Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion more on "Tiger Mom"...

http://www.slate.com/articles/doubl...s_the_parenting_method_doesn_t_work.html

And although Chua presented her own children as Exhibit A of why her parenting style works, Kim said, “Our data shows Tiger parenting produces the opposite effect. Not just the general public but Asian-American parents have adopted this idea that if I'm a tiger parent, my kids will be whizzes like Chua’s kids. Unfortunately, tiger children’s GPA’s and depressive symptoms are similar to those whose parents who are very harsh.
“Tiger parenting doesn't produce superior outcomes in kids.”

Chua's goal was Yale Law School.

This was her attractor, the destination that guided her actions.

I was there and felt it.

If you do not understand this, you do not understand what this issue is really about.

It wasn't the "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother".

It was the call of intellectual status and elitism, and all of the subordination that entails.

It's a massive practical joke.

Well, that's encouraging to hear--I was starting to feel guilty for not trying to be a Tiger Mom. Of course, the way studies go there will probably be another one next week showing the opposite.

Actually I knew two guys in college who were kids of tiger parents and both had quasi-nervous breakdowns when they weren't able to get the grades their parents were expecting. I felt really bad for them but didn't know how to help. I hope they came through it okay; they were both nice guys.

Tigering appears to work only with kids that a) come from a culture where elders are treated with deference - so that they bother to listen b) are very, very bright - so the high grades are actually acheivable and c) have natural resilience - to handle the constant pressure.

Without at least the above it will probably be a case of the 'cure' being worse than the disease.

Can't we all just get along...(joking!!) But seriously, I think that maybe we should stop relying on this mom or that mom who wrote a book, or this culture or that culture and start relying on common sense for parenting. I don't know about anyone else, but intuitively if I follow my gut instinct it usually leads me down the right path. And if I get stuck parenting, I ask for help but still choose what intuitively feels right for my home and family.

I think a middle ground of being supportive without smothering and offering discipline with compassion is the best approach for my family.

Correlation is not causation. For example, it's no surprise that children who were doing well experienced less criticism/shaming than those who weren't - it doesn't prove that criticising/shaming your kids makes them do less well! (Not that I'm advocating it.)

Amy Chua's essay "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior" struck a nerve because Chinese-American kids *are* over-represented at our elite universities and among science competition winners. If Chinese-American kids were underperforming, she would be ignored. I think Chinese outperformance partly results from a higher average IQ (some studies find 105), but few critics of Tiger Mothering want to consider that reason for outperformance.

Culture may also play a role. Chinese parents commonly send their children to Chinese school, where in addition to learning the language (and preparing for high SAT subject test scores in Chinese), enrichment classes are offered in math and English. The math classes are taught at an advanced levels by Chinese fathers who are mathematicians, scientists, and engineers, and they prepare students for math contests and school math. If a Chinese kid and a white kid have the same math talent but the Chinese kid has been exposed to algebra and MathCounts problems
for several years before 8th grade, the Chinese kid may have an edge and think he is good at math.

In my web searches I have noticed that California, with its large Chinese population, has many enrichment programs with mostly Chinese students. Look at the Avid Academy's Physics Olympiad results http://www.avidacademy.com/site-new...s-olympiad-semi-finalists-medal-rankings , for example. What fraction of the U.S. population knows there is a Physics Olympiad?

I think it's worth looking at successful groups to see how they accomplish what they do.

Here's a comment on Amazon regarding her other book.

"Chua, a professor at Yale Law School, is herself the progeny of a market dominant minority: the Chinese of the Philippines. Chinese-speakers make up only 1% or 2% of the Philippines' population. But they own the majority of the country's business assets. They seclude themselves in a luxurious world fenced off from the indigenous majority, whom they hold in contempt and wouldn't dream of marrying.

Not surprisingly, the impoverished natives aren't crazy about the rich newcomers. Chua's beloved aunt in Manila was brutally murdered by her chauffeur. The unmotivated cops made little effort to find him.

It's definitely nicer to belong to the minority than to the majority in these countries. But Chua makes clear that, to Americans used to our norms of congeniality and social equality, it would be an awfully depressing way to live.

A grimmer example: Indonesia. The Chinese made up 3% of its vast population, yet owned the great majority of all businesses. The dictator Suharto, whose family had lucrative ties to the Chinese community, fell in 1998. Democratization set off a vicious pogrom against the Chinese, many of whom fled to Chinese-majority Singapore. The government expropriated $58 billion in assets.

Not surprisingly, the native Indonesians proved inept at running the businesses nationalized from the Chinese, and the economy collapsed."

http://www.amazon.com/World-Fire-Exporting-Democracy-Instability/dp/0385721862

I can still vividly remember my time as a 7 year old schoolboy in England (1970s). The teacher, in the middle of talking about a totally different subject like geography, for instance, would suddenly point to a random kid and yell 'what's seven times eight?' or some other random product. Woe betide the poor kid that couldn't just rattle it off or, even worse, starting counting on his fingers - the teacher would start smacking those fingers with a stick! I was very glad that I had a good memory and that things just naturally seemed to make sense and stick at those moments - let me tell you.

It (public shaming/hitting with a stick) did not seem to help at all either - what a surprise!

I am going to throw some random thoughts here. As someone who grew up in Asia, one of the driving factor is the limited supply/ high demand environment for almost everything including access to first class higher education. It is not enough to be in the top 10%. In fact, if you are not in the top 2%, you have to settle for tier 2. It is all about achievement, dedication to work, and lots of plain hard work memorizing copious amounts of data. Just as the sequoia grow tallest in competition with each other, so do we. That said, the truly gifted are just as left out there as they may be here, if not more so. Gifted underachievers have no place in the system.
Thought number 2, asians are the newest immigrants to this country so most Asian Americans are usually first generation. Their parents came here because in most cases, they were in the top 10% in their native countries and had the drive and desire to do more, work harder to improve their children's lives. So you start with highly intelligent, possibly gifted, driven families and the mix of genes and environment is most likely to produce more of that kind.