healthy and happy.

5 Top Tips: How to listen so your child will talk

Lately I’ve been worrying about one of my high school students. Chun (name changed) is academically successful and well liked by her peers. In school, she smiles and chats with friends and teachers, her face successfully concealing the storm that rages within her everyday.  

Chun and I have a good relationship, and she sometimes confides in me. In one particularly troubling conversation, she confessed her attempts to harm herself and disclosed her deep feelings of despair, anxiety, and futility. I asked her whether she had talked to her parents about her feelings – did they know the depth of her anxiety and depression?

“My parents don’t listen to me, they never really have,” she said, her voice trailing off.

My conversation with Chun reminded me of the pressing need to create strong relationships with our kids when they are young and receptive. If we build and strengthen close relationships with our kids when they are young, then perhaps they will trust us and talk to us when they are older

5 Top Tips : How To Listen To Your Child:

    Here’s a great rule for life: Judge Less, Empathize More.

As parents, we tend to judge and evaluate everything our kids say because we want to help them do better. But in our desire to help, reform, advise, teach and instruct, we often forget to really hear what our kids are saying and what they are feeling.

So next time your child tells you anything, don’t pass judgment. Instead, just listen carefully and try to understand how your child feels.

Prioritize your relationship with your child and think long term.

In today’s world, we parents are often so anxious about short term goals, that we forget what really matters in the long run.

At the end of the day, our children’s happiness matters more than their achievements, and our relationship with them matters more than their marks and scores.  When they are teens and adults, we want them to enjoy being with us, and we want them to willingly share their lives with us.

So next time you’re anxious, think long term. Don’t nag and instruct, but instead sit down and listen. Listening is the foundation for a strong and close relationship.

Create Rituals in your day, where you have time to chat with your kids:

• Bedtime -- when you can cuddle up with your little one and listen to her talk
• Tea-time -- when I was working part-time and had the luxury of doing this, I used to love sitting at the dining table with my kids when they got home from school and chatting with them about their day. I'd play soft music, they'd eat their snack, and I would have a cup of tea. And we'd enjoy each other's company. And most importantly, I'd listen!
• Car-time -- If you drive your kids to school in the morning, that can be a great time to ask a question and listen to your child talk. 

Note: I would advise putting away all phones and laptops during these ritualized talking/bonding times.

Ask Kids Questions, and master the art of the follow-up question

 If you get into the habit of asking kids questions, they will get into the habit of telling you more about themselves. Ask them open-ended questions and let them talk.  Show them that you’re interested in their lives.

Ask them how their day went, how they’re feeling, and what they think…and then (and here’s the hard part!) keep your mouth closed and listen to their responses. Try to really hear what they are saying and feeling.

When your child tells you about something that happened in school, don’t immediately offer advice. Instead, ask follow-up questions: Why did you do that? Do you think you did the right thing? How did that make you feel? What did the other kids do? What did she say next? What were you thinking at the time?

Put away your digital devices, look at your kids, and give them your full attention.

A few days ago, my seven-year old daughter gave me the best piece of advice I’ve gotten in a long time. I was on my laptop looking at my twitter feed. She wanted to chat, but I told her to wait a minute while I read an article.

She shook her head at me and said, “Mama, I’m far more important to you than all the people you are following on Twitter, so please shut down your laptop and listen to me instead of them.”

 I’m proud to say I did – I held her tightly on my lap and I listened carefully as she told me all about her day at school.

And here's an article in SmartParents.SG that I contributed to ... also on listening to your kids.

Adolescents, Depression, Suicide, and other troubling trends

Here's a recent article from the Atlantic on teenage suicides in Palo Alto. It got me thinking about my own students and about the stresses that teenagers in high achieving, competitive urban schools face. In the last few years, I've seen a number of students suffer from different mental illnesses: depression, self-harming, anxiety, eating disorders, and even thoughts of suicide. I've often wondered whether the pace and the level of stimulation that I deal with at my current school is sustainable -- on many occasions, I've thought that we humans are not designed to do so much and to hold ourselves to such high expectations. It's just too exhausting.

Here are some of the issues that I think affect teens (and perhaps adults as well).

1. Over stimulation or Hyper stimulation: There are only so many hours in a day and there is only so much that our minds and our bodies can absorb and deal with on a daily basis. When we have days of non-stop activity, coupled with information overload and incessant sensory stimulation, our bodies and brains become over-stressed. If this continues on a daily basis without breaks, then our bodies and brains literally fray and break down.
Possible antidotes: Limit technology, more time to do nothing (down time), more time in nature, more quiet time and rest

2. Loneliness and Isolation: With parents working longer hours and spending more time on laptops and phones, kids are increasingly disconnected from their parents. Our kids need real conversations, close conversations, with their parents. They need to feel loved, cared for, and valued -- not just for their grades and their performances, but for who they are as people. I have too many students who feel isolated from everyone -- they don't feel close to their parents, and they don't have a close network of friends whom they can really trust. As parents, we can't solve their friendship problems, but we can be there for them to let them know that they are loved.
Possible antidotes: Put away those phones and spend time talking and relaxing with your kids. Stay close to your children, and make sure that grandparents and extended family members are around as well. Maybe also get a pet.

3. Pressure, competition, and a deep sense of  inadequacy: My students often tell me that they feel stressed and anxious about grades and college admissions; they feel as though they're working as hard as they possibly can, and yet they're still not getting the grades that they want (or that their parents want). Much of this pressure is self-inflicted - it's not necessarily coming from the school or from the parents -- but the fact is that kids are feeling it. And often they feel it intensely.
Possible antidotes: Conversations to help kids keep things in perspective. Mindfulness, yoga, and time in nature  -- all ways to help teens recenter and think about what is really important.

4. Exhaustion: When I walk into my twelfth grade classes, my students inevitably look exhausted. When I cheerily ask them how they're doing, their response is almost always, "We're so tired." They never seem to get enough sleep. Whether this is because of the work load, or because of social media/gaming/ and other distractions, the fact of the matter is that a lack of sleep is clearly correlated with mood disorders. Our kids need sleep. And we need to make sure that they eat and sleep in healthy ways.

When I feel the pressure and pace of life in Singapore wear me down, I often wonder if it's healthy for kids to grow up in environments where the bar is set so high -- too high, perhaps. Maybe if we all do less, and worry less about doing everything so spectacularly well, we will all be happier? Sometimes I watch my students -- their exhaustion, their stress -- and I contemplate moving out of the city to the mountains. I don't think that our bodies and minds are built for the high tech, competitive, fast-paced, urban lifestyle that we've created for ourselves. I think that our biology and psychology are at odds with the world we've created, and the costs of this misalignment can be very high indeed.

The Choices Moms Make - Part 2

I recently wrote this post about the Mom Wars, or the tension that exists between working moms and stay-at-home moms. And this is something that I've been thinking about a lot lately, particularly as I'm investing increasing amounts of time in my own career and finding that I have less time to actively parent my own children.

Here are some scenarios I've encountered in my teaching career:

A few years ago, I had a student who was terribly depressed. Despite being a bright and creative kid, this boy practically failed my class and most of his other classes. He often looked sick to me -- he coughed a lot, he often put his head down in class and zoned out, and he once told me that he suffered from deep anxiety. Despite numerous email exchanges with his mom, I never once met her in person. She and her husband both had jobs where they travelled extensively, and neither of them was ever at home with their son. So, he spent his time with his laptop and his ipad. The housekeeper made sure he was fed, but beyond that, he was left to his own devices (pun intended).

I remember thinking, quite judgmentally (and perhaps unfairly?), that if he were my son, I would have quit work and stayed at home to help him. He needed his mom. Who knows what the situation in the family was like. All I could tell, from my vantage point, was that this kid needed a whole lot more care than he was getting.

And here's another scenario - but a different one.

Some years ago, when I was teaching in Boston at a very elite all-girls school, I had a mom call me up and tell me that her daughter, who was in my advisory group, was trying out for a part in the school play and "she just had to get that part because her self-esteem was very low, and not getting that part would be devastating for her." I explained to the mom that I had nothing to do with the drama department, and that they would pick the girl who deserved the role most.  The mom argued with me vehemently, and finally threw a veiled threat at me: "We've given the school a lot of money. And if you really want to help my daughter, you certainly can." I was shaken. So I told my principal. She shook her head, sighed, and then declared, "That woman really needs a job!"

I agreed. Some moms live through their children in a way that it destructive for the mom, for the kids, and for everyone else involved.

So, coming back to the question I posed earlier: What's a mom to do?

There are obviously no right or easy answers here. But perhaps we women need to introspect deeply about the choices we make so that we can be the best possible mothers and also feel really good about ourselves. At different stages in our children's lives, and in our own lives, we may need to make different choices. Sometimes, mothering may need to take center stage. And at other times, work and outside interests may need to take center stage. Mothering in the 21st century is a balancing act in every sense of the word, and striking the right balance is never easy.

Aunties, Uncles, and Allo-parenting

When I first arrived in Singapore, I was surprised by how quickly I felt at home here. I had never visited Singapore before, and I knew so little about the city-state. Yet, feeling tropical sun on my back and seeing bright flashes of pink bougainvillea made me feel at home. In so many ways, Singapore reminded me of Chennai, my childhood-home.

While the tropical landscape comforted me, what made me feel most at home was the "auntie-uncle culture." Much like in Chennai, every adult here is an auntie or an uncle to every child. Now this may seem kind of ridiculous. If every single adult is an auntie or an uncle, then what do those words even mean? Does the overuse of those words render them meaningless? I think not.

I believe that the way a child addresses an elder is very important. To start with, the terms auntie and uncle imply a familial relationship, suggesting that  adults must treat all children as if they are part of the same family. In other words, all adults need to work together to raise children, and simultaneously, children need to respect and obey all the adults they encounter, as they would their own family members.

These terms originate from a community-orientation. Historically, most Asians were raised in strong communities; in Singapore, kids grew up in communal kampongs; in India and China, they grew up in large joint-families with three generations living together under one roof.  While Asia has industrialized rapidly over the last fifty years, it is still attached, at least in theory, to the ideals of community, extended family networks, and communal child-rearing.

In traditional societies, all the adults in a community or tribe are responsible for the well-being and socialization of the younger generation. In his book The World Until Yesterday: What the modern world can learn from traditional societies, Jared Diamond describes the benefits of "allo-parenting," or communal parenting. When a kid is jointly raised, disciplined, and loved by multiple adults, he/she grows up with a strong sense of belonging to a larger community. This practice not only diminishes the pressure placed on parents, but it also helps children feel secure. Each child has many adult role-models, many adults that he can turn to when he needs advice, support, or help. The popular saying "It takes a village to raise a child"  is another way of thinking about the benefits of "allo-parenting" and traditional wisdom.

As allo-parenting is becoming increasingly endangered in the modern, developed world with its impersonal apartment buildings and fast-paced lifestyles, I think that the "auntie-uncle" cultures of the East should try to preserve these practices as much as possible. In Hold on to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More than Peers,  the American psychiatrist Gordon Neufeld documents the price that families pay when they are no longer part of a cohesive community. When parents don't have a community to help them raise their kids, they become stressed and exhausted. Simultaneously, when kids don't have a strong network of supportive adults to draw on, kids often turn to peers to fill the vacuum and the results are dangerous and frightening.

On a related note, over the weekend, I watched a Bollywood movie with my husband, and I began to think about the ubiquitous presence of grandparents and extended family members in the movie.  In contrast, your average Hollywood movie doesn't even feature parents, let alone grandparents or aunts/uncles. The young twenty-something heroes and heroines of Hollywood are forced to rely entirely on themselves and their peers for guidance; they get nothing from the older generation. In contrast, the young protagonists of Bollywood have a whole cast of older family members to turn to for comfort, support, guidance, and help. While neither Hollywood nor Bollywood reflects reality, they do reveal something about what their respective societies seem to value or idealize. Clearly, allo-parenting and extended family networks are still idealized in the East, though with 21st century lifestyles, they may become endangered.

Suggestions for parents (adapted from Neufeld's book):

- Socialize as a family with other families; multi-generational socializing is healthy for kids and adults alike. Your kids should know your friends. They should have lots of aunties and uncles that they feel close to. This is important even when (particularly when) your children are teenagers.

- Make sure you know your kids' friends, and ideally, their friends' parents as well. Again, this is fairly easy when your kids are young, but it gets harder as they get older. Yet, Neufeld argues that it is particularly important with teens because they are most vulnerable to toxic "peer effects."

- Spend a lot of time with your kids and make sure that you and the other adults in their lives (grandparents, aunts etc.) are their go-to people for questions and crises. Their peers should never replace the older generation. Again, this is particularly important for adolescents, who could get very skewed advice from friends.

- Make time for family dinners, family outings, and family days.

- Involve grandparents, aunts, and uncles in your lives as much as possible, and talk about "family stories" with your kids. Make sure the kids know their extended family well. Weekend Skype sessions are important if the grandparents live far away. If you're not close to your family, then create a similar network with friends.

And here are some other Singapore-specific suggestions:

-  If you have a domestic helper, encourage your children to think of her as part of your family. She is a crucial part of your "allo-parenting network," and both she and the kids will benefit from a close familial relationship.

- Encourage your child to read Asian literature and mythology -- most Asian stories seem to glorify and idealize familial relationships and community structures. Watching Bollywood movies helps too. These stories will implicitly teach kids that family matters a lot, and they could provide some sort of balance to the other messages that kids get about the need to be independent, rebellious, and "peer-oriented".

Shadow Education: Helpful or Harmful?

A couple years ago, one of my seventh grade students complained that I was giving the class too much homework. "We don't have time to do all this work," he argued vehemently.
"Why not?" I asked, wondering what these kids were doing after school.
"We have too much other stuff to do after school," he replied.

Curious, I polled my class. What do you do after school each day?
The results were about as stereotypical as results could get.
Most of my East Asian kids went on to hagwon (Korean school) or juku (Japanese school) or tuition classes of some sort for two hours every evening. There, they studied Math, English, and their native language.
Most of my South Asian kids spent a lot of time at "tutions," but they also engaged in some extracurricular activities.
And most of my European/Australian kids spent a lot of time on after-school sports. One of my students swam for two hours every evening. Another was at basketball practice for hours, and she travelled all over the region for tournaments.

In the Indian community in Singapore, moms often talk about Divesh Shah, the math guru who guarantees high scores in high school Math. Every Indian kid I meet here goes to Divesh Shah, and these moms swear by him. He's tough though -- the kids stay at his tuition center for hours, and he piles extra homework on them as well. But he does guarantee results.

I've been thinking a lot about the Asian practice of "shadow education." Sometimes, shadow education happens at home: moms "sitting with their kids" on a daily basis to supplement school education with extra math worksheets. Sometimes it includes private tutors. Often it involves large, established "enrichment centers" or "after-school schools" including Kumon, Abacus, Korean school (hagwons), Japanese schools (jukus), Divesh Shah centers, Mindlab, and a host of other tuition centers. Much of the academic success that Asian kids experience is a result of long hours in a shadow-school of some sort.

The proliferation and success of shadow-schools makes me wonder about a lot of things:

What is the role of a school? Should schools be sufficient in and of themselves? Is shadow education a sign that regular schools are failing? Does it mean that schools don't give students sufficient opportunities for practice during school hours?

Or is it an alternative model of education: schools tell kids what they should be able to do, provide creative opportunities to begin to explore these topics, and assess how well they can do these things. To supplement schools, shadow schools teach kids how to do these tasks well and give them opportunities for drill and practice. Society sort of acknowledges the limitations of group settings/school settings, and accepts the need for the shadow school to make sure that students get more individualized attention and practice.

Would kids be better off if we acknowledged and formalized the role of shadow schools by cutting the school day down so that kids go home for lunch? Then kids can go to shadow school earlier, finish up earlier, and have a little more time for fun stuff?

Do shadow schools cause too much pressure and competition amongst students? How much school is sufficient for students?

Many of my Western colleagues are very against the practice of shadow-schooling because they believe that it destroys creativity. Do shadow schools squelch and destroy creativity by making students focus entirely on analytical skills, test-taking strategies, and drill and practice exercises? Would these kids be better off taking a walk in the park and day-dreaming? Or painting a picture or reading a book? What is the opportunity cost of these shadow-schools?

The Singapore School system's new learner-centered motto is "Teach Less, Learn More." As one Singaporean parent said to me, what they really mean is that the schools will teach less so that the students can go to even more tuition classes to learn more. Is that really what's going on in Singaporean schools and international schools?

I'm curious about what moms think of shadow schools: a blessing? a necessary evil? a terrible source of pressure and competition?

East and West: Parenting Styles

When I read articles and books on child psychology and parenting, I increasingly realize how Western-centric all the available research is. With a few exceptions (most notably, Chua’s sensationalist book about tiger parenting),  all the child psychology and parenting literature available is written by Westerners, about Western kids, and for Western parents.

 Interestingly though, most of the literature presents itself as universal, and Western child psychologists seem convinced that their findings apply to all children around the world.  After leaving the US and moving to Singapore, I have been struck by how un-universal Western child rearing and parenting styles are, and I have also become increasingly aware of the very different value systems that inform Western versus Eastern parenting.

Singapore has a substantial Indian population, and since I’m Indian, I have easy access to this particular community. For months now, I’ve been informally polling Indian moms in the playground about their views on childrearing and parenting, and I’m fascinated by what I’ve found. Most of the moms are middle and upper class Indians now living in Singapore, and they have school age children under the age of 12. Simultaneously, I’ve been aware of the marked differences between Eastern and Western parents during parent conferences at the school where I work.

A big qualifier:  I'm making massive generalizations here based on a very limited sample, and there are bound to be many exceptions to these broad stereotypes and statements. In fact, I've worked with many students and parents that defy these stereotypes completely. I have encountered extremely intense and high pressure Western parents and very relaxed, laid-back Indian parents. Obviously, one should never pre-judge a child/parent/person, but nevertheless, I have noticed broad trends and am interested in exploring them further.

 Here are some of my findings:

1. “The Individual versus the collective”

This finding has been documented in numerous sociology/anthropology studies, and I see it very clearly around me. 

Western parents believe strongly in the idea that their child is an individual whose individual rights should be respected. They are often hesitant to critique, punish, or push their children too much because they believe that this will infringe on the child’s individual rights, and it may hinder the child’s development by squelching his creativity and preventing him from expressing his true self. They don’t want him to conform to a group, and they hope that he will be his own person.  They want to encourage choice and freedom, even if that means occasionally letting the child fail or letting the child challenge them/talk back because they believe strongly in the ideals of individuality, self-expression, creativity, independence and free will. 

In contrast, Indian parents believe strongly that their child is part of a family and a community, and that it is of paramount importance that the child realizes that every decision he makes and every action he takes has consequences for the entire family and community. They see the Western way as selfish: it is selfish to focus on the individual, and it is unseemly for a person to consider his own needs as more important than the needs of others. Each child’s life is inextricably linked to the lives of his parents, grandparents, and his community. He must understand how to respect others (particularly his elders), and how to act in a way that maintains harmony in the family and the community. Indian mothers seem far less concerned with self-expression and independence than they are with the child's ability to respect his elders and show consideration for the family unit. 

If the Indian child challenges his parents, speaks rudely, or slacks off academically, the parents don’t see it as a natural part of growing up, like Western parents do. They see it instead as selfish and aberrant behavior that is inexcusable. When asked what parents value most, almost all the Indian mothers I polled said “manners” and “respect.”  When one looks at Indian mythology and stories, these values of respect, loyalty to the family, and filial piety are evident everywhere. Children are expected to sacrifice their own personal feelings and desires for the sake of the family.

Where Westerners may view personal sacrifice  as oppressive, Indians view it as noble and good. One's duty or dharma, in Indian terms, often entails making sacrifices for the sake of the family and community.  For example, a child may want to play instead of study, but clearly for both the child’s own good and the family’s good, it is better for the child to study. Therefore, the Indian parent would feel absolutely justified in making the kid study, regardless of what the child wants. The stereotypical Western parent, on the other hand, would engage in a discussion with the child, and then second-guess herself, wondering whether she is somehow infringing on the child’s individual rights and squelching the child’s creativity by “forcing” him to do something against his will.

One of my Western colleagues used the word "oppressed" when she described the ways in which an Indian/Asian child is "limited" by his parents. In the Western mind, dictating terms to a child is oppressive because it is a violation of that child's individual rights. In contrast, in the Indian mind, it is absolutely necessary because it ensures that the child understands his/her role in the family and it keeps the child on a path that the parent believes will lead to future success and happiness. 

2. Approach to Academic Work: How much should a parent demand of a child? Is it right to push a child academically? Is it fair to the child? Are Asian/Indian children “beaten into submission” by their parents? Is pressure good or bad?

These are interesting questions to consider. The Western view is that parents should be involved in the child’s education and they should make sure that the child does his/her homework. However, at the end of the day, most Western parents will concede that their true goal is to make sure that their kids are “happy” and that they feel good about themselves. In this regard, they worry about striking a balance. They want to motivate and inspire their children, but they also want their children to be happy, and they want to praise and validate their children as much as possible.

The Indian view is quite different. As one Indian mom said to me, “happiness is all well and good, but it won’t get my child a job, and it won’t put food on his table when he’s an adult. He may think that watching television or hanging out with his friends is making him happy, but I know that in the long run, he will be happy if he does well in school and is able to succeed professionally.” Similarly, they seem less concerned with self-esteem. As another Indian mom, who admits to regularly berating  her son for not studying enough, said to me, “if he works very hard and does very well, he will develop self-esteem. So, I have no qualms about shouting at him for not working hard enough or not getting top grades. Self esteem is the reward of hard work.”

I wonder about two things when it comes to the amount of parental pressure that one exerts. Firstly, I think that there is a connection between the economic standing of a society and the degree of anxiety/pressure that a parent feels. India is still a developing country, and Indian parents are acutely aware of the global competition that they are engaged in. They constantly make comments such as “life is not easy” and “look at the competition.” They know that their own country will not provide their child with any back-up (social security/welfare etc) and that the playing field is still not entirely level for Indians. They are absolutely sure that the stakes in this game of education are very, very high, and that failure is not an option. So they push their kids like crazy.

 In contrast, Westerners have dominated the world for the last four hundred years. They have good safety nets: their kids can work at Starbucks and still live somewhat decently, they can rely on the state for public services of a reasonable quality, and they know that the world still favors them over others. In some ways, they can afford to consider “happiness” over “success.”

While part of the explanation for Asian parental anxiety versus Western parental complacency may be economic, a part is also certainly cultural.  Asians feel morally justified in pushing their kids, so they do. Westerners don’t feel as though it is morally right to push their kids too hard, so they don’t. Indians/Asians raise their kids to be obedient (“no back-chat allowed”) so their kids listen when they are told to stay home and study. Westerners raise their kids to challenge authority (“it’s good to question the system”) so their kids may challenge them when they are told to stay home and study.

3.  Western parents focus on Reading; Indian parents focus on Math.

This has been a particularly interesting finding. All Western books on early childhood stress the importance of reading aloud to your child, and then go on to cite numerous studies that show high correlations between “language immersion” and later academic success. They claim that the single most important thing a parent can do to improve their child’s educational outcomes is to read to the child on a daily basis. However, they say almost nothing about early Math skills.

Indian parents (and I think most Asian parents) are, interestingly, fairly relaxed about reading but totally obsessed with their child’s performance in Math. They may or may not read to their child on a daily basis, but they all immerse their child in a Mathematical world from an early age. Most of the Indian moms I polled began formal Math instruction with their children by age 4, and some by age 3. By the time their child turned 5, without any exceptions, they “sat with their child” on a regular basis to work through Math workbooks. They also encourage “Math games” such as chess, building  (lego) activities, and board games. 

They are big fans of the Singapore Math curriculum, and even the most liberal and low-maintenance moms admit to supplementing the school’s Math curriculum with frequent Math sessions.  The Indian moms I spoke with in Singapore uniformly believe that you cannot trust “International Schools” (read “Western schools”) when it comes to Math because Western schools don’t value Math sufficiently.

Where Western moms are convinced that reading to their child is the most important thing that they can do for their child academically, Indian moms are convinced that giving their child a solid Math foundation is their top job on the academic front. Read more about Asian moms and math here: Building a Math Rich Home: Learn from the pros. And read more on Asian moms and the stuff they do here: What Asian Moms Know

More to come on this topic!