according to the times today, this is the reasearch that show how a kid can achieve academically:
"1. The child has highly educated parents.
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The child?s parents have high socioeconomic status.
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The child?s mother was 30 or older at the time of her first child?s birth.
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The child had low birth weight.
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The child?s parents speak English in the home.
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The child is adopted.
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The child?s parents are involved in the PTA.
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The child has many books in his home.
And the eight factors that are not:
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The child?s family is intact.
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The child?s parents recently moved into a better neighbourhood.
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The child?s mother didn?t work between birth and kindergarten.
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The child attended Head Start. ( american literacy shceme for underpriveleged kids)
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The child?s parents regularly take him to museums.
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The child is regularly spanked. (??!!))
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The child frequently watches television.
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The child?s parents read to him nearly every day.
To over generalise a bit, the first list describes things that parents are; the second list describes things that parents do. Parents who are well-educated, successful, and healthy tend to have children who do well in school tests, but it doesn?t seem to much matter whether a child is taken to museums or frequently read to or plopped in front of the television. For parents who are obsessed with child-rearing technique this may be sobering news. The reality is that technique appears to be highly overrated.
But this is not to say that parents don?t matter.