By Hannah (Age 12, Canadian International School)
Hi, I'm Rebecca Johnson, Becky for short. I am a 13-year old girl and still have mean, cruel, evil, bad, annoying - and don't forget old - parents. Anyway, I slipped and fell down some stairs, and I must have gone through some kind of magic portal. After I got out of it I woke up in my parents' room and I was an adult. When I went to look around the house I saw my parents in child-form and they were on the computer, playing. My dad said to me, "Hi mom, where is BREAKFAST?!"
"Yeah, give me the breakfast!" repeated mom. I was shocked, confused, and scared. Then I had an evil thought in my head... "Hey mom, cook me some breakfast!" demanded mom. Now it was time to give them a piece of my mind!
"Do it yourself, you little lazy butt!" I replied and they went off and listened. If I was in their shoes I would have shouted, but I didn't have to. Ha ha ha! I treated them like my parents treated me!
"You get me a snack and you be my footrest!" I commanded. My parents quickly followed my orders and got to work with no comment. Awesome! I drove them crazy. I made them to work, I made them clean up, and I didn't let them eat or sleep.
"Hey mom, don't you have to go to work?" asked little mom.
"Oh right! Bye! Oh and when I come back I want you to have done your work and gone to asleep!"
At work the boss made me do a whole bunch of things I didn't want to do. He made me work to the bone! I thought I was about to explode and I hated him.
When I got home from work, the whole house was spotless and my parents were asleep in bed. I felt sorry for them because now I knew why they were mean to me. Their work was really stressful!
The next day my parents woke up and they were adults and I ran up to them and hugged them tightly. Then they said they had a weird dream and they explained the whole of yesterday to me. I told them to work for someone else and they did. Now, when they come home, they have a smile on their face and a skip in their step. I was also treated differently and I liked it. Now they don't punish me anymore when I do something bad!
Showing posts with label Amy Chua. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Amy Chua. Show all posts
Friday, February 18, 2011
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Tiger Moms
By Vanessa (Age 13.5, St. Paul's Convent)
Recently, Amy Chua, Yale professor and author of the book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, published an essay on the Wall Street Journal. It caused such an uproar that everyone around the globe is talking about it.
In her essay, she talked about the 'teaching' methods she used on her two daughters, Louisa and Sophia. She expected perfect grades from them, and never allowed them to go to sleepovers, watch TV, or have boyfriends. They were made to practice violin or the piano for excessive hours too.
To tell you the truth, I don't agree with Amy Chua. How can a kid survive without her social life, Internet, or fun? It's just crazy. The methods she used were extreme and way over the line, and in short, inhumane. I can't picture how it would feel to be forced to do whatever my mother says especially when my social life is at stake.
On the other hand, I do have to give her credit. She was able to train her two daughters to ace practically every test or exam they have. They are also not hooked on drugs, computer games, or other entertainment that may take up most or a lot of their time. This is not what every child can achieve as there are many temptations around us these days, may it be computer games, TV, money, etc. What Amy did well was that she was able to prevent her daughters from being affected by temptations. She has made them strong and independent through her harsh training. However, I don't think that this should cost a happy childhood. Furthermore, it seems to me that she made it their life goal to get straight-A's in everything and just neglect everything else. Though she may have given them extremely good training on the piano and violin, I have a feeling that her daughters don't even know how to do the dishes.
Furthermore, I don't agree that Amy should just force her daughters to do whatever she wants them to do. Forcefully making someone do something is not the best way to get good results. Instead, she can settle for methods that are not so aggressive. She can sit down and discuss with them and try to work out a timetable or plan that the three of them are satisfied with. Amy should also remember that nobody is perfect, least of all her daughters. Although setting up a high standards will help her daughter academically, she should never forget that Louisa and Sophia are just young girls at heart. It is very natural for them to want to socialize and just have fun.
In a nutshell, I really think that Amy should just let her daughters make their decisions for themselves. Let them fail, and encourage them to try again. Keeping them in an ivory cage is not going to help them become strong. Only if they truly experience it for themselves can they understand and learn from it, and that is definitely not something straight-A's on every report card can do.
Recently, Amy Chua, Yale professor and author of the book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, published an essay on the Wall Street Journal. It caused such an uproar that everyone around the globe is talking about it.
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| Photo via Wikimedia Commons |
To tell you the truth, I don't agree with Amy Chua. How can a kid survive without her social life, Internet, or fun? It's just crazy. The methods she used were extreme and way over the line, and in short, inhumane. I can't picture how it would feel to be forced to do whatever my mother says especially when my social life is at stake.
On the other hand, I do have to give her credit. She was able to train her two daughters to ace practically every test or exam they have. They are also not hooked on drugs, computer games, or other entertainment that may take up most or a lot of their time. This is not what every child can achieve as there are many temptations around us these days, may it be computer games, TV, money, etc. What Amy did well was that she was able to prevent her daughters from being affected by temptations. She has made them strong and independent through her harsh training. However, I don't think that this should cost a happy childhood. Furthermore, it seems to me that she made it their life goal to get straight-A's in everything and just neglect everything else. Though she may have given them extremely good training on the piano and violin, I have a feeling that her daughters don't even know how to do the dishes.
Furthermore, I don't agree that Amy should just force her daughters to do whatever she wants them to do. Forcefully making someone do something is not the best way to get good results. Instead, she can settle for methods that are not so aggressive. She can sit down and discuss with them and try to work out a timetable or plan that the three of them are satisfied with. Amy should also remember that nobody is perfect, least of all her daughters. Although setting up a high standards will help her daughter academically, she should never forget that Louisa and Sophia are just young girls at heart. It is very natural for them to want to socialize and just have fun.
In a nutshell, I really think that Amy should just let her daughters make their decisions for themselves. Let them fail, and encourage them to try again. Keeping them in an ivory cage is not going to help them become strong. Only if they truly experience it for themselves can they understand and learn from it, and that is definitely not something straight-A's on every report card can do.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Teacher vs. Student
By Cheung (Age 15, Chinese International School)
Teacher Frustration Guidelines:
Are you a teacher? Have you ever felt extremely frustrated and annoyed? All because of a student that misbehaved and started disrupting the class, have you wanted to shout all the profanities in the world at him, but didn't want to get in trouble? Well fear no more. With these guidelines you can vent out your frustration.
The first thing you should do is to count to five and give students time to be quiet. For each second, over the five seconds you count, you should add one minute to the end of class. This would make the kids more disciplined and would become quiet quickly, because kids do not enjoy detention. If this doesn't work, then you can send an email to their parents every time they misbehave. If the parents don't care, which is not usually the case, you may report to the principal, and he will give the student a warning. If the student misbehaves two more times, the principal would publicly announce the misdeeds of this student and suspend him for three days. If further behavior continues, you can expel the student. This frustration guideline may not completely vent out your frustration, but it will make it so you don't have to deal with the student or students anymore.
The teacher, having said "go shoot yourself" to a 6th grader in this case, should get suspended for around three days. There isn't anything more the teacher should be punished for. The teacher may have been a bit harsh by verbally abusing the student, but this is all normal. This is because being a teacher is extremely frustrating. It is extremely frustrating to the point that even some teachers at my school need to be taken to the hospital because of stress. Since in this case it is a public school, it is already unfair for the teacher. It would make things even more unfair for the teacher if the school punishes them too harshly.
There are two scenarios for the dangers of letting this situation go. As the teacher is in America where it is perfectly normal to carry a gun, then it is quite easy for the child to shoot himself. Though I would like to stress that the child would only do that if he were an idiot, it is still dangerous. Letting this go may also result in other teachers doing the same because they think it is appropriate. The moment the teacher says it to a particularly sensitive child, then the child might take the teacher's word seriously. This is highly unlikely, though.
The other scenario is if the teacher were in Asia where it is perfectly normal to throw a few insults at an extremely misbehaving student. For example, like most of the people in our critical reasoning class, we have all gone through some sort of Amy Chua-styled training. We are either used to this kind of verbal insult, or would be able to tolerate it with no problem at all. In some cases, Asian students would brush verbal attacks off as an everyday routine, and even laugh at it. More importantly, it is illegal for civilians to carry guns or any kind of artillery, therefore the possibility of danger is close to nothing.
Teacher Frustration Guidelines:
Are you a teacher? Have you ever felt extremely frustrated and annoyed? All because of a student that misbehaved and started disrupting the class, have you wanted to shout all the profanities in the world at him, but didn't want to get in trouble? Well fear no more. With these guidelines you can vent out your frustration.
 |
| Photo via Wikimedia Commons |
The teacher, having said "go shoot yourself" to a 6th grader in this case, should get suspended for around three days. There isn't anything more the teacher should be punished for. The teacher may have been a bit harsh by verbally abusing the student, but this is all normal. This is because being a teacher is extremely frustrating. It is extremely frustrating to the point that even some teachers at my school need to be taken to the hospital because of stress. Since in this case it is a public school, it is already unfair for the teacher. It would make things even more unfair for the teacher if the school punishes them too harshly.
There are two scenarios for the dangers of letting this situation go. As the teacher is in America where it is perfectly normal to carry a gun, then it is quite easy for the child to shoot himself. Though I would like to stress that the child would only do that if he were an idiot, it is still dangerous. Letting this go may also result in other teachers doing the same because they think it is appropriate. The moment the teacher says it to a particularly sensitive child, then the child might take the teacher's word seriously. This is highly unlikely, though.
The other scenario is if the teacher were in Asia where it is perfectly normal to throw a few insults at an extremely misbehaving student. For example, like most of the people in our critical reasoning class, we have all gone through some sort of Amy Chua-styled training. We are either used to this kind of verbal insult, or would be able to tolerate it with no problem at all. In some cases, Asian students would brush verbal attacks off as an everyday routine, and even laugh at it. More importantly, it is illegal for civilians to carry guns or any kind of artillery, therefore the possibility of danger is close to nothing.
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