Hothouse kids wiltStephen Lunn From: The Australian September 01, 2008 12:00AM
"HE was one of three kids, the middle one as I recall. He was 9, and as well as school, each week he was learning the piano, playing in cricket, football and basketball teams depending on the season, doing tennis lessons and attending cubs.
"When I asked why he did it all, he answered 'You'd better ask mum'."
Early childhood expert Kay Margetts from the University of Melbourne is recalling a recent session with a boy. It reinforces her concern that parents are too often putting their children so front and centre of their own lives that their youngsters' achievements become their only measure of success.
"It really was clear from the boy's words that his life was being imposed on him rather than him having any real choice," Margetts says.
"It's motivated by parents thinking a child engaging in lots of activity, and the parent being involved in taking them to and fro, is a sign of good parenting. That they're somehow providing their child with an advantage that will benefit them in later life."
There are parallel worries. First, that this overwhelmingly child-centred family life is leading to a lack of imagination and independence in children. How often do children wake up on the weekend and the first thing they say to their parents is "What are we going to do today?".
"Sometimes these children's lives become so crowded they end up with no time to just veg out, to fiddle with Lego or toys, to give their minds and bodies a rest, to do what they want to do, to not 'be on' or perform all the time," Margetts says.
"And where is that time to just sit and hang out with your kids rather than be doing things with them all the time?"
Second, while parents seem so keen for their children to participate in different activities they desperately fear seeing their child fail. And in trying to cushion them against life's losses and psychological bumps, the parents are serving merely to lower their children's resilience to failure and loss in laterlife.
A recent article in Britain's The Sunday Times cited the example of a production of Snow White at a primary school in Japan where there were 25 Snow Whites, no dwarfs and no wicked witch, as the parents were worried about the effect on their children of one child being picked out for the leading role. It's the same notion as a prize in every layer of pass the parcel at children's parties, rather than one prize in the middle.US academic Joseph Epstein has dubbed this relatively new and inordinately tight focus on the needs of children and their place at the centre of a family as a "kindergarchy".
"Children have gone from background to foreground in domestic life with more attention centred on them, their upbringing (and) their small accomplishments," the recently retired lecturer at Northwestern University wrote in the US magazine The Weekly Standard.
"Parents seem little more than indentured servants."
Melbourne-based author and barrister Hilary Bonney and husband Ray Gibson, also a barrister, have worked to shield their twin seven-year-old girls Hannah and Audrey from this activity obsession.
"I know of little children who do not have a night off, every night after school they are attending structured, expensive goal-based activities and classes," Bonney says. "I cannot take my own children around to play with them because they are always busy, sometimes with two classes on the one night.
"After living in Fiji for two years I really noticed this phenomenon when I returned to Melbourne. It is a product of an affluent society that parents feel the need to compete about how many special activities their children are doing. It doesn't mean your children are necessarily getting a better childhood because they are so busy. Children need time to go outside and play with a stick.
"There is simply too much emphasis on doing and not enough on children being. I had a no-activities policy until my girls were 7 1/2. I wanted them to get used to the first tiring year of school without adding further stress into the mix. In the last term they have just started playing basketball and that happens one night a week. That is enough forthem.
"I make sure we have space in our lives to hang around at home or to go to the park if the sun starts shining."
Don Edgar, an internationally known expert on family trends and co-author with his wife and fellow academic Patricia of an upcoming book The New Child: In Search of Smarter Grown Ups says if a child complains about being bored "they should be told to go outside and play or pull out a drawer and find old things to play with anew, or just to enjoy reading or thinking to themselves for achange".
"Kids today are not given enough contemplative, imaginative free time, partly because of the lack of open outdoor space, but also because parents think they have to manage their kids' time, terrified their little darlings might become bored," Edgar says.
Of course the experts don't discount entirely the value of organised sports and activities. It teaches children about how to work within a team, gives them an understanding of how to cope with winning and losing, and many enjoy the competitive element. As children get older they may be able to handle more activities, but finding the balance between organised recreation and pure play is where parents must really takestock.
Kent University sociologist Frank Furedi tells The Sunday Times that some parents are looking to make themselves feel better by encouraging children to undertake all sorts of activities and then praising them for even mediocre performances.
"It's a way of reassuring ourselves that our children are going to be insulated from pain and adversity," he says. "We tell children they are wonderful for tying their shoelaces or getting 50 per cent in an exam. But really it's our way of flattering ourselves that we're far more sensitive to children than people were in the past."
Edgar agrees, pointing to new US research by Stanford University academic Carol Dweck that shows parents can actually impede their child's progress by constantly telling them how wonderful they are.
"Dweck finds that kids who are always told how smart they are, who are praised for every little thing, fail to try. They don't put in the effort needed to learn new things because they think they should be able to do it automatically because they are 'smart'," Edgar says.
"Instead, she shows that kids praised for their actual effort are more likely to succeed than the 'smart' kid always being told how good they are."
He says schools should heed the danger, and that "individual mastery and effort should be the goals (of education), not just test results ... to satisfy some sort of school league table".
Kathy Walker, one of Australia's leading education consultants, doesn't accept Epstein's notion of a kindergarchy, but does believe we "are living in paradoxical times".
"On the one hand we're rushing and hurrying children far too much and expecting more than we should of them. On the other hand, many parents with the best of intention are becoming more and more afraid of being the parent and more wanting to be a peer or a friend," Walker says.
She says the school or kindergarten car park has a lot to answer for, with parents' competitiveness about their children's activities a real issue.
"There is a myth out there in parentland that the more your kids do, the better and more successful they will be as adults. In fact it may just be the opposite is the case, with kids doing too much and ending up not being able to play to their strengths," Walker says.
Edgar takes Epstein's kindergarchy on board, adding that it may extend well beyond early childhood. "Kids have been exploited as little consumers, they have power in the marketplace and parents have been duped into thinking that indulgence is the way togo."
He says parents shouldn't be completely blamed for this indulgence, because having kids older, and having fewer of them, makes it "natural to want the best for your preciousfew".
"And work demands mean spare time with the kids is hard to get, so there is a lot of compensation going on."
Walker, who is often asked by parents about how to build resilience in children, says a key piece of advice is not to hand out praise and affirmation for every little thing.
"We have to be careful about telling kids how fantastic they are for setting the table, and giving them gold stars for making their beds or bringing their dirty plate from the table to the kitchen sink. What we should be saying in those circumstances is simply thank you, because it's something they should be doing without false praise."
Walker agrees the no-losers scenario of the Snow White play is becoming more and more prevalent in modern society.
"For instance, I've seen parents having to negotiate with siblings to give them something special on their brother or sister's birthday so they don't feel left out. There are times when children have to learn how to deal with the fact they aren't the ones in the spotlight that day. It's part of growing up," she says.
Margetts agrees. "There is a concern that if we are always praising children and giving them what they want they aren't learning how to regulate their behaviour in the face of adversity, they aren't learning how to cope with disappointment, they aren't learning how to cope with conflict."
Parents have a difficult path to tread to build resilience in their children. As Edgar says, "they need to be authoritative, set limits and give firm guidelines if genuine self-development is to result".
"Mum and dad as servant is not the model today's kids need. They need emotional and moral guidance, a sense of respect for others, and room to become capable, responsible citizens in their own right."
Stephen Lunn is The Australian's social affairs writer
