Let Your Children Be Kids a Little Longer

It is kind of funny. When you are a child, you think of what it is like to grow up and be independent, and then once you become an adult you realize how short and precious childhood really is. A lot of people find my blog by searching terms relating to Asian parents pushing their kids. Today I want to address a few things about parents who push their children because they consider their children to be gifted.

I am not a parent, so I can only speak from the perspective of a child. My mom taught me to read Chinese at a very young age. My parents and their neighbors tell me that I was three when I started to read newspapers and books. I only have vague memories of those times. Anyway, I do remember people calling me a "sheng tong", which means "god child" or "genius child". So as a result my dad decided that I should go to elementary school early. In China you are supposed to enter first grade if you are age six by June 30th of the school year. I was born in the latter half the year, so I wasn't supposed to enter elementary school until I was almost seven. As a result, my classmates were 1 to 2 years older than me. When you are five years old that age difference is huge. I was the puniest child in the class and I had trouble with holding a pencil and copying Chinese characters over and over again. Nevertheless I did pretty well in class, and beat out the older children in math and language tests.

I was a bit weird socially, though. I remember that none of the girls wanted to play with me for some reason and my best friends were boys. Maybe it is because my maturity level was the same as boys since it's generally accepted that boys are 1 to 2 years less mature than girls. I liked bugs, dirt, and running around. I finished 4th grade in China, and all the friends I remember are boys. I also distinctly remember that one of the popular girls hated me because I did better than her academically. It's kind of funny how passive aggressive most girls are.

After 4th grade, I moved to America, and I didn't know any English. At first I was put into the fifth grade class. Since I didn't understand anything it was pretty tough. So my mom decided that I should move down to the fourth grade class. This turned out to be a good choice because they put me in an English as a second language class and I was with children my age. After a year or so I was able to catch up in English and I was really glad to be with kids the same age as me. I wasn't a super popular kid, but it felt like I was on equal ground as everyone else. I have pretty fond memories of secondary school in America because for the most part I was normal, and I had plenty of friends.

When you are a kid, you really don't want to be a freak, and being younger than everyone else sort of singles you out. Life is especially tough for a teenager who is quite a bit younger than everyone else and sometimes the results are quite tragic. For example, during my freshman year of college a boy jumped from the tenth floor of the math building and killed himself. From his blog I found that he entered college at the age of 16, and was isolated for his whole life because he was younger than everyone else. Loneliness made him jump. It is great to be academically gifted, but I think we are such social creatures that we all want to have friends and be loved.

I think what parents should do is to foster their kids' interests, but don't push them into a social environment they can't handle. I know a couple real geniuses who never skipped a single grade. They took advanced classes in the fields they were interested in, but they chose to finish school at a normal age. I also have a brilliant friend who skipped a grade and is now a PhD candidate at MIT, but her emotional IQ is quite above average and she is fine. Each person is different, but everyone has less than 20 years to be a child, and so many more years to worry about annoying things such as finances, jobs, and relationships. Why would anyone want to rush into adulthood? So here I say to the parents out there, let your kids be kids just a bit longer even if they are gifted. An extra one to two years of childhood is really priceless and I sincerely thank my mom for letting me flunk 4th grade and be normal.