Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy How to Hothouse Your Kid

There always seems to be a certain level of uncertainty and stress in these hothousing threads. Personally, I don't like the term "hothouse." A hothouse is a warm nurturing environment for plants that keeps them safe from the weather outside. Why is that bad? I get the impression from some of the messages here that parents who teach stuff to their kids in the absence of the kid begging are somehow doing something bad. This leads to the idea that only gifted kids should be taught by mom and dad.

It seems perfectly reasonable (to me at least) for any parent to teach stuff to his/her child. There are loads of perfectly valid reasons for teaching math or music or reading to a child outside of school. As has been pointed out, there are times when, as a parent, you have to teach your child the importance of doing something or following through on something even when you'd rather be doing something else.

Obviously, there are parents out there who live vicariously through their kids and end up treating them in unhealthy ways. Amy Chua's thing with not letting her kid pee or eat until she got some chord just right is a perfect example of that. Parents who consider an A- to be a bad grade are another example of that. Parents who use their kids as status symbols are a third example.

I'm not going to say that forcing your kid to do something when he's miserable is one of those things. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't. It's easy to identify the extremes but not so easy to identify the stuff in the middle. I expect we all make mistakes in that regard.