What's wrong with hothousing?

[justanotherdaduser]

That's it really. Hothousing is often mentioned here in a derogatory tone and I was wondering why people dislike it?

@ThunderDad I'm just genuinely interested why you would prioritise him learning the names of all those shapes over other things.
I just can't really see how that knowledge is useful to him at 2!

@ThunderDad
There are boys only school where I live ( Richmond/Kingston upon Thames): Tiffin Boys, Hampton Boys, Richard Challoner etx Maybe boys perform better in single sex school but they miss greatly on an important social lesson on how to interact with girls. I would not consider single sex school for my son. Definitely a mix.

The social aspect is the usual reasoning I hear as to why mixed schools are better. However I don't agree. My recollection of primary school is that there is really very little socialising going on between boys and girls. Boys play with other boys and girls play with other girls. Perhaps things have changed in the current year but it seemed to be such a fundamental phenomenon that I'd doubt it.

One thing I do remember throughout primary school is that the teacher's pet is always a girl and always will be a girl. This has a lot to do with the fact the girls understand how to please the teacher and be pet much sooner than boys do. Ultimately this undermines boys' confidence as they are being compared to girls who are at this age vastly more socially advanced than boys.

That all sounds rather anecdata to me. Not borne out by my children’s experiences really.

I'm enjoying the father of a single toddler teling us all about education. Please come back when they are older and tell us how it works out. Education is a marathon not a sprint and filling a toddler's head with facts without context is not educating them. To learn creativity they need to play board games and have time to do imaginative play. That helps them develop their abilities in abstract thought which is required for higher level learning. Different cultures value different things and you appear very critical of education in the UK. Whereas my experience is that the good state schools my DC have attended work hard to teach nuance and complexity and value independent thought. I value that more than them learning things by rote.

Also @ThunderDad , you've got it the wrong way round. Girls are the ones who do better in single sex schools, probably because they aren't exposed to the sexism of teenage boys andso are allowed to flourish. Boys, on the other hand, do better in mixed sex schools, probably because they are influenced by the more studious girls. However, girls and women still outperform boys and men until they have children.

@ThunderDad
I'm not exposed too widely to schools and class environments to say that the teacher's pet ought to be a girl.
But if that is a case , it may be that because girls are maturing faster up until around 14. Then boys catch up and excel.

My 10 years old boy loves to play with girls and boys. He has friends on both sides of the fence

Where are you getting your data from about boys doing better in co-ed schools? You're wrong. It's the other way round. The imbalance is particularly pronounced when it comes to learning English. Boys succeed very, very much better at English when educated in single-sex classes compared to in mixed classes. Go do your research before you write a load of misleading nonsense on here. You sound a bit woke so maybe your ideological prejudices are your source of data. Am I wrong?

As to why do boys do better at English (in particular) in boys-only classes? We don't know but many educators suspect it is to do with self-confidence and boy's perception of their own ability at the subject being negatively influenced by far more advanced girls of the same age.

Yes girls do mature much faster than boys. This is a very big problem in mixed schools as it damages the self-esteem of boys.

Hothousing = a parent's desperate strategy to feed their ego in exchange for their child's mental health.
If only really the super bright went to the "prestigious" schools, we wouldn't be hearing so much about mental health issues at those schools. Parents' vanity and egos are a huge part of the mental health issues we see today.

@ThunderDad
what is the reason behind all this?

what are you trying to prove?
And
On other pages on MN parents are moaning that kids are starting school too early/soon , so why are you needing your son to do all these things before the poor bugger is even three - bullshitting parenting

Kids probably are starting school too soon in my opinion. What do you mean by 'bullshitting parenting'? Are you criticizing my parenting or do you simply have a mouth that turns into a gaping potty every time you open it?

I think I probably am a lazy parent - it's all so knackering. But philosophically, too, I just think my job is to set my kids up to make choices and achieve balance. I'm also faintly unimpressed by high performing toddlers - perhaps because I started school way way ahead of the other kids (reading before 3) but it turned out that was my peak and I have been resolutely ordinary ever since.

On music, in my teens I was friendly with Hephzibah Menuhin, sister of Yehudi and a concert pianist in her own right. She used to have me round to stay and helped me with my piano practice, and sometimes I'd turn the pages for her when she made records at Abbey Road. Her parents had invested everything in getting their three kids to be musical. They started at 18 months old and by the age of 3 were having to practise 8 hours a day.

It clearly worked with Yehudi. But Hephzibah told me it had killed off all her joy in music. She hated playing the piano, just did it to earn money to fund her real enthusiasms (feminism and human rights). So what the hell was the point of that? Just to make her parents proud?

If you are hothousing you are making choices about your child's future interests and career, because there isn't time to do everything. So there is a high chance you will get those choices wrong. Far better, I think, to raise a well balanced child who can make their own choices. They won't be a child prodigy. But they may be a happier adult.

OK lazy is perhaps not always the case. Other reasons are:

1. No time available. Fair enough. But maybe try and make time even if it means being more poor / stressed.
2. Genuinely believe (and probably wrongly so) that hothousing will damage their kid. A lot of this believe is a cultural thing in my opinion.

2nd point. No knowledge of Ruth Lawrence but don't worry my wife isn't about to leave me. Mathematical geniuses are most often very strange people and I think it is probably not going to be meaningful to link their situation in life to their parenting. Most people who are profoundly talented at maths have quite a lot of social interaction issues. I've known one or two and read on the subject although I'm not familiar with RL.

I'd be disappointed naturally if he had little interest in music, although at this stage this seems unlikely. I wouldn't really want him to pursue a career in music as it is a very difficult career with very little money in it for the most part. I'd be happy for him to do a maths degree or something, then he can go on and do whatever he likes. So long as he does something productive with his life the details don't really concern me too much.

<misses point of thread> Why would you want to set out to teach perfect pitch? It's not always an advantage - sometimes quite the opposite <ask me how I know>

As far as hothousing (both musical and horticultural) goes, I recommend reading 'The Girl with the Green Ear' by the wonderful and underrated Margaret Mahy.

ThunderDad, I still think your posts are satire. Or, depressingly, this might just be a sign og the misogynistic times: 'Yes girls do mature much faster than boys. This is a very big problem in mixed schools as it damages the self-esteem of boys.' The way girls are is a problem in mixed environments because boys. <sigh>

*of the misogynistic times, obviously.

Depends on what you mean by hothousing really. My 2 did 11+ prep, an hour a night throughout year 5. 3 hours a day in the summer between year 5 & 6. Some people considered that to be cruel and/ or excessive we considered it a reasonable investment to ensure a good secondary education. They didn't love it but DS who is 19 tells me he is glad we made him do it. It also teaches them how to study.

If you are offended by the notion that there might be developmental differences between boys and girls then I can't help you. Some people see misogyny wherever it is convenient to see it. I'm not familiar with Margaret Mahy is but if she is a feminist writer I'll have to turn down your recommendation. My school forced me to read a Margaret Atwood novel once and am still recovering to this day.

She was a wonderful children’s writer. I hope you’re also going to encourage your son to read widely. Imagination and insight into the human condition are both great for growing children.

Of course! I'll check her out in that case. My wife covers the reading side of things and we are always on the lookout for new books for our son.

My recommendation is a short story, in a collection called 'The Downhill Crocodile Whizz', but it appears to have been published in a different collection too: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2526061.The_Girl_with_the_Green_Ear

@fklps
There no such thing as super bright wothout hard work. Super bright also have to read the book to get the knowledge out of it and do excercises to pass the maths tests.
Everything comes with determination and work. The memory is something you can excercise.

Please share link

@Ketzele Hard work in any subject and at any age quite often makes people to develop dislike to that subject. I have "museum-phobia" because I studied art hist for 5 years, and I know a lady who studied English literature and for years she was sick at the thought of reading a book.
But the thing is that life is not all about doing only pleasant things, it is also about determination. They say that the Milenials and generation Z are weak and drama queens. This is because their parents wanted for them low stress and " like-it" only environment. . Well, in life it have to be also a bit tough to build character

Please post back @ThunderDad when your child is 11.

I've always exposed my kids to a wide range of things and eventually let them choose what they liked and wanted to do. The problem with hothousing is that kids do whatever their parents make them and have no idea what they want or who they are.

A friend of mine who's 9 year old son is working on A level further maths claims she's never pushed and let him lead the way but made sure he had lots of play dates and meeting people to grow his social skills. I just find that incredible.

Inclined to agree.