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16. Why Pressure Our Children? 10.15.19

It was a rough one tonight. Leah broke down before bed and started to cry telling me “Mom, I used to love school and be exited and I used to do really good, but now I just hate it and I’m not good at it anymore. I don’t even feel like I like school anymore.”
It really upset me and broke my heart for her. I told her that as long as she is doing her best and that she can be proud of the work she did and the effort she put in, that I’d be proud of her no matter what her grades looked like. To be honest I really don’t care what her third grade report card looks like at all. In the greater scheme of things I hope that she is the kindhearted one, the one that helps others, the one that never lets another kid sit by themselves. I care more about her heart and her intentions and her character than I ever will about her grades.
It upset me that kids today have so much more on their plates than we did growing up. I remember having book fair and one yearly wrapping paper and candy sale in school. We wore sweatpants and cartoon t shirts. I got one good pair of shoes and a new outfit for Kennywood every year. We’d do lay away for school clothes at Hills. My elementary year book pictures are comical to see what I wanted to do from one year to the next. I hardly ever had homework because the teacher always gave you 10 mins before the walkers and busses were called to do it there. I’d walk home from school, eat dinner and relax, riding bikes or playing with the neighborhood kids.
It feels like as a parent every time I open her folder they need money for this or money for that. They keep everyone so busy all the time. I can’t keep it straight. The clothes kids wear today have them looking like little adults going to their first day of work. Every school picture is treated like a senior portrait. We slam them all day with academics and forced socialization and then they come home to an hour of homework that they’re trying to struggle through on top of that. Parents are getting home from stressful days at work and are now struggling to get homework done and dinner made while kids are frustrated and upset. The whole atmosphere surrounding after school dinner has changed drastically in the last decade. And we wonder why kids are so anxious all the time?
For what? Why are we putting so much pressure on elementary aged children? Yes, listening and getting good grades should be important, but shouldn’t it be more important to instill this excitement in them about learning new things? Encouraging creativity and curiosity instead of conformity and test taking? Shouldn’t kids be encouraged to do their best regardless of what grade that looks like on a test? Shouldn’t every child come home knowing that if they did the very best they could that it should be enough?
I remember chasing the A’s. I remember gifted education classes and quiz bowl and all the extra work thinking that this would get me somewhere. I remember how that pressure to be perfect to get praise ruined learning for me too.
I don’t have an answer to how we can help kids love to learn again. I don’t have suggestions on how to run the school. I don’t know nearly enough about what goes into all of that to say I would do things differently or one way over the other. But what I can say, is that I wish we could slow down and let them be kids. I can say that my child will never have to come home crying and feeling like she is less than good enough because she got a bad grade or is struggling to understand a few things in school. I’m not going to be the mom who will yell at her and tell her to study more or reprimand her saying it’s her fault for not listening to her teachers. (Unless thats the real reason for the bad grades) What I will do is encourage her to love learning again and help her find new ways that she and I can make learning more fun. I’ll take her to get ice cream and cry when she needs to and I’ll stand up and cheer with excitement the day she walks to get her diploma. Even if her report card had a D on it one year in elementary school.
No matter what happens in school, what impacts children the most is what happens when they get home. I hope Leah knows how proud of her I really am. ❤️

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