“Ma’am, could you please check every day to see that my son eats his food during the lunch break?” - Parent of a 10-year-old, healthy boy.
“Girls, please help him in the hostel, he is staying away from home for the first time”- School teacher and mother of a 16-year-old boy to his classmates, all leaving for college. Assuming that being girls, they will ‘manage’.
“Hey you know, I managed to change my girl’s section so that she has the best teachers this academic year too.” – from the mother of a 14-year-old, bright student who happens to work in the same school.
“Oh! that question? My son knows the answer to it. He knows the definition and two examples. That is enough for a 5mark question. Thank God! I know all his textbooks by heart, what we have to do as parents, really!” - The parent of a board student waiting outside the centre, upon hearing about the questions in the assessment paper.
“Why did you let my child carry her bag to her class? What is the Nanny for then?”- Parent of a 6-year-old student.
“How did he lose 1 mark? This is not done for such a small error, let me go and ask his teacher.”- a parent-teacher rushing to her colleague after finding time to have a look at her child’s marks during school hours.
And then, there was this bright, lovely child in the primary years who always looked stressed out and was always seen making notes in between classes in a little blue diary. And, we would regularly receive ‘Minute of the day ‘emails from the parent pointing out when a teacher was late to class, which period was handled by a substitute teacher and why an extra PE period was given to the children. Didn’t take much sleuthing to discover that the poor child had to fill in the details of the school day and report it back home.
As an educator, it amazes and fascinates me to see the evolution of parents over the last few decades. I sometimes seriously wonder how the ‘working’ parents have so much time to micromanage their child’s life. They must be in some cool jobs with really cool bosses if they can be in school every other day checking on their kids. If the parents could have their way, they would have personal cameras fitted in every classroom of their child over their entire learning years.
Why? Why do the parents have this paranoia of letting their children be? Let them make mistakes, learn things the hard way? How long do we cushion their life? There will come a time when we have to let them go. At that time will they be independent and emotionally strong enough to face the world? The world is not going to give them stars and kudos for every line that they draw or every word that they utter. They are going to be critiqued, rejected, compromised and rubbished. How will they rise out of these dejections? Will we be around forever to fight their battles?
Parenting is all about nurturing your children to grow up into emotionally and socially strong individuals. Doesn’t matter if they have degrees from the Ivy League or if they have the best clothes, the best houses and the best gadgets. As long as they can live as happy, useful members of society with empathy and care towards fellow beings, they are a success.
Just this morning, I was watching our Balcony Cat ( named so, because she made our balcony her nursery) weaning off her kitten at 8 weeks. The kitten tried her best to suckle but the cat shooed her away. The kitten pleaded, touched her mother’s paws gingerly, tried snuggling near her face but, the mother had a hard heart, she walked away leaving the kitten to fend for itself. This tough love by the mother would make the kitten strong and it will learn to survive. Well, my kind daughter did break the order of nature by taking pity on the weak, little kitten and feeding her. The kitten will learn a little slower now.
We also need to follow the order of nature and nurture our kids only till they need it and only to the extent that they need it.
“Should we buy him a refrigerator, or maybe the washing machine?”- Yours truly when the son started working in a new city.
I rest my case.
The term “helicopter parenting” was introduced by Dr Haim Ginott in 1969. This term is used to define over-protective parents who control each and every aspect of their kids’ lives so thoroughly, it seems they are hovering over their children like helicopters. Other terms used to describe this phenomenon are “bulldozer parenting” and “lawnmower parenting.”
(Courtesy: brightside.me)
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