New book suggests parents learn to let kids fail
Early on in her bid to try "autonomy-supportive parenting" with her two sons, New Hampshire middle school teacher and journalist Jessica Lahey met the enemy: her son's forgotten math homework.
As her younger son, Finn, climbed onto the school bus one morning, Lahey noticed that he'd left his completed homework sitting on a coffee table. She wanted desperately to deliver it — her son faced losing recess without it. Lahey was scheduled to stop by the school later that day anyway, and she soon found that holding back from delivering it was "killing me."
Lahey's efforts to step back from over-parenting form the basis of her new book The Gift of Failure: How the Best Parents Learn to Let Go So Their Children Can Succeed. USA TODAY's Greg Toppo recently talked with her.
Q: In the Introduction, you write: "I have inadvertently extended my children's dependence in order to appropriate their successes as evidence and validation of my parenting. Every time I pack my child's lunch for him or drive his forgotten homework to school, I am rewarded with tangible proof of my conscientious mothering. I love, therefore I provide. I provide, therefore I love." Isn't this a big part of parenting? The nagging, cajoling, reminding? It's simply smoothing out the rough edges of our kids' scary lives, right?
A: "N, C, R" is a big part of parenting, but my point is that too much of the "N,C,R" undermines the best part of our relationship with our children, our connection. As connection is one of the three essential elements of intrinsic motivation, we also destroy the likelihood that they will engage in learning and family responsibilities under their own steam. If all that N, C, & R damages our relationship with our kids, and fails to achieve results anyway, what good is it? Kids will cease to hear it when they tire of it, and it becomes the "Wah-wah-wah" of Charlie Brown's parents.
Q: But apart from that, there are times when we really must rescue them, right?
A: The providing part is different from the N, C, R. Providing for our kids, rescuing them, helping them, all of that does remove the scary, pointy edges from our children's lives, but it also renders them incapable of navigating the pointy bits themselves. That terrain isn't going to go away just because we navigate them around it. It's still there, and it may be even more painful when they crash into it 10 years down the road, as adults, with no tools on board to help them do their own repairs.
Q: At first it seemed like what you're describing with "autonomy-supportive parenting" is the difference between my wife's and my style of parenting. I tend to let things unfold as they will; she wants to intervene. But it's not just "stand back and let things happen." It's not "negligent parenting, and it is not permissive parenting," as you say. What's the secret sauce?
A: The secret sauce is to be available — nearby, not on top of, doing your own thing, showing your kids that your life is not all about them, and that you have your own interests, obligations, and responsibilities — while they do their thing. Let them struggle a bit before stepping in, but make sure they know that if they are genuinely, truly stuck, you will help.
Q: What, exactly, does this kind of parenting look like? Teaching your son, finally, to tie his shoelaces required you to invest nearly an hour. How is that "letting our kids experience failure"? Shouldn't you simply have let him figure it out himself?
A: I got honest with him about my failure to treat him with respect and faith in his abilities, so in a sense it was a re-boot, a moment of working together to conquer something hard in order to wipe the slate clean. I'd been treating him like an incompetent toddler way past toddler-hood, and I needed to show him that despite that message, I believe he can learn how to do just about anything he wants. Once we'd re-established that trust in each other, he was more willing to trust me when I said, "Don't worry, you can do it."
Q: So now everyone wants to know: Did you take Finn's homework to school?
A: No.
Q: What happened?
A: His teacher told him to bring it the following day, assigned extra math practice, and made him promise to write a note to himself. My son owned up to his mistake and got to talk to the teacher about solutions. He was encouraged to think about how to keep from making the same mistake again — and he devised a system that worked for him. If I had taken the homework in, he would have missed out on that.
Q: What did you do in the meantime?
A: I made cookies that expressed my love for him, instead of taking the homework to show my love.