Anyone backpedalled on pushy parenting and changed course?

[AnnaBBB]

Am having real second thoughts about applying for highly selective /academic senior schools for DS even though he is quite academic ....... I feel already there is too much teaching is to the test and confess I have contributed to that pressure at home too in an effort to improve his shot at getting into these schools ....but there seems to be little creativity in it all ....I am wondering if it is having the opposite effect of fostering a genuine joy of learning, and the prospect of having him spend several more years of being hothoused at senior school and then having to follow that through at home to keep up in a highly competitive place where everyone needs to get A * or they feel a failure could backfire... the constant testing even at 9/10 years old is making him lose perspective of what he really used to love about a subject and he is starting to question the point of it all. Am curious if others having got into these highly selective schools (aka intensely competitive exam factories/hot houses), regretted it and then pulled their DCs out for similar reasons. Plus you read stories of child geniuses whose parents hothoused them even giving up their own jobs to home school (so effectively 1:1 tutoring) who then grow up to say they feel they lost their childhood and would never put their own children through it (Ruth Lawrence for one). Is it really worth it in the end?

Tangled your post seems rather one sided, I'm afraid.

DH and I are both high achieving and are very happy indeed. Please don't assume all high achievers are miserable. And please don't press this bias upon your DC ...

Also, with regards to the GCSE, the whole point of siting early is to allow space for other things. Endlessly going over stuff you've already covered is mind numbingly boring and quite disheartening when it takes up your entire school day.

That said, the slower academic pace at DD's school has allowed her to take part in somehting rather exceptional outside school...

But still, I wouldn't recommend that slow pace for the uber bright. DS woul dhave died of boredom.

It's worked well for a girl like DD who is bright enough, and wanted to pursue somehting else too...

As for DS school. Well I suppose it might be considered a hot house. But he doesn't find it so. About right, I'd say.

Certainly he bumbles along, relaxed to the point of being comatosed most days!!!

We are ridiculously slack unpushy parents (my MIL was the pushy mother from hell) we have never pushed our children. DS1 has just sat his GCSE's and we're beginning to wonder if we should have been a bit more pushy??

Pushy parents..... can you describe your childhood, do you look back with fond memories ? How does your upbringing compare to your childs ?

poppy I had a very pushy Mum.

We lived on a sink estate and she was determined that I was going to get a good education and leave!

Sometimes I balked. I wanted to do what my mates were doing. But by God am I glad now!!!!!!!!

My MIL made my super bright DH's life pretty crap nagging pushing all the time from a very early age; its was never good enough and he'd never worked hard enough. He did OK in his A levels for the time were talking about but not ok enough to go to top uni and read English (his passion) he refused to retake his A levels as he couldn't stand it my longer. For ten yrs after he escaped left home they were estranged and the relationship between them is to this day only OK.
So we never pushed our children we do have an excellent relationship with our children, much to the envy of many of their friends Im told we're considered the coolest parents around by DS1 friends. Its frequently commented on by friends and strangers and we rarely argue about school work or anything in fact and we laugh together a lot. But the jury is out on how this mega slack parenting will turn out for DS1; a reluctant scholar. DS2 is highly motivated and I suspect will fare better.

wordfactory - I don't think that all high-achieving people are unhappy by any means. Just like I don't think all medium/low achievers are wonderfully happy! My post came across wrong if that's how it sounded.

I know many happy high-achievers, some in my own family. But, without exception, those people are happy because they are pursuing a career that they find intrinsically interesting. So they get satisfaction out of the job itself, as well as considerable financial rewards from it.

The high-achievers I know who are unhappy are the ones who don't enjoy the job itself. That can be extremely draining, to the point of actual depression. They feel trapped by the high pay, but IMO they are more trapped by the fact that they simply don't know what they really want to be doing - they haven't had the chance/taken the time to find their consuming interests in life, and they don't feel they have the power or the 'right' to follow them.

So, our plan for our kids is to help them find and pursue what interests them. I see no reason why they shouldn't get excellent grades in the process - but I won't be making the grades themselves the focus. It will be their interest and application that I focus on. I would never criticise a child for coming second in a test. But I would praise them loads for the work they put in, and have discussions with them about what they've been learning.

I'm not prejudiced against success! I don't mind if my kids are investment bankers, as long as they are happy ones.

wordfactory - just read your post about your upbringing. I think in that situation, i would have been pushy like your mum too. I would fight to prevent my children dropping out, or being failed by a bad system. I don't think that being non-pushy is the same as being laissez-faire.

It sounds like your mum ensured that you had future opportunities, and if she hadn't, you might not have had many. But that's different to being ultra-competitive and making exam results the be all and end all of life. Life isn't about beating the person next to you, it's about doing what you do well. There are a whole range of capabilities that children need to develop to have good futures. Since you are successful AND happy, it sounds like your mum did a great job of nurturing those.

People who don't know me, and who only are aware of me as DD1 or DD2's mum, often think I 'must' be very very pushy. People who didn't know my mum, and who were only aware of her as my mum rather than my sister's mum, thought the same of her.

My mum was certainly not pushy in any sensible understanding of the term, and I am positively lazy. Although I do sometimes go ballistic with DS if I think he is taking the piss. I was a super high achiever - like Word, council estate working class background (we didn't even have a house, we lived in a small flat) to Oxbridge - and DD1 and DD2 are extremely good at school despite their SEN issues (which I also had/have). People often assume that kids who do well at school and who also do music stuff to a high level must have people pushing them to be like this, because 'normal children' aren't like that. Well, I've never denied that my kids (all of them) and I are weird. But I'm not pushing them to do stuff they don't want to do or be people they don't want to be. I don't know their school timetable, I have no idea how their homework is going, I don't get involved. I usually don't even know till after the fact when they have a test.

What I do try to be is encouraging and enabling. If they come to me with a problem I try to fix it. They know I will do everything I can to do that, within the realms of, you know, practicality. If they want to do something (an extra music class or in DD2's case extra theatre things) then I usually say 'sure'. I tell them they are fab and they can do what they want, if they try hard enough, but the key thing is to be happy. It'll probably all go tits up, mind you.

I think though there is a danger that some people aren't recognising - some people are naturally competitive. It's the way they are. This isn't necessarily a Bad Thing. And those people shouldn't be made to feel bad by lazier people who want to demonise those who aren't like them. The problem is competitiveness by proxy - that is vile. But if a kid cares about that for themselves, then that's their right.

I used to push my DD when she was younger she ended up in the year above, totally miserable socially. Academically she was still not challenged because she learns so fast. The best thing I ever did was to let her find her own way, stop tutoring and let her devote the time to hobbies. She is 15 and has two businesses, both bring in more than enough to afford her a very nice life. If I had continued on the path we were on she would not have had time to devote to her chosen hobbies.
There is so much more to education than heads in books.

The problem is competitiveness by proxy - that is vile. But if a kid cares about that for themselves, then that's their right.

That's a good point, Russian. Though i disagree with your wording of non-competitive people as lazy - I don't think it's a simple opposition between 'competitive' or 'lazy'. But I do agree that you should support your particular child's particular abilities and personality, even if (especially if) they are quite different from your own.

Taking GCSEs "on time" doesn't have to mean not taking DC way beyond the syllabus in years 10 and 11. The same is true of any scheduled public examination.

Yes, good point Bonsoir. We've just had our 'parents evening' with information for parents of children going into the next year. One parent got very upset because she looked at the list of 'things your child should/will be able to do by the end of the year' and her DD could already do most of them. I think she imagined the child would be sitting doing nothing all year, waiting for the rest to catch up. My DC can also do all those things, but I know the school will be widening and deepening his knowledge, not just ticking off the targets.

Unis prefer children not to have taken GCSEs early.

Tangled - I don't think non competitive people are lazy. I think some of the people who are very invested in attacking others for 'being too competitive' may be a bit lazy. And know it. Thus feel bad, thus attack others. My DD1 is the least competitive person in the world. She is also the least likely to be ever described by anyone as lazy.

bonsoir I think that can happen, but first it requires a critical mass of students at the same level and second it requires a hell of a lot of resources and will on the part of the school.

In most schools, both are lacking, so students proceed through the GCSE syllabus in years 10 and 11 at the prescribed pace. Even in the top sets, it's very hard to have meaningful differentiation if the ability levels are mixed.

poppy - not true at all.

That's one of the myths people put about. But it isn't true. There might be the odd admissions person or HOD in specific subjects who doesn't like it for reasons of their own, but universities as a whole? Completely utterly neutral.

poppy universities, especially the most selective universities, take applicatnts who have sat their GCSEs early as standard.

The schools in question send almost all their students to university, and selective ones at that!

i think though that unis do prefer that you sit the whole lot in one single year though , apart from subjects like maths, where you can do IGSCE maths a year early and then progress to further maths

Russians I agree with you about assumptions by non-competitive people about their opposite numbers.

I think part of the problem is that competitive/ambitious/driven folks are in the minority, so we stand out. Outliers, us lot.

And whilst I'm happy for the majority to roll their eyes at usin disbelief, I do think it often tips into neagtive assumptions. Even the words competitive and ambitious and driven are perjorative.

Some schools are now entering pupils early for GCSE, AS-level and
A-level. You should be aware that some universities or their individual
subject departments may want to see that you have taken a number of
advanced level qualifications all at the same time; for example, they may
want to see three A-levels taken in Year 13. This can be because they
want to know that you can comfortably manage a workload of this size
in your advanced level studies. Admissions policies may therefore differ
in relation to A-levels taken early, and whether these are included in
offers made or not.
For example, some courses that typically make a conditional offer of AAB
may take account of an A-level A grade achieved at the end of Year 12
and, as a result, make a conditional offer of AB for A-levels taken in year
13. Other courses may still make a conditional offer of AAB on subjects
taken at the end of Year 13 and will not include the A-level already taken
in their conditional offer. If you think that this may affect you, it is important
to check the admissions policy for the courses and universities that you
are interested in applying to.

Taken from RG website

Anna providing the universities know that they were sat to avoid boredom, and not to facilitate resits or ludicrous numbers of GCSEs, they really really don't care!

poppy that is directed at those schools that are trying to play the system.

It's not directed at the highly selective schools who send their students by the armfuls...