11. A Parent’s Good Intentions
- Each generation faces its own challenges. No one gets it perfect and it’s ridiculous to expect that any one generation can.
Out of a desire to do the right thing, one generation might impose very strict rules, responsibilities and curfews on their children.
Feeling oppressed, distrusted or unloved, the next generation might place far fewer restrictions on the following generation.
That generation, suffering the results of being raised without responisibility and believing that the lack of rules and curfews implied less concern, interest or love, might tend to tighten the reins again on the next generation.
To Be a Child a Little Longer
Doing What I Was Told
I was told that I was smart, that I could understand anything. I was told that I could draw — and incredibly, I found that I could. (Some said it was because a distant and virtually unknown uncle on my father's side was a professional artist and so it was in my genes. (My father wasn't bad either. He'd painted a pretty good portrait of my mother.) I tended to think that these influences had prompted my immediate family to 'believe' that I must have talent and so to "tell" me that I had the ability if I wanted to develop it. And because they provided me with the materials and encouragement, I tended to spend any quiet time drawing.)
My questions were never dismissed and my ideas, thoughts and sensibilities were treated with respect. Before I began kindergarten, Mum had taught me “readin’ and writin’ and ’rithmatic”; and since the adults had taken to spelling words backwards to discuss topics not meant for my ears, I was a pretty good backwards speller too, and was excited to learn more.
No one needed to tell me that I was living in an “enriched environment”. With four or five adults around me all the time, (each with an awesomely unique personality), home was a vibrant place where someone was always teaching me something, whether deliberately or accidentally. It is clear to me, that the early education my mother had given me had had time to percolate and settle before I began attending school. I suppose I’d had the time to understand the concepts behind the rules because everything I learned from kindergarten onwards blended nicely with what I already understood. This, of course, allowed me to ace every test that was put in front of me, so it did not mean much when I achieved high scores on a number of Stanford-Binet IQ tests I was forced to write in first, second and third grades in the early sixties. They told me that my scores had been very high—“exceptionally-gifted”, is how it had been explained to Mum.
My Apologies for any Arrogance – it has never been intended.
- Letting an eight-year old child make a potentially life-affecting decision is possibly not the best idea in the world – even if that child has an Einsteinian IQ. After all, no matter how sensible a child is, an eight year old has had only… at the very most … nine years of experience on Earth (less a day)! (How is that? Well...when you "turn" one, you've already spent one year on earth, so when you "turn" eight, you've spent eight years. If your ninth birthday is tomorrow, you're still eight today, but you've spent nine years on Earth (less a day).)
In the autumn of grade three, I mentioned to my mother that my friend G., (who lived a few doors away but who was in a different school district than I), had been placed in an accelerated class that covered grades three and four curricula in one year. Mum was surprised, and (with my agreement and curiosity) set up a meeting with my principal to find out why I hadn't been put in a similar situation, given the results of my tests. The answer was predictable. My school didn't have resources to implement an accelerated class. If I wanted to take an accelerated class, I would have to change schools, and Mum would have to contact the Board to do that, which is what she did, insisting that someone explain to her why tests were given to all children if not everyone was afforded the same opportunities. She demanded to know the reason for putting me through so many tests. (I have no doubt that my mother’s determined quest for action was softened by one of her dazzling, disarming and wholly genuine smiles). Mum won her point and she was told that another child and I were eligible to move ahead and stay in the school.
To my surprise and delight, the other child turned out to be one of my best friends, B. (While B. and I attended the same school, we had not really bumped into each other until we met at Sunday School, which was right across from our public school.)
Before I decided what to do, I'd occasionally wish that the whole thing had never started and that I had no choice to make. Then I could just stay with my friends and go along happily in my classroom with a teacher I liked. But that pining-for-a-different-reality (i.e. one that did not present a choice) didn't tell me that I should stay. As far as I was concerned, there was always a brief pang of wishful thinking when faced with situations that presented an unknown or a difficult choice. Ultimately, I decided to move ahead.
posted by Winter Child @ 9:21 p.m.
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