Do I As I Say Not As I Can't Do

When my kids do something clever they "get that from me", when they don’t they "get that from their dad". I’m a laugh a minute.

As much as it it is lovely to see the best parts of ourselves in our kids it can be equally as painful to see in them the things we like least about ourselves. Is it genetics? Are they predisposed to be nail biters, control freaks or clumsy? Or do they emulate our behaviour? How closely do they watch and mimic until being overly sensitive or too competitive is something they became not something they are?

Nature vs nurture

The great debate. Our genes or our behaviour? Either way it’s our fault. Their shrink is going to tell them that one day, we might as well face facts.

You Can Do Math Even If I Can't   

My kids go to a math enrichment program once a week for an hour called Bright Minds. My daughter was less enthused about it than my son but she went for two years and he still goes, happily. She used to ask why she had to go to the classes and I explained that she comes from a long line of women-who-hate-math and that she would be the first woman on my side of the family tree who does not hate numbers.

She started the classes before she had heard that “math is hard”, “girls hate math”, “girls aren’t good at math”. And it has paid off. Last week, for example, she had a math test at school, she’s in grade 5, and I asked her if she needed to study, wanted to look things over and she said: “Nah, I’ve got it Mom.”  She aced it and was proud but pretty blasé about it. I asked if she had been nervous, was the test hard. “Nah, it was a breeze Mom.” and I reminded her: "Remember when you used to ask why you went to Bright Minds? It was for this moments like these kid, ones I never had."

She knows she can learn any math, or ANYthing for that matter, she encounters in the coming years. She has the confidence to ask questions, she can try to work it out, and she’s willing to learn how to solve the problems. Math isn't something she fears. For her it will never be something "girls can't do". I would have given anything for that kind of confidence in math.

Research shows that school-aged children are especially apt to emulate the attitudes and behaviors of the same-sex parent—a source of concern if we want to improve girls’ still-lagging performance in traditionally male-dominated fields like science and mathematics. If mom hates math, a young girl may reason, it’s O.K. for me to dislike it too.    (more here)

Well, there was no way I was going to be able pretend to be okay with math, I wouldn’t have been able to help her with her homework without having a breakdown, so instead I told her about her great grandmother’s, her grandmother’s and her mother’s math woes and explained that she wasn’t going down that path. It wasn’t going to be okay to hate math. I was going to get her the help she need to make sure it was a no brainer.

If we can’t model it, whatever IT is, we can sure help them to not make the same mistakes. That’s the job.

Do as I say, not as I do. (or can't do)

Our Children's Future

Our Children's Future

What they'll be when they grow up hasn't been invented yet

My daughter wants to be a writer, an artist, a candy store owner, an app developer and about a half a dozen other things on any given day. The other night she was getting settled in bed and let out a long sigh.

“What’s up puddin’ ?

“Well, I was just thinking ... there are so many things I want to be and learn and do, how will I ever decide?" 

There was no sense pointing out that she was only 10 and had lots of time, that wasn’t the answer she was looking for. She’s old enough and smart enough to know the reality of that truth, she was going deeper that night.

Instead I told her what I believe, what I envy about her being 10 - that the world she is growing up in will allow for her the chance to be all those things if she wanted. At various times, at the same time and not for all time. Gone are the days of being one thing, I told her. You could own a candy store that you decorate with your own art and about which you write and, in your free time, you could develop an app that makes art out of candies. If people are even still using apps by then. Or eating candy for that matter. They may just put on a hat that lets them experience the happiness of eating candy without being within five miles of a lollipop. You may want to make those and be a Cranial Experience Helmet Engineer.

More on the subject -

Yesterday I read this great piece from a Gen Y mom. HAving read it I can say; "I wish I was 10 today and I'm so relieved I wasn’t 10 in 2000! 

Excerpt from The Question That Ruined Generation Y - by Lea Grover 

There is no, "What do you want to be?" There is only, "What are you doing now?"
And so I'm not going to ask my kids. I'm not going to imply that there's an end result -- that there's a final destination at which you have arrived, when you have grown up and are what you thought you wanted to be.
I'm going to ask my kids what they like. What they're interested in.
I'm not going to tell them that it matters what they get their degrees in. I'm going to tell them that opportunity is what you make of it, that your life is defined by your actions, and that whatever you're prepared for will be another door that can open for you.
I'm going to encourage them to study everything. Science, math, humanities, fine arts, business, languages. I'm going to encourage them to be Renaissance women, because there is no assurance that any jobs I know today, any careers, will still exist.

Please Tell Me When My Kid is Being a Sh*t

This morning I posted an article entitled "Is Your Daughter a Bully?" (read it here) on my Facebook page and added this note: 

A friend read it. It prompted her to tell me something that happened three weeks ago. She had deliberated bringing it up, decided not to and then read the post this morning and thought she should. We talked after school today.

My grade 5 daughter, Clancy, told this woman’s grade two daughter, and another girl, that the dance they performed with their class for the parents and all the other kids was “lame”. It hurt their feelings and one of them told their mom. These little girls like my daughter, look up to her and they were really disappointed, as was the mother. 

Was I disappointed in my kid? Yes. 

Did it come as a surprise? Not completely, no.

I think my kids are great and I like them more than most other kids but I don’t think they are perfect but when they make mistakes we are on them. If they are involved in something I usually lean towards blaming them I find out the facts. No, of course it’s not a great approach but given how well I know their mother (me!) I am apt to believe they must be somehow at fault. 

When Clancy came out of school today I presented her with the facts as they had been given to me, the mom was still there and assured Clancy that she still thinks the world of her.

I watched Clancy’s lips go dry, cheeks go pink and her eyes go everywhere but land on us. I said; “You feel bad and you’re embarrassed but it'll be okay.” She said she was both those things. We told her we were not mad but disappointed as we knew this wasn’t her usual behaviour.

Clancy left to apologize to the grade two gal and came back to tell us she had. She could look us in the eye, she was smiling, she felt better. She explained that she had said she was sorry, had not meant to hurt anyone’s feelings, that she was learning to not say what she was thinking and that the dance was really just kids spinning in circles so that was why she said what she did. 

I explained that the art of the apology is sincerity not qualification.

I saw the little girl a few moments later and asked if she was okay with the apology. She said yes. I told her that if it ever happened again she should feel free to tell Clancy; “Hey, that hurt me feelings. You need to apologize.”

Later in the car I asked Clancy how she felt about it and she good that she wanted to write about it. Here’s that:

Why does this minutia bear repeating? Because it never happens anymore.

Moms don’t tell other moms - “Hey, your kid needs to learn from something they did/said, didn’t do/didn’t say. Do you want me to handle it or will you?”

In the good old days my friend would have found Clancy that night and said; “You hurt my daughter’s feelings, you owe her an apology.” And the business of parenting my child would have been just as much her business as it was mine. We all need help with the stuff we don't see.

But what used to be a regular part of conversation between women is now verboten and can end friendships. Our relationships are so entangled with those of our kids that more often than not we ignore a child’s crappiness rather than lose the connection with the mother. There is an unspoken rule that we never discuss our children's failings, everything is peachy keen so what has become epidemic is the discussing of one another and our kids behind each other's backs. It's yucky.

Rather than say; "Myrtle, can you please tell Junior to stop punching my kid so we can just enjoy our morning together in peace? Or do you want me to go do it while you get us more of these delicious Peak Freans?", instead we chose to say nothing and the problem between the kids escalates until finally we just avoid Myrtle on the playground, Junior never finds out his behaviour is abhorrent, he beats on other kids until finally neither he nor his mom have any friends left.

If we feel comfortable relating our children’s missteps to one another, using all these normal behaviours, water-testing and line-crossing moments as an opportunity to teach and help our own kids and other kids, then the teachers could get back to teaching, the kids could get back to learning how to be good humans and the birds would sing all day.

Chris Ann, thanks for coming to talk to me. You and I and our daughters all learned something today. 

To all the moms of all the kids that my kids know and interact with; 

If Clancy or Jack MacNeil’s name comes up at dinner, if they did something that hurt, upset, disturbed your child in any way, please

tell me, call me, tell them.