Nearly all of the parents that I deal with as a high school
teacher are great to work with. They are highly supportive of teachers and
education in general. Every once-in-a-while
though, I come across a real piece of work. In this case, the “work” in
question came to advocate for her son.
On the spectrum of kids I have taught, I would put this kid squarely in the
“good” category. Also like most fourteen-year-olds I have taught, given the
chance, he will sell future success in exchange for short term gratification
faster than a doughnut disappears at a weightwatchers meeting. When given the
prospect of working on an assignment and chatting it up with some pretty young
thing, he is going to choose the PYT every time. Actually, that would be his
ideal distraction but he will actually take just about any distraction that
will keep him from bearing down and working something challenging.
In my class, assignments involve making observations about
maps, charts or graphs. I ask students to turn their observation into a
question that begins with “why,” venture an answer and then try to find
evidence to support or disprove their tentative conclusion. Whatever they don’t
complete in class, has to be done at home. Given the number of missing
assignments this kid had, he is not getting much done in class. With thirty to
thirty-five students in the room working on such a task, you can imagine that I
can’t monitor this poster child for Ritalin every second. But that is exactly
what this mother wanted. She apparently thought I would be a willing enlistee
in her corps of hovering helicopter pilots.
I explained that there are things that I can and will do but
“sit down with him” and “make sure he does the work” was not one of them. I also declined when she offered to come to
class and “sit with him.” Now comes the delicate balancing act of giving
parenting advice without passing judgement, though I have to admit that
judgement had been passed and a verdict rendered. I just don’t want her to know
that.
I am interested in learning about the conditions behind
optimal human performance so I have done a lot of reading on motivation and
behavior modification. I draw on the work of Jessika LaHey (the author of the
book that I stole the title of this article from) Carol Dweck, Angela
Duckworth, Mihayli Chicsentmihayli, Stephen Covey, Daniel Pink, Daniel
Kahneman, Paul Tough, Liz Wizeman and Tony Wagner, to name a few. Some of these
are scholars and researchers while others have reported on the work of scholars
and researchers. So, there is my bibliography, I hope you weren’t expecting
parenthetical references. These are all compelling authors of compelling books.
If you haven’t read them, you should. They will help you with all of your
endeavors where humans are involved.
Over the years, I have distilled the words of these writers
and researchers into a kind of formula for motivation and eventual achievement.
Here it is:
1.
Set high standards- The standard must stretch
the individual beyond their current abilities but is within the “zone of
proximal development.” In other words, meet them where they’re at (where else
would we meet them?) and set a standard just beyond what they can currently do.
2.
Allow the student, child, worker or whoever to
figure out how they want to reach the standard. It is tempting to want to step
in and offer help and advice when you see the inevitable flaws in the plan but
it is important that you don’t. If you do, they won’t own it and they must own
it.
3.
Provide reasonable support to help accomplish
the plan. You can play a role but the principal architect of the plan has to be
the principal player.
4.
Hold them accountable for the results. This
usually means they will get something they want for meeting the standard or
have something withheld if they don’t. This is where the process usually breaks
down. Think about how often you are truly held accountable for your performance
and how much more freakin awesome you would be if you had to account for your
performance in the areas that matter most.
5.
Regroup and retry- Old dogs can learn new tricks
but change is hard and we feel compelled to gravitate back to what we are
comfortable and familiar with. That is when the accountability and support are
the double-edged sword of justice and mercy. This is where you and your protégé
look at what worked and what didn’t. This is where the steward accounts for the
learning, growth, pain and struggles. This is where plan B is created and the
process starts over until the standard is reached.
As I explained this to the snowplow parent, I could see that
I was beginning to lose her at two, her eyes begin to gloss over at number
three and she interrupted at four. She said, “I think what he needs is to just
have someone sit down with him and make sure he is getting these things done.”
I got the feeling that this mysterious “someone” she was talking about was me! So,
in the spirit of misdirection and the aforementioned metaphor, I plowed on to
number 4. “What does he love?” I asked? Her immediate and unequivocal response
was “soccer.” I actually knew that. The various professional and club soccer
jerseys he sports was the evidence I was going on. “So what if his
participation in soccer was contingent on his performance in school?” I asked.
She looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language. Then she said, “Oh, I
couldn’t take that away from him. I don’t want to set him up for failure. I am
looking for a win-win.” Now how do you
like that?! Not only was she using Stephen R. Covey’s words against me (albeit,
incorrectly-poor Stephen R. is probably rolling over in his grave), she had the
audacity to refute my wisdom. That
usually doesn’t happen until after the parent leaves my classroom.
I tried to press my point by saying that the reason she
feels like parenting is a game of Whac-A-Mole, is that her son is not being
held accountable for his work. I asked her if there were any consequence for
his poor academic performance. Her consequence was taking away his devices
temporarily but she said she gave them back after a short time. Probably after
he made some measly effort and conned her into believing he had actually done
something. I suggested that he wouldn’t comply until he had the desire and that
wouldn’t come until he had something to work for. He shouldn’t get what he
wants until he has met the standard. I bet she has no qualms making her husband
do her bidding before he gets what he wants. It’s the same idea minus the
Oedipus Complex.
Instead she is making her son into a pansy. Have you ever
wondered why pansies, the toughest of flowers, are given as an emasculating
label for men? I digress. From where I stand, this woman’s problem is that she
doesn’t trust her son. She is afraid that if he fails, irreparable damage will
be done to his precious psyche and quickly emerging ego. The seeming paradox of
wanting him supervised yet not wanting to hold him accountable are two sides of
the same coin. She doesn’t think he can handle failure. She, therefore, feels
like she has to control all of the circumstances in his life and fight his
battles for him. This is the definition of the helicopter parent or the
snowplow parent who goes ahead of the child, clearing the path so they don’t
have to encounter any hardship or difficulty.
It is natural for a parent to want to protect a child. But
is my attempt to protect my child actually making him weak? In the book “David
and Goliath” Malcolm Gladwell addresses this paradox. He cites one study of 699
“great” people. Over one third of them had lost a parent before the age of ten.
Nearly half had lost a parent before the age of twenty. I am not advocating the
we knock off a parent to facilitate the growth of our children. I think that
applying the principles above will foster the grit we are looking for and no
one has to die in the process. So, good luck with this parents everywhere. I am
counting on you so that I don’t have to have many more conversations like the
one described above.
