Children's Advice to Parents

Indian parents are known to be amongst the most pushy, globally!! (checkout all the feats of Indian and NRI kids on Youtube published by their parents). Until the 80s and in the ration economy, Indian parents pushed children into doing well academically so that their kids got through into an engineering or medical college and they had some hopes of landing decent jobs or go away to America to get a decent future. In the 90s as education and the economy was liberalized, and the number of seats at professional colleges increased manifold and so did the number and range of jobs, it would have been expected that Indian parents would start to relax and let their children grow up without their pressure and just let them be!

However, expectations from children just dont seem to have changed. Infact it seems to be increasing, with parents showering all their time and money on the one or two kids that they now have, inturn demanding that their kids excel and be "first in class" in everything they do. This is expected of them in academics (getting into IIT, IIM or AIIMS) as well as extra-curricular activites such as debating or playing the piano. As Kapil Dev, famously said after India's early exit from the last cricket world-cup, when the press and the middle class was comparing the non-performance of the Indian team with the solid performances of other teams "We cant compare ourselves with Australia, South Africa, West Indies. There parents take their kids to play football, to do white-water rafting or to play cricket. In India parents take their kids for Tuitions"

Recently read a National Geographic article about China's Parents putting pressure on their kids - dont know which country's parents are worse! Several other stories in the Indian press on exam pressures, student suicides and the great Indian Debate on the right way to bring up kids and give them a Wholesome Education continue to appear, while we continue to bringup our kids with the same pressure that we endured in the 70s and 80s.
Advice on bringing up children from philosopher-poet Khalil Gibran (via Tarun Malviya) is perhaps the best advice that we can get as parents. Here's some advice from Children to Parents on how they should be brought up - (via Krishna Mokhasi whose work in Hubli has been described in - Small Town Ideas: Wholesome Education in Hubli in one of my earlier posts)

Children's Advice to Parents
Some of the best advice parents can get is from children themselves. A fourth grade teacher asked her pupils to pretend that they were Ann Landers giving advice to parents on how to raise children. Here are some of the precocious bits of wisdom that resulted:
"Dont always be giving orders. If you suggest something instead of giving a command, I'll do it faster."
"Dont keep changing your mind about what you want me to do. Make up your mind and stick to it".
"Keep your promises, both good and bad. If you promise a reward, make sure you give it to me. If you promise punishment, make sure I get that too"
"Dont compare me with anybody else, especially a brother or sister. If you make me out to be better or smarter, somebody gets hurt. If you make me out to be worse or dumber, than I get hurt"
"Let me do as much for myself as I can. Thats how I learn. If you do everything for me, I will never be able to do anything for myself"
"Dont scream at me. It makes me scream back, and I dont want to be a screamer"
"Dont tell lies in front of me and ask me to tell lies to help you out. It makes me think less of you and less of myself even if I am supposed to be doing a favour"
"When I do something wrong, dont try to get me to tell you why I did it. Something I dont know why"
"Dont pay too much attention to me when I say I have a stomach ache. Playing sick can be a good way to get outof things I dont want to do, or going places I dont want to go"
"When you are wrong about something, admit it. It wont hurt my opinion of you. It will make it easier for me to admit it when I am wrong"
"Treat me like you treat your friends. Then I will be your friend and you will be mine. Just because people are related doesn't mean they can't be polite to each other"