Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
~ Thomas Edison
As a parent I really struggle with how much should I meddle in the affairs of my kids. At what point are you just making your kids decisions for them? Recently I went to a winter retreat with a group of middle and high school students as a chaperone. We had fun, but as a chaperone we were talking about a choice one of the kids was making and the other parent said to us along the lines of it will be a "self correcting error". At what point do we has parents let our kids fail, not to be mean spirited but at some point you learn by error.
Clearly something that is going to cause them or others physical or emotional harm needs to be dealt with as soon as possible. What about the kid that wants to take AP history? The class you know will be hard. It will take a lot of work and might not be worth the AP credit. Do you let them never even have a chance to succeed or fail. How will our kids ever know what their limits are if we limit them before they even try.
I personally would like my child to know what their limits are before they go to college. I want my kids to experience the too hard or almost too much for them in order for them to have an understanding of themselves. They might have a lower GPA when it is all said and done at the high school level but that is not going to make or break my child's ability to go to college. I was not a great student in high school and ended up going to graduate school. Trust me, I learned from my mistakes I made in high school. Some I paid for, literally. The cost of not having a scholarship was costly. Impossible, no. I ended up in a job that paid for all my graduate classes so in the end my hard work (self correcting error) paid off.
I think our society is over the top with my kid does x, y and z and is the best at them all. One day these kids are going to grow up and not be good at something, not get the promotion, or the job and it will be a huge blow to their ego. I would rather my kid learn now that they are not the best (or even need to be the best) at something they enjoy. If it is AP history or mountain bike races. Enjoy the learning and the riding, being the first or last but above all have fun.
I clearly do not want my kid to make some of the mistakes I made but in the long run I have to step back and realize that they need to know what they can and can't handle and if it isn't harmful to them then let them try. They might surprise me. I will have a conversation about it but I have decided if we talk about it and they still want to try, I am not going to argue. Pick your battles.
I am not saying to let your kids do everything under the sun either. We have a rule around here, one sport and one art at at a time. Although two of my oldest daughters sports are at the same time, one is mostly weekends and the other during the week so there is not a conflict. I can not be at two different places at once and this rule is mostly for my sanity.
I am preaching to the choir on this topic. It is hard for me to listen to other parents, especially the ones that have kids that already took the AP class and tell everyone how hard it is going to be for them and not tell my kid, don't do it. Clearly it isn't too hard for all kids or they wouldn't have the class. They could be trying to sort out the kids that really don't want to work hard. I won't have written this blog if the topic didn't challenge me in some way.
~ Thomas Edison
As a parent I really struggle with how much should I meddle in the affairs of my kids. At what point are you just making your kids decisions for them? Recently I went to a winter retreat with a group of middle and high school students as a chaperone. We had fun, but as a chaperone we were talking about a choice one of the kids was making and the other parent said to us along the lines of it will be a "self correcting error". At what point do we has parents let our kids fail, not to be mean spirited but at some point you learn by error.
Clearly something that is going to cause them or others physical or emotional harm needs to be dealt with as soon as possible. What about the kid that wants to take AP history? The class you know will be hard. It will take a lot of work and might not be worth the AP credit. Do you let them never even have a chance to succeed or fail. How will our kids ever know what their limits are if we limit them before they even try.
I personally would like my child to know what their limits are before they go to college. I want my kids to experience the too hard or almost too much for them in order for them to have an understanding of themselves. They might have a lower GPA when it is all said and done at the high school level but that is not going to make or break my child's ability to go to college. I was not a great student in high school and ended up going to graduate school. Trust me, I learned from my mistakes I made in high school. Some I paid for, literally. The cost of not having a scholarship was costly. Impossible, no. I ended up in a job that paid for all my graduate classes so in the end my hard work (self correcting error) paid off.
I think our society is over the top with my kid does x, y and z and is the best at them all. One day these kids are going to grow up and not be good at something, not get the promotion, or the job and it will be a huge blow to their ego. I would rather my kid learn now that they are not the best (or even need to be the best) at something they enjoy. If it is AP history or mountain bike races. Enjoy the learning and the riding, being the first or last but above all have fun.
I clearly do not want my kid to make some of the mistakes I made but in the long run I have to step back and realize that they need to know what they can and can't handle and if it isn't harmful to them then let them try. They might surprise me. I will have a conversation about it but I have decided if we talk about it and they still want to try, I am not going to argue. Pick your battles.
I am not saying to let your kids do everything under the sun either. We have a rule around here, one sport and one art at at a time. Although two of my oldest daughters sports are at the same time, one is mostly weekends and the other during the week so there is not a conflict. I can not be at two different places at once and this rule is mostly for my sanity.
I am preaching to the choir on this topic. It is hard for me to listen to other parents, especially the ones that have kids that already took the AP class and tell everyone how hard it is going to be for them and not tell my kid, don't do it. Clearly it isn't too hard for all kids or they wouldn't have the class. They could be trying to sort out the kids that really don't want to work hard. I won't have written this blog if the topic didn't challenge me in some way.
Stars can't shine without darkness.
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