To think some parents can't accept their kids are just normal & average?

[Devonco]

In my children's circles there are some parents (very wealthy & highly educated) who refuse to accept their dc are average & normal.
They are constantly complaining their dc aren't pushed enough in school, aren't getting on better in extracurriculars etc.. Throw money at the "problems" then complain..
Also openly despise children who aren't as affluent as theirs surpassing theirs academically & in extracurriculars..
Drives me batty & I feel they should just let their lovely dc at peace & let them find their own path

Oh bless! 😂 How frustrating as a parent.
Hopefully she grows into a lovely young lady and one day you'll all laugh about this.
Funnily enough a few acquaintances of mine regret not indulging in these things as carefree teenagers - returning to sport and music as adult hobbies. That still doesn't return the money their poor parents spent on these things though...

She's done coding and guitar and sports. But seemingly CBA with any of them. But she'll find her way, she's a smart girl. So, we'll just have to wait and see!

I totally agree. These days it seems that if a child is so much as a bookworm they’re a child prodigy.

I have one child who is has an eidetic memory and this makes tests, school work exams etc an absolute doddle - but they have NO common sense.

The other is very very middle of the road, if that, and gets much needed learning support at school for maths.

Im immensely proud of them both because they are sweet, kind loving children not because of what a test result says, and I feel quite bad for the children who have SO much pressure put on them to deliver academic results. I dont think people realise how easily children suffer from burnout

You broke this down very well!

Dd3 (year 11) attends a private school, I feel she is pretty average (fine by me) but the school seems to think she is highly intelligent. Both her sisters are Oxbridge graduates and one of them was decidedly average. I think there is too much pressure on dc today. When I was doing my O levels I don't remember anyone talking about grade predictions etc. Having happy confident dc is surely the end goal.

My kids are not privately educated (yet) but if they were I’d want them to do well academically as I’d be paying over £50k a year for this for two kids. It’s all well and good saying you want them to be happy of course you do but you also want to get your return on investment.
I’m not privately educated but through sheer resilience and hard work find myself working with people who have been educated to a high standard achieving top degrees. I’ve also done the same but started from the very bottom.
Im planning to save to put my kids in private school and will be expecting them to take their education seriously. They need to understand the investment that’s gone into them and put the effort in. I’m also prepared to take them out if they felt that they didn’t want the extra pressure too.

My friends children go to a private school where the tagline on the website is “excellence for all”, which I think is hilarious but absolutely illustrates your point.

The fact is, Capitalism has spectacularly failed to ensure that only the offspring of the wealthy get to be brainy 😏

This is it in a nutshell!

That's just weird & racist. Where on earth have you got your evidence about some races or nationalities being superior in some abilities?!

Yeah, the amount of privately educated children who are ‘exceptional’ really is odd… private schools are the least competitive places too… if you want real competition for your child then state school is best for this, with kids from a range of backgrounds, some with true competitive grit.
Our football team recently played the first team of a local private secondary and absolutely battered them. The trials for our team were genuinely competitive, with 50+ children trying out for the A team. The private schools ‘first’ team were clearly just the 15 or so kids who fancied a go. Or perhaps with such small numbers in the year those genuinely were the best players they had.

We compete at schools, cup and county level - there are rarely Private schools who qualify, and at ‘schools’ level they generally just play other private schools.

They all got annihilated in netball too. Now the private schools just stick to just playing the other private schools - where we live anyway.

Eh? She didn't say that at all.

She said the most musical kids in her dc's school happen to be from eastern Europe, and that this is specifically because their parents had a strong emphasis on music growing up and spend more time practicing with their kids at home. More practice = more skill. Not inherent ability based on race.

Yeah, that’s a bit odd - the best musicians in our DCs are the ones who started young and/or practice at lot!
Both our DC plays instruments to a high level - mainly because we encouraged them to at a younger age and made them practice.

Theres one kid at school, who is concert level violin - his mum is a piano and violin teacher. They’re not Eastern European 😅

it’s the same in all sports, friends DD is very sporty, in all the teams, private school. They spend half a day travelling to play another private school when there is brilliant interschools competition leagues in our city.
They don’t seem to want to play against teams who will
actually give them a challenge. Weird, given how ‘rounded’ they tend to say their experiences are at these schools…

Not some. Most.

I kind of get it - they’ll get their arse kicked and won’t even get a fancy tea. Fair enough to want to avoid!

In any curve distribution, there will be those who are at one end and those who are at the other, with the majority either side of the middle.

I’ve seen a child at private school who was so worried by the class lists posted at the school entrance every week, that he developed tics. He was terrified of not doing well in the weekly test and moving down.

If children are happy, surely they will be able to perform better, because they feel comfortable and valued by their school and their parents.

Many children who are privately educated are trained by parents and tutors to get the points necessary for acceptance in the school of their choice. Thats fine, but without a degree of innate ability, they’re going to find it really difficult to cope in a pressurised highly academic environment.

So far my kid has been average in every way: weight, height, development. Obviously I think he's special in the sense he's very special to me and his Dad and we adore him, but objectively always around 50th percentile in most things.

I was the kid labelled as gifted, moved up a year in school, so much pressure to excel, addicted to achieving things and hit burn out in my 20s. I don't want that for my children. I just want them to be happy and find their niche in life, and have fulfilling relationships.

I went to private school ( dad taught there so I got money off) and I think my parents mistakenly thought that money in = better outcomes.
No...just normal me. Even some of my peers called me normal. I'll take that as a compliment.

Honestly some would dream of an “average”
kid. Friends perfect sports playing swotty dd spiralled out of control as teen it’s terrifying been expelled etc life is now very different for them as a family. They would LOVE her to be an average kid. Count your blessings.