Is Socialization More Important Than Academics?

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In China, children who look like their parents can't do anything. Parents are indispensable for giving kids very clear cues and signals about how to make their way in the world. It should be very, very clear that parenting really works well when it's discreet,. When it's about child rearing. The more we load on to parenting, parents become therapists and teachers and philosophers...the more parent thing becomes denuded of any real content. Can we produce leaders that can function and n b, you know, be funny and humorous and have initiative?

Why are there so many Chinese maths and music prodigies? Because Chinese mothers believe schoolwork and music practice come first, that an A-minus is a bad grade, that sleepovers, TV and computer games should never be allowed and that the only activity their children should be permitted to do are ones in which they can eventually win a medal - and that medal must be gold. These methods certainly seem to get results but do they make for the rounded individuals Western parents are striving to bring up? Isn't it better that our children should be happy rather than burnt-out brain boxes? Who's right and who's wrong? In this debate from June 2011, Amy Chua, author of the best-selling Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, and Theodore Dalrymple, the writer and psychologist, speak for the motion. Justine Roberts, co-founder of Mumsnet, and Frank Furedi, emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent and parenting expert, speak against the motion. The debate was chaired by columnist and broadcaster Jenni Russell

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