How to respond to "hothousing" comments?

[ItsHarryTheDirtyDog]

Other than smile and ignore, of course...

I am involved in setting up a fairly niche extracurricular activity - a primary-level Classics club - in a small town where education isn't particularly valued by quite a lot of the population. Coming from a background that would see this as being an obviously good thing, I have been perplexed by repeatedly being told that the club is a stupid idea and can only possibly be for parents who want to "hothouse" their poor children.

I've said in response that actually it's a lot easier for children to learn both English and foreign languages if they have a reasonable grasp of grammar and vocab roots, and that Latin is a great way to learn it, as well as being interesting in its own right. That it's far easier to learn a foreign language before age 10 than after. And that teaching kids basic skills in something that adults do isn't hothousing, it's teaching them basic skills in something that they're interested in.

None of this seems to get through, though.

I am going to be interviewed by the local paper, which is a bit of a redneck rag, and I bet this will come up.

Anyone got any suggestions as to what to say to people who seem to disapprove of extracurricular activities that actually involve any form of brain activity?

My best friend was hothoused so i shall say this; whilst I appreciate that teaching children foreign language skills early on is beneficial, it should be done in an agreed collective environment where everyone is on board. If you want to teach your child another language early on then so be it, but like it or not, if you form a club where children are pushed into learning something before their designated time, I'm afraid it's hothousing, and it's deeply unpleasant if a child cannot perform.

I like the fact that in Europe, children are taught several different languages from the moment they walk into school, but that a properly organised educational environment. I believe we should be teaching kids languages earlier than we are, but it seems like tour approach might have gotten stuck in your town's craw a bit. Latin is extremely complicated and frankly, not really something a small child is going to need.

I'm interested, do you have a client base already?
Reading your post it seems like you are looking down on a lot of the people in the area, people are naturally going to feel defensive if you are treating them poorly and behaving as if you're better than them. Maybe a way to tackle the criticisms is by getting to know people and building proper relationships because then they get to see where you are coming from.

Examples:

• in a small town where education isn't particularly valued by quite a lot of the population

I am going to be interviewed by the local paper, which is a bit of a redneck rag, and I bet this will come up.

Anyone got any suggestions as to what to say to people who seem to disapprove of extracurricular activities that actually involve any form of brain activity?

Don't see this as your chance to convert, but your chance to 'advertise'. So your local area does not value Latin or 'hothousing'. What do they value in terms of children's activities? Play up to these when you're talking about your group. Use this as the slant to explain what you're doing.

Sorry - I really have come across as a bit of a snob, haven't I.

Those who have seen typical primary Latin materials (Minimus books) will know this is fun, not forcing kids to remember every detail of grammar.

Locally there are people who value this kind of thing (French, robotics, chess, music/orchestra, ballet classes etc) and they are probably the client base for this club. They are a minority though. Most people here think it's great if your boy goes to rugby aged 5, or girl does dance, and think kids should do team sports, but are actively against kids having hobbies that are "difficult" because that apparently equates to a hothoused kid with no social skills, no friends, no initiative, and diabetes from sitting on their backside all day.

I don't really understand why a kid who does 1h robotics, 1h latin, 1h French per week (all at school as clubs) can't also play with friends outdoors, do team sports, etc?

Having apologized for coming across as a snob, I would say that I don't think I should have to apologize for valuing academic education. I don't think academic stuff is the only thing in life that is important, but I don't think that arguments against academic pursuits are both valid and made in good faith, most of the time.

Also - most people have experienced the local paper that is 50% advertising and 50% schlock manufactured outrage about stuff. I don't think it is "thinking I am better" to say it is poor quality journalism or that the reporter will likely try to find a controversial angle about something he is likely to judge to be "hothousing" (based on what he writes every week).

Anyway I guess I have demonstrated myself here to be not the best interviewee when advertising something potentially unpopular.

I guess I will have a few short answers prepared about the value of earlyish language teaching for brain development, the place of Latin as an adjunct to MFL and English, uses of Latin in modern contexts, and where it comes up in kids' literature. And just repeat the evidence on language teaching if told that 9 year olds cannot possibly be interested in something like this. It's like robotics - how could a child possibly be interested in programming a computer? Well, why shouldn't they be?

Lots of children would be interested in robotics in the area I live in but usually thise classes are high cost. Or school wouldnt run robotics or latin or French.

It just shows the huge disparity in education though. Id love to have a higher income and be able to access that kind of thing. Well the robotics. Not sure my 9 year old would choose latin!

We run all these for free where we live...

Wow lucky kids! Our school is in a low income area and there's some sport and music at junior level and thats it.

are actively against kids having hobbies that are difficult

My dd would love this because she just loves learning. However she also dances, which is equally as ‘difficult’ as Latin...your attitude is terrible, which is probably what you’re picking up, nothing specifically against the Latin.

I let my children choose their extracurricular stuff (within reason) as it's their hobby so they probably wouldn't choose this one, but I know parents who'd love it.

If you want to offer classes in this particular area you need to stop judging the local community. Even after apologising for being a snob you're judging them for wanting to do rugby or dance.

I don't really understand why a kid who does 1h robotics, 1h latin, 1h French per week (all at school as clubs) can't also play with friends outdoors, do team sports, etc?

Not everyone wants to do 3 hours of this stuff a week. I wouldn't have done as a child, I wanted to be doing sports- especially after school.

It's the same as all extracurricular stuff some people will want to do it, some won't but please don't think you're club is somehow more worthy than rugby. It's just different with different benefits.

I do think lots of parents (myself included) believe that kids are now tested (SATs etc) and pushed (the levels seem to move up every year) and have (averagely) somewhere between 2 and 4 pieces of homework a week that I do consider outside activities should be about ‘fun’ or sport based. I’d much more likely sign one of mine up to yoga than Latin to try and unwind or relax from all the work they do at school.
Our school offers a multitude of extra curriculum clubs from fencing to yoga to art club to karate to chess, I’m just not sure there’d be much call for Latin, I’m sorry, I understand it’s your passion.

For a newspaper like that, maybe you should come up with a couple of simple jokey reasons that Latin is fun for kids, like being able to invent new Harry Potter curses, or understand Percy Jackson references, or say a huge amount in one word (give an amusing example).

Maybe if anyone mentions hothousing, just talk about why your club is fun (are you going to learn about ancient blood sports or visit a Roman ruin or serve cookies?),. Mention how you can do football and also Latin, etc. Perhaps make a dumb joke about how you had trouble pronouncing French, Spanish or German, and Latin was easy to pronounce or something like that.

You can obviously say a bit about why Latin is important, brain development, and foreign language acquisition, but I would keep it short and not use phrases like "adjunct to MFL". You can dumb this part down to: "Did you know that a little bit of Latin will help your kid pass a Spanish GCSE?".

I agree with a PP this is a chance to advertise not convert. No offence but you need to completely change your tone if you're doing this to help the club be successful- and if you can't, is there someone else more suited to the press work? Whoever talks to the press should be some one who will enjoy it/do a good job, irrespective of their role.

Promote the fun stuff, why would kids want to go - whether they also do sports/dance/other languages/whatever. What makes the hour with you better or more fun than an hour spent elsewhere?

If you're scared they'll look for a hot house angle for the headline give them an alternative - or if the interviewer goes down that route have some fun answers. It's a local reporter not Paxman - they need to fill column inches.

I'd go along the lines of everyone has different strengths and interests, and by offering this fun and engaging look at Latin, and how people lived 2000 years ago I'm hoping to add an after School activity to the area to complement those already generously hosted by other community members.
But I don't know how well that would go down.

OP I see exactly where you’re coming from and don’t see the snobbery that others do in this thread. A bit of reverse snobbery, perhaps.

On the issue, identify what people locally want from an after school activity eg fun, exercise, nothing too much like school. Then play up those aspects.

Perhaps you could have a Roman feast day (dress up in a toga and eat some Roman style food) or something else that would fit with your syllabus each term? You want kids to see it looking fun - our local church does this through craft activities and sweets in the group it runs in school, and is very effective - kids pester to be allowed to join that club.

Out of interest, why are you having them interview you if you think they're a redneck rag whose poor quality journalist is likely to be hostile?

It's the only local newspaper for a few hundred km radius... so it's the main way to get info out.

I'll prepare answers and run them by other people first. I'd far rather they interviewed someone else as I know I will come across as a git, but I am the main instigator/ organizer so have to roll with it.

I'm not looking down on people who want their kids to do rugby or whatever - I'm railing against the feeling that it's OK for them to tell me what we're doing is stupid, but if I ever pushed back and said "why don't you respect what others might want to do, not everyone has to want their son to play rugby" then I'd be the one in the wrong.

Those saying make it fun - yes of course! Roman feasts! Percy Jackson! etc

Latin has been a major part of my professional life- and I'd have to say my identity- for the past 30 years, but I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here, OP. You want to start a certain activity (=sell a certain product), the potential target market don't seem interested- what do you want us to do about it? Tell us that they're wrong? But they're not, any more than you are wrong for not spending your life skateboarding or playing football or teaching your dc DIY or whatever. They just have different tastes. And if they tell you your tastes are stupid, it may just be because they sense that in your opinion your tastes are superior. Don't let that show: nobody is going to want to come to a club where somebody is planning to show them a superior way of life.

This attitude needs to go:
actively against kids having hobbies that are difficult
There is nothing intrinsically lazier or less difficult about learning to play football or skateboard to a high standard than learning a few subjunctives. Respect your target audience is the first rule of good pedagogy.

If I were to give this interview to the newspaper, I would totally ditch the idea of talking about further educational benefits, making it easier to learn other languages etc etc. I'd pitch it to the potential archaeologists-at-heart and make it about connecting with people of long ago. I'd reference something that has recently been on the telly. Make it about Classic Civ and slip Latin in as an afterthought.

Or, another possibility- you could pitch it to the local historians (child or adult) and do things like local tombstones.

Have one really good story about what learning Latin (to the kind of basic level you're looking at here) would enable them to do, not 5 years from now, but now.

My ds would love this - he decided to learn latin inspired by Rick Riordans books and the mythology in there and loved Minimus. From that, he wanted to learn more about the family in Minimus so went to Vindolanda and York and then read more about roman history and has gone on from there.

I'd emphasise the aspects of learning about roman britain, history, and making it easier to learn other languages than being 'classics' which does sound elitist

Teaching children Latin is a really bad way to teach them about English grammar, or the grammar of MFLs. I say this as a linguist, who has learned 5 languages plus Latin, and who has bilingual DC who are also learning several languages.

NB I said "difficult" not difficult.

I agree that people should be able to do what hobbies they want. Playing a sport or dancing is of course just as difficult as learning Latin or computer programming.

Where I live, however, the gross-motor hobbies are esteemed far above anything else, and the reasoning usually given is that "intellectual" hobbies are hothousing, which by definition implies that they are too difficult for the children doing them.

I've taken the above on board.

I personally found Latin extremely useful in learning Romance MFLs, but I think I wasn't really formally taught much grammar. So I also need to unpick that statement to being: learning Latin grammar helps people understand that (almost) all languages have structured grammar. Familiarity with this point means it's then easier to pick up how other languages work.

You are far more qualified than I am user, but, for what it's worth, I still disagree with your point.

Of course you don't directly learn about English grammar by learning Latin, but I learned about the whole idea of grammar and syntax from learning Latin, and it was fun and interesting to apply these ideas to a different language (English). When I was a child, it seemed dry and pointless to learn about how English was put together, but it was fascinating to try to understand the structure of Latin, and that shone a light on English-- how it was different and how it was the same.

OP, I completely get your point about people's attitudes to "hothousing". I really sympathise, and know how frustrating it would be to try and stand up for unpopular hobbies and attitudes. I am generally too cowardly and lazy to bother trying to win people over.

I think the challenge when starting a club like yours is to avoid fulfilling other people's narrow-minded prejudices, while also keeping a keen eye out for (and eradicating) narrow-minded prejudice of one's own.

Good luck with your club! I think it is great that you are doing it, and I hope you have a wonderful time.