Last week, an article in the Wall Street Journal caused a major stir in the parenting world. Amy Chua, a law professor, author, and mother just published a book called Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, and the blogosphere is having spasms over her and her stories of forcing her daughters to practice piano for hours on end, bending their little fingers to her will, or so it would seem; of banning such normal American pastimes as playdates, sleepovers and school plays; of commanding (demanding?) nothing less than ideal grades.
Yeah, let’s just say that she’s generating a lot of horror and hand-wringing, a lot of discussion on what she may be squelching in her daughters, such as self-esteem and creativity. Love her, hate her, agree a little bit, secretly, while also feeling more than a little squeamish … seems everyone has an opinion.
Want to know mine? Me, I think I’m a little bit in love with Ms. Chua. For a few reasons. But first, a few facts some might not be aware of. First, she does not mean her book to be prescriptive; it’s not “How to Be a Chinese Mother and Raise A+ Kids.” Instead, it’s a memoir of her own parenting journey, and like all journeys, there are ups and downs along the way, and she changes and grows as time passes. Second, she’s really quite funny. And also, she loves her children, believes in them, an awful lot. I’ve heard a couple of radio interviews with her, and I have to say, I kind of want to meet her for lunch, and not to throw tomatoes at her.
She talks about being a Chinese mother as, she says, a broad term for the kind of parent (often immigrant parents) who expect her children to succeed. What’s wrong with that? What’s wrong with, as she says, assuming your child’s strength, rather than tiptoeing around his vulnerability? Now, that’s right the heck up my alley; assuming that your child is competent and smart means you expect him to act that way, to live up to that belief. Meanwhile, presuming vulnerability (his self-esteem is so fragile that he needs you to cheerlead his every effort and post his every scribble on the fridge and give him an ice cream sundae as a reward for a B grade) is what leads, or is one of the things that leads, to coddling. To creating children who, when they are well past the age of sleepovers and playdates, can’t make their inflated dreams match the harsh reality of the world.
The Wall Street Journal piece got a lot of negative comments and reactions thanks to a story Chua relates about her younger daughter, Lulu, and her love/hate relationship with the piano. In a story that can be tough to read for parents steeped in the belief that your child should lead the way while you clap for him on the sidelines, Chua describes sitting for hours with her 7-year-old, compelling her, without a break, to work on a tough piano piece until she gets it right.
What a lot of people missed in that story, in my opinion, is the fact that Chua loves her children deeply and emotionally (she’s far from cold or unfeeling); and that she understands them, what motivates them, what works and what doesn’t. She knew this approach would work, that her daughter would get to the point where she loved the piece she was playing precisely because she had worked so damned hard to master it. She also knew that if she didn’t push that hard, her child would have never felt that rush of mastery.
During a recent radio interview, Chua pointed out that if she had been that strict with Lulu and was also a cold, unfeeling, abusive parent, her efforts would quite obviously have backfired. But she’s not. She simply expects a lot.
When did it happen that expecting a lot — and not backing down on that — became awful?
Chua described, in a recent radio interview, how her husband (raised in a liberal Jewish household) laments not having learned to play a musical instrument. His parents, he said, gave him a choice: do you want to take piano lessons, or play with your friends? What do you think a 7-year-old will say? Yes, yes, piano! Make me practice! Or will he go out and play with his friends and only regret that his parents didn’t sit his butt on the bench when he’s deep in his 40s?
To me, it simply doesn’t come down to the choice between showing your child unconditional love on the one hand, and pushing them hard to reach their potential on the other. I love my children unconditionally, but that doesn’t mean I’ll let them slack off for the sake of their self-esteem.
Sometimes kids have to be pushed hard. If I let them, my kids would bargain their way out of piano practice (both take lessons), or only do it every few days, or only for the absolute minimum. I don’t have future prodigies on my hands, I know that already. But I compel them, absolutely, to sit down and play their pieces and do their scales over and over because otherwise, as I tell them, they are wasting their own time and my money by taking lessons. Harsh? Thanks.
What do you think?
I love her too. In Southern California, I grew up with tons of Asian kids with mothers a lot like that. My best friend in high school scored a perfect score on the SAT because her mom forced her to drill vocab words and do practice tests for hours each weekend. The thing was, she was a fabulous girl — hilarious, well-rounded, a great tennis player, a student body officer. Yes, she was annoyed at her mom, but I don’t think there was a squelched bone in her body. Ditto for virtually all the other Asian virtuosos I remember — they’ve all turned out quite nicely. I think it’s just a cultural thing, so I’m not sure Americans could get away with this, but I’m frankly inspired by Chua’s belief that the best way to instill competence is to help/force kids to actually work at something till they succeed.
Denise, I agree with you. I haven’t read the book — just the first 25 pages you can get for free on Kindle, plus all the brouhaha — but Chua speaks the truth about a lot of things, mainly that we (“Westerners”) have gotten too soft on our children and it’s to their detriment. Her naysayers point out that the “American way” develops adults who can think creatively; that may be true, but I truly believe we’re raising a generation who thinks mediocrity deserves a gold medal.
After I read some of the interviews with Chua and the book excerpt, I noticed I worked my son a LOT harder on his spelling words last night. When he came home today and told me he only got one wrong, I said, “Only?” I’m just not going to praise him for “only” one wrong, especially since he knew them cold. I merely said, “We’ll have to work harder next week.” This kid knows he’s loved dearly, so I think he’ll survive.
I think teaching children how to focus and master things (even when they don’t feel like doing them, even when it’s hard, etc.) is crucial for them to achieve any kind of success in life, however you might measure it. I just don’t think piano lessons are the bridge I’m going to die on to teach that.
Now ask me how many hours I put in teaching my cognitively impaired “she’ll probably never learn to talk” child how to read. How many hours I’m still doing that. Even when she would rather do something else. Even when I would rather do something else.
I learned to play the piano as a child. I could give a rat’s ass that I know how to play the piano.
I learned to write as a child. No one stood over my shoulder and made me do it. In fact, my parents were mostly indifferent to it when they weren’t openly hostile. Yet I spent hours and hours learning how to write. I walked to the library every week to read writing books in the reference section. I copied out editors’ addresses from Writer’s Market when I was twelve so I could send out my magnus opus to them (using cash I earned from ironing my father’s dress shirts, in manuscript boxes I ordered from the back of a Writer’s Digest magazine).
No parent standing over me could have induced that kind of commitment.
So. Parenting is complicated.
Jennifer
I’ll need to read the book to make a final call, but I like the idea of not letting our kids give up, I like the idea of having high expectations and letting our kids know that, and I like instilling a good work ethic. But forcing lessons on them, not letting them pick their own, hobbies or explore interests, not letting them play with their friends … she’s lost me there.
I don’t know, D, can you see yourself calling one of your boys “lazy” or “selfish” or whatever other words she admits calling her kids? I agree that we are, as a society, too easy on our kids. But I can’t condone name-calling as a way to demand respect or motivate children. I think Chua is wrong; it does belittle them and undermine their self-esteem.
Parenting doesn’t come easily to me now that my children are older. When they were younger, keeping them to a strict, disciplined routine was simple. Now that they’re 14 and 11, I struggle every day with deciding what I can compromise about and what I can’t. I don’t think anyone has the answers-we have to all do what we can live with.
“Back at the piano, Lulu made me pay. She punched, thrashed and kicked. She grabbed the music score and tore it to shreds. I taped the score back together and encased it in a plastic shield so that it could never be destroyed again. Then I hauled Lulu’s dollhouse to the car and told her I’d donate it to the Salvation Army piece by piece if she didn’t have “The Little White Donkey” perfect by the next day. When Lulu said, “I thought you were going to the Salvation Army, why are you still here?” I threatened her with no lunch, no dinner, no Christmas or Hanukkah presents, no birthday parties for two, three, four years. When she still kept playing it wrong, I told her she was purposely working herself into a frenzy because she was secretly afraid she couldn’t do it. I told her to stop being lazy, cowardly, self-indulgent and pathetic.”
This is not “Chinese parenting.” It’s abusive parenting.
My parents bullied and berated my brother in a similar manner. He moved to the other side of the country as soon as he graduated from colllege and has had little contact with them in the past twenty years.
Sorry Denise, you lost me. I never questioned her love for her children; I just find her methods hard to take. I, too, push my kids but sometimes a “B” or second place is good enough. Not everyone is meant to play piano at Carnegie Hall or teach law at Yale. Most of us are just average, and I think that’s OK. To each his own, I guess. I’m just glad she wasn’t my mom!
No need for sorry, Christina! I like a good debate. I’m going to read the book (not being a Kindle-r, it’s coming to me soon in old-fashioned paper binding!), and report back. The storm of controversy over Chua’s book raged pretty fiercely for a mere two days. The New York Times ran a piece yesterday where she comes to her own defense. I still stand by what I said. OF COURSE I’m not in favor of abuse of any kind, but who hasn’t come down hard on a kid from time to time? I know, I know, my version of “coming down hard” is nothing like Chua forcing her 7 year old to play that piece over and over, but … I still do believe a lot has been distorted, and plenty has been ignored (such as her admission that her belief in her parenting philosophy changed as her children grew, and such as the to me clear evidence that it’s a high-functioning, loving household. I dunno.
Certainly no one has the answers. But in answer to my friend Emily’s comment earlier, yes, I actually CAN see myself calling one of my sons lazy or selfish, either in the heat of the moment or when I truly thought it might bring them up short and make them think. What’s wrong with telling a child — in a larger atmosphere of love and acceptance — that they are being lazy by whizzing through their piano practice in 2 minutes flat?
Well, the pendulum has swung too far. While some American parents hover, helicopter style, to save their children from any boo-boo or bad thing that might upset them, others are just plain slackers indeed.
And the “Everybody wins” mentality of parenting has long annoyed the heck out of me.
But this kind of tyrannical parenting with rote practice kills creativity. I said so at MommaSaid and I’ll say it again: Creativity breeds innovation. Playing someone else’s songs for three hours when you’re 7 does not.
Insistence on unquestioning obedience, rote memorization, and “strict, disciplined routines” is a rational parenting strategy if you want your kids to survive and perhaps even thrive in a totalitarian society.
I disagree with pretty much everything the Tiger Mom says. But I guess it comes down to this: I don’t share her goals at all. She says she’d never let her kids act in a school play. I guess that’s not furthering HER goals for her kids. But I don’t see my role as a mother to prescribe what my kids should accomplish. I see my job as the person who helps facilitate my kids in meeting THEIR goals. When they’ve made a commitment I do nudge them along. But that’s a far cry from deciding for them what is important.
Her vision of success for her kids seems very narrow. Frankly, I find it heartbreaking.
I love watching my kids’ talents and interests unfold before me as they grow up. My 16 year old daughter has skipped a grade (on her own initiative) which is probably something Tiger Mom would puff up about. But she also has installed a darkroom in the basement and spends hours on experimental methods of developing film and printing photos. My son has discovered that sailing restores his spirit. I’m sure that Tiger Mom would find both of those pursuits a waste of time. And she would be so wrong. Because they’re discovering who they are this way, not who I want them to be.
That’s my version of success.
Sorry, Denise, but I don’t think it’s appropriate to call kids names, ever. There are other ways to verbalize to your child what you want and expect without the labeling and name-calling. I think names stick and if you tell your kid he’s being lazy or stupid or whatever, then I have a feeling he will live up to that label. You’ll see as your boys get older that a lot of those names are stereotypes that confront boys in society, particularly at school. It’s sad, actually.
There is a series of books that was written a while ago based on the philosophy of Dr. Chaim Ginot (Between Parent and Child was his book). The “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk” books are excellent in my opinion. But the best one is a book called “Liberated Parents Liberated Child-Your Guide to a Happier Family.” In it, the authors (Faber and Maslisch) discuss how to motivate kids in a way other than labeling and they show how name calling and labeling really becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy for most kids.
I agree with Jen that the “everybody wins” thing is crap. But I think we are supposed to help our kids be the best they can be and motivate them in a way that’s positive and not critical or destructive.
And by the way, I think acknowledging a child’s feeling first, but then telling him or her that the work still needs to be done (whether it’s school work, instrument practice…) really helps. “I know you wish you didn’t have to practice, but you do. So get it done and then you can…” Or, “I know you wish could stay in bed all day, but the bus is coming in a half-hour…” Giving a kid what he wants in a “wish” actually validates the feeling but doesn’t let him off the hook for the work that has to get done. Not exactly “mean mommy” parenting-but effective, I’ve found.
I have her book on hold at the library but I saw her interviewed on the Today Show. She related a story about how she won second place in a contest and her father said, “Never humiliate me like that again!” I think that’s my whole problem with it–it’s great to push your kids to do their best but to me, second place is pretty darn good and should be congratulated!
Ironically, the LA Times ran a story on the on 1/13/11, “Chinese Students’ High Scores in International Tests Come at a Cost,” where the public & gov’t are beginning to lament the lack of creativity and imagination in their country due to the emphasis on good grades. This made me think of how Chua won’t let her kids be in the school play. To me, that was the highlight of my high school years and nurtured my creativity. As I said before, not everyone is meant to be the Number One Student.
I think there is a lot Western parents could learn from a less touchy-feely version of parenting. My problem with Chua is that she seems to (I haven’t read the book, so I’m just going off the WSJ essay) embrace an abusive style of parenting that’s so over-the-top that it’ll either turn off, horrify, or offend most of us. I mean, really, calling your kids “fatty” or “garbage”? By coming off as so over-the-top, she makes it hard to read between the lines, because everybody’s just reacting and freaking out by the time they get to the second paragraph.
My other issue is that in order to keep up such a level of, uhh, “supervision” over your children, you’d pretty much have to give up all other goals, ambitious or pastimes in order to lurk in the next room for hours and make sure the child didn’t slack off on her lessons. Doesn’t exactly come off to me as a recipe for motherly happiness.
Emily Rogan, I agree with you completely. The “How to Talk” book was something I happened upon when my first born was a baby and it has shaped my communication with my kids, as well as with other people in my life. What I’ve come to believe is that, long run, the best thing I can do for my kids is to facilitate a good, respectful (both ways) relationship with them. After all, this is their first relationship. It will influence every relationship they have. So when I’m tempted to get Tiger-mom-ish with my kids I ask myself, “Is what I’m about to do going to build a wall between me and my child? Or is it going to help us connect?” And I think long and hard before doing anything that will hurt our relationship. That doesn’t mean being a pushover. It means treating them as thinking, feeling human beings. I don’t see my job as pushing my kids to succeed. I see my job as giving them the resources, time, and attention so that they CAN succeed, but being the soft place to fall when they don’t.
Sorry, hit “submit” too quickly. One more thing. In the long run it won’t matter much if they got an “A” or a “B” in 9th grade biology. But it will matter a whole lot if I’ve put a wall between us by calling them lazy for getting that “B.”
Just to weigh in on the name-calling. I don’t think it’s right to call your kids names, but I do think it’s ok to name their bad behavior. Saying, “You’re being lazy: you didn’t try very hard on your piano practice” is different from calling your kid a lazy bum.
I think western parents are often too soft and happy-clappy over every thing their kid does, but I cringed big-time when reading the piano scene. There’s no way I would have the stamina to face my child down like that, even if she was being stubborn beyond belief and I thought she had it in her to nail the piece. I would try my best to make her do it, and if she didn’t/wouldn’t, I would tell her what the consequences would be (in this case, maybe overall the lack of self-discipline, or momentarily the fact that she won’t be able to play in the concert). And then let her live with that. Maybe she wouldn’t even care.
That said, the only situation in which I can see myself pushing my kid to the absolute brink like that is if I were trying to, I don’t know, get her off of drugs or something. Something huge and life-changing with major consequences for failure.
The other irony, which Meagan touched on in her comment above, is that IMO both Asian parents and Western parents (as Chua paints them) spend a ton of time standing over their kids. The Asian parents micromanage and push (again, according to the essay) and the American parents clap and encourage. My middle of the road approach is to encourage their talents and interests, but also to encourage self-sufficiency and autonomy. To me, that’s what makes a creative, self-starting child and adult.
Gretchen, thanks — you make an excellent point about the hovering aspect of both helicoptering, cheerleader-y parents, and so-called “Chinese” mothers: Both are micromanagers, and that’s the opposite of my approach. I want to be clear, again, that I would never do some of the things Chua says she did. I was listening to yet another interview with her, where she talked again about how she was talking about a certain segment of immigrant parents, namely educated professionals — immigrants like her parents, who came to the US as graduate students. I’m the granddaughter of immigrants (my mother is first-generation American, my father is second). But Italian immigrants didn’t come here at the time my grandparents/great-grands did to be PhD’s, they did it to escape poverty and give their children a different chance. My maternal grandfather left Sicily with zero education (he died illiterate in two langauges). Of my four grandparents, only one had a high school diploma. By my generation, we have advanced degrees (doctor, lawyer, nurse, etc.) and all have professional careers. My parents didn’t push nearly the way Chua did, that’s not in their DNA. What was though is a lack of fear that they’d harm our self-esteem if they EXPECTED a lot of us. As I said in the post, what struck me most about Chua’s take on parenting is the expectation of strength and capability of your kids, rather than a wishy-washy presumption of fragility. So that was my takeaway. It has been interesting to think of the ways my parents’ immigrant experience differs from hers.
I heard Chua on Diane Rheam (sp?) the other day, and am really intrigued now. I definitely want to read the book. I’m really still trying to figure out what kind of parent I want to be. I’m also reading Bounce, which is all about success and demystifying the idea of raw talent alone making for success (it echoes Gladwell’s Outliers, where he talks about the 10,000 hour rule). I don’t see myself as a Tiger mother (just from listening to her on DR) BUT, I do see myself pushing my kids–with love–to succeed and not letting them just give up on stuff. I was always so self-motivated to do stuff, like practice gymnastics, when I was little. No one told me to do it; I wanted to. But clearly, my parents did something. I just can’t figure out what. But I want to raise self-motivated kids too!
Just to clarify, I agree that there is a difference between labeling a behavior and labeling a child. My understanding is that Chua admitted to calling her children names, “lazy, selfish, etc…” not describing their behavior. And for what it’s worth, I cannot imagine that either of her daughters was ever lazy anyway. Just by her standards.
I was out with a Chinese friend Saturday night and she’s offended and furious, not by Chua’s parenting, but by the stereotyping of Chinese vs. Western parenting. I get that.
I can’t decide whether or not I will read her book.
Great post and excellent points, Denise. I think we’re in perfect agreement! I am really sick and tired of the pansy parenting that has taken hold in society. And I hate the “We’re all wonderful” song and dance. The kids are smart enough to know when they’re being duped. They know when they’ve done work that is less than great. And as they say in The Incredibles, “If everyone is super, then no one is super.”
Recently I noticed that underneath every single one of my 7-year-old son’s assignments the teacher had written comments like “Congratulations”, “Well done” or “Excellent”. So when I asked him whether he was proud of his achievements he shrugged and told me that every single child in his class gets comments like these on every assignment. While I was frustrated with all this grade inflation he just looked at me and said: I always know whether I have done well or not. I don’t need a teacher for that.
Although he has a point there I have to agree with what most people here have said. While children always need to be aware of their parents’ unconditional love for them, they most definitely shouldn’t be praised unconditionally. That’s a pathetic approach to parenting and eventually reduces their self-esteem since they sooner or later must find out that the world doesn’t think like mum and dad…
I really believe that compelling our kids to succeed is important, especially when they are young. Kids are like water, they will naturally take the downhill route whenever possible. You need to teach them how to be able to succeed so they can have that power for themselves!
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I have to agree with this blog post as someone that was never pushed. And I applaud Denise for being brave enough to agree with her despite the criticism that may come her way. My parents thought second place was good enough, and they gave my brother a pat on the back for everything (which he is still requiring well into his 20′s and that doesn’t work out so well in the workplace these days). There are so many things in my life that I have not followed through on because I am afraid of failing. Even though I too cringe at the piano scene I think that the child will be better off because now she knows she can do anything. When I was running cross country in high school and my team was in the semi-state meet with a good chance of doing well, I was “hurt”. Instead of pushing me to help my team and be the best I could be, I was allowed to bow out and wish someone would have said, wait a minute, you could be really great if you didn’t just walk away because you are afraid of failing. I should not have been allowed to make that call. My parents or coach should have made it for me. I kind of wish my mom had been more Chua-esque because who knows what more I could have done. At 30 I am finally facing my fear and doing things to push myself, just wish I could have started earlier. And I will push my children as much as I can so that they can reach their full potential.
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