Aibu to think some parents can't accept their child is a average?!

[Chasingshadowss]

Just from listening to some parents at the school gates & activities.. It seems certain parents can't accept their child is normal or average..
If they are not over achieving it's the schools fault, teachers fault, other parents faults, coaches fault.. It's draining.
Also some parents who might be very high achievers themselves just expect their child should be the same as them & point the finger if not..
What's wrong with average?

“Finding one’s own path is the most important thing for anyone. I am profoundly convinced that every individual possesses a unique talent—everyone is endowed with a divine gift. The tragedy of mankind is that we do not seek to discover this gift in the child and nurture it—we do not know how. A genius is a rare event among us, even a miracle, but what is a genius? It is simply a person who has been lucky. Fate has decreed that the circumstances of life themselves nudge the individual toward the correct choice of path. The classical example is Mozart. He was born into the family of a musician, and from an early age he found himself in an environment that ideally nurtured the talent with which nature had endowed him. But just try to imagine, my dear sir, that Wolfgang Amadeus was born into the family of a peasant. He would have become a crude rustic herdsman, amusing his cows by the magic trilling of his reed flute. If he had been born into the family of a rough military man, he would have become a mediocre officer with a love of military marches. Believe me, young man, within every child, every single one without exception, there lies a hidden treasure. One simply needs to know how to reach that treasure!"

That's not true at all.There is lots of tutoring for 11+ and 13+ entry into private schools. Surrey is totally tutor-tastic and mainly for entry to the private sector.

I was the kid who performed excellently in class and surprised everyone by making silly mistakes. That was later realised to me due to SEN. As an adult, I've done quite well academically due to strengths but exams are still a struggle. Why am I telling you this? Since school I've had lots of coaching from others and myself, but I still make silly mistakes in exams. Coping strategies are 1) practising lots, 2) figuring out where I score points easily... for me I do better at "hard" questions but struggle to remember and quote defs which are low scoring 3) accepting I will make lots of mistakes - this reduces mistakes but also realistic.

It'd have been hard for school to help me with 2 because it takes a long time to work out, perhaps you could help get figure out where she scores points well, find a patten, reason and build a strategy with her. Build her confidence after silly mistakes

I was very happy to accept DD2 was average in terms of academic performance, but hsd to become "one of those parents" at secondary school to advocate for her additional needs when it turned out she had ADHD and ASD.

This thread has posters which prove op’s point. Pretty bog standard SATS results being touted as genius, home testing that shows perfection but very average at school. How about you leave it to the professionals!

I once saw a parent whip open the kids rucksack, examine the new reading books colour band and bomb over to the teacher to have it out. The worst one was a mum telling her kid “I can’t look at you” after a dismal sports day performance.

Parents are over invested. I work in education and see it's having devastating consequences for children’s mental health.

I’m of Indian origin and I firmly believe there is no such thing as an average child - only average parents. White people are amazed that DS spoke from 9 mths, conversations by 1.5, fully potty trained by 2, reading by 3 and writing not long after, ambition to be the best in everything he does, but when I speak to other parents of Indian and Chinese origin this is typical for our kids. To do all this I am very involved despite working full time (it’s exhausting but worth it) and yes that does mean speaking up for him when I feel the teacher isn’t noticing what he can do.

People on this board have previously complained about south asian / east asian parents not allowing their kids to socialise with white British kids and this concept of ‘average’ or ‘it’s okay to fail’ is a big reason why. Due to racism our kids can’t fail and be successful at the same time like their kids can. So we do everything to instill the disclipline that they don’t. Being good at sports / academics is about practice over natural talent in most cases any way

Because the taught skills of ambitious and conscientious parents, plus a large and varied vocabulary from being exposed to the same, can masquerade in the early years as exceptionalism. People frequently mistake taught knowledge and skill with inate intelligence and it takes the introduction of new concepts alongside peers to show which children are the most competent at reasoning, critical thinking, logic and so on, which are the real markers of high intellect.

This is an excellent post & very interesting. The Indian, Chinese & also Nigerian dc in my childrens classes are very high achievers according to my dc's (& nice, polite kids too). We have in the past tried to organise playdates with a couple of the kids but they seem to do numerous activities after school & theirs clashd with ours. Those kids are at all the birthdays though so they do make an effort.

@Ozanj

People on this board have previously complained about south asian / east asian parents not allowing their kids to socialise with white British kids and this concept of ‘average’ or ‘it’s okay to fail’ is a big reason why. Due to racism our kids can’t fail and be successful at the same time like their kids can. So we do everything to instill the disclipline that they don’t. Being good at sports / academics is about practice over natural talent in most cases any way

This is a very interesting point.

I am white so have not experienced racism as you have but I feel similar: I have been a single parent and I felt very strongly that I needed to work three or four times as hard as others to succeed in my career and that my daughter will have to work hard too. In particular I am absolutely determined that above all else my daughter should never be reliant on a man for money. So I understand your position about not being allowed to fail. And honestly I think a lot of White British people could learn a lot from your work ethic.

I do think there’s a decadence about the perspective that it doesn’t matter how you do in school as long as you’re happy. That may be true if you come from a very comfortable background or have low career aspirations but for most people the reality is that doing well at school is the minimum to being successful. Its disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

Of course this should not be imposed with a crushing authoritarianism and at the expense of a child’s mental health and a child should not be forced to do something they loathe and have no aptitude for. Nor should this involve bullying teachers and demanding special treatment for kids. Parents need to be very clear eyed about their children’s behaviour and academic abilities.

But let’s be real here. Instilling a sense that school doesn’t matter and that it’s more important to have fun is not helping your child succeed. I would far prefer to be a hands-on parent who is invested in their kids education than one who bitches about “pushy parents”.

An average

That's all well & good about bitching about "pushy" parents. They are not the subject of the thread. I agree with you though, parents have the power to do so much themselves with their kids to improve their kids performance without resorting to bitching about the "rubbish" school or coach "playing favourites". It's setting their child up for a victim mentality.

As an Indian parent I can confirm that white coaches and teachers can absolutely play favourites and discriminate against children who aren’t white. That is why I step in.

@Chasingshadowss

parents have the power to do so much themselves with their kids to improve their kids performance without resorting to bitching about the "rubbish" school or coach "playing favourites". It's setting their child up for a victim mentality.

I agree with this. I don’t think it’s helpful to draw attention to favouritism, whether real or imagined (unless it’s very egregious). Children need to develop their own work ethic. The reality is that favouritism exists in all walks of life. Feelinh that a parent will come in and bail them out every time doesn’t support a child’s resilience in the long run.

I think there are two separate issues here: there is the question of whether teachers are being accused by parents of not doing their jobs properly (by and large they are), but there is also a question about what signal the parents are sending the child about the importance of school.

The premise of this post is that a of parents overstate children’s aptitude. That’s probably true. But my philosophy is that it’s better to err on the side of over promoting confidence than under promoting and encouraging mediocrity.

@ozanj that is terrible, so sorry your kids experience this in the U.K, they are very lucky they have a clued in parent like you who can help the succeed 💐

Exactly, I think sometimes teachers are so busy & juggling many balls at a time it's easy to pick the child with perfect attendance, confidence, good reading & speaking ability who is reliable rather than coach a child for a speaking part when there simply isn't time... This then makes it look like certain kids are favoured & parents bitch their child doesn't get a look in..

I think may be the area you are in.

With my kids their first school in particular was bad for competitive parents often with Autumn born kids who were often disapproving of kids like mine summer born who struggled - very much crab bucket mentality - you were just supposed to accept your kids were average or below not help them at home.

I did a lot of support work at home and they slowly improved - rare occasions that came up that was really wrong even DS especially improving - his year was particularly bad for it - was just wrong - to point a parent loudest voice possible insisted her DD must be wrong as it couldn't be top group with my DS in it.

Move to completely new part of UK - wales and it's just not a thing here - no one cares how other kids are doing. There is tutoring but it's usually used by kids struggling - one with non English parents so often bilingual and struggling with English grades or with underlying condition - dyslexia etc - or who need to boost up a grade or so.

I did mention on here once in first area how flummoxed I was by another parent attitude their DS didn't know their time tables in Y4 and what was the school going to do - I did think they taught maths poorly reflected in their SATS results - but parent refused to do any help at home. I got told on here I should go round and teach the boy - it was a couple with one child and more money than I had - and I was dealing with three kids needing a lot help tight budget and a DH away in week. Had it area DH grew up in family friend DS struggling with handwriting - as our DS was - I recommended resources we'd found helpful - oh it's the schools responsibility.

Ideally you should be able to leave it to the schools - I don't know if it areas we have lived in - very working class - but there can be an attitude from schools of oh good enough rather than support and pushing.

The posters experience is the norm for the majority of kids of colour.

If your parents don't advocate for you as well as push you then you end up nowhere.

I find parents like this dreadfully boring and avoid at all costs. They often have pretty banal substandard lives centred solely around their children.

And the poor children. My parents and grandparents may not have pushed me academically but they never made made me feel that I wasn’t good enough. And I think self esteem is more important that slightly higher grades.

If your parents don't advocate for you as well as push you then you end up nowhere.

I always thought it was one the main reason why lower social economic groups generally do less well in UK school system - their parents are less likely to step in and advocate for them.

From DH and mine experiences as working class bright pupils and as parents with kids in working class areas school there can be very low expectations generally - so unless you have a very talented driven child or supportive parents they have quite the disadvantage.

When I was teaching I hated it when parents couldn't accept that their child wasn't in the top group for everything. It was always the teacher's fault. "What are you going to do to make sure he's i the top group" etc etc.

I know it isn't always the case but I'd been at school with a lot of the parents and they weren't particularly academic but thought their children should be.

My teacher friend said she once had a parent who said "My husband & I were top sets all through school, we expected our child to be similar".. That's insanity in my opinion, your child us not you!

I always thought it was one the main reason why lower social economic groups generally do less well in UK school system - their parents are less likely to step in and advocate for them.

It has to be carrot and stick though. Appropriate pressure plus understanding and advocacy where needed. Plus instilling in the child that it’s at least as much their responsibility as that of the teacher.

There is a big difference between appropriate advocacy in a situation where a child has been discriminated against or is getting poor treatment abd creating a sense of entitlement. Some parents approach this from the point of view that teachers are stipid and incompetent.

A lot of people have no concept of a normal distribution or a bell curve!

I really feel for teachers. For some kids reaching expectations is a huge achievement that would not have been possible without said teacher... But a certain cohort prefer to blame the school rather than accept they have an average child..

Remember, when GCSE results come through and the wunderkind has not done as well as the parents expect it's because of the lousy teachers, if they have exceeded expectations it's because they have wonderful parents. Was ever the case though.