Putting Pressure on Children for Studying

As a parent, I am always caught in this eternal debate, to put pressure in my child or not to study. I find myself often comparing my own childhood with that of my child’s, forever putting one against another, and trying to think if what happened to me should happen to her or not. Is that what all mothers do? Are we always judging our children by what had happened with us in our childhood, and if so is that really fair?


I had a very simple childhood, so far as education is concerned. Every evening we had to study. However the onus of completing homework (these days schools call it assignments) was always on me. My parents were only interested in seeing me study. All that changed somewhere before my board exams, when suddenly I was asked to compete and get high scores, and simply seeing me study did not work for my parents. But till that happened, it was sheer bliss for me. So I developed this habit of dreaming, and letting my mind wonder when I used to study in my childhood.


But my daughter has a totally different environment altogether. She has this extremely engaging and competitive environment to live, where academics is all about muscle flexing, some by children, mostly by their parents. I had a first taste of this when couple of years back, a very competitive mom of my daughter’s classmate walked up to me and wanted to know her rank and her exam results. I was taken aback by the query, and in later years had found that for a whole lot of parents, this question does not mean breach of etiquette at all. More important than how your child performs, is the fact how good or bad did your child’s classmates perform, much to my amusement and horror.



As a mother I do understand a parent’s anxiety regarding her child’s future, but to turn it into another child’s (or the parents’, for that matter) nightmare is something I guess I didn’t appreciate. Since then I have decided to stop putting pressure on my child for her performance, and have spent days telling her that results don’t matter but hard work does. But what amazes me is my child’s seemingly unperturbed nature in all this. With supreme confidence, she tells me to relax and not worry, and goes about to play with her friends. And when she finally studies, it’s with that same sense of calmness, with which she goes to do well in class too. And that leaves me perplexed, should we let our children be, because they can take care of things, or force our ways on them, because our parents had said so?

 

Hi Rohini,

Yes, I agree with you, that parents are too under lots of pressure :drowning. But as adults we are supposed to keep our children free from stress, and not pass down our very own anxieties on their little shoulders. At least thats how I see my parental responsibilities

 

Hi Malar,

Ask me!! I have a extremely headstrong child, who just cannot be forced into anything she doesn't want to do :roll:. That's where the internal debate stems from.

As for the debate, yes please, let's discuss. I am all for it. :thumbsup