I think this is similar to advice often given on this site about kids applying to selective universities.
I also found the cheating aspects interesting since we sometimes see references to it here as well.
I thought it was a really good article
This is a really good article. I’ve always found the idea that “you can be anything” to be very trite. At the tender age of four, I saw Olga Korbut in the Olympics and dreamed of being an Olympic Gymnast. Of course, there were no gyms offering gymnastics near me, nor could my family afford such a thing. And I was tall for my age, now I’m 5’11". So I could never ever be anything I wanted. Plenty of people will need to do jobs they didn’t dream of, or love every minute of. That would not be realistic, or no one would be there to do the plumbing or drive a truck or cut your hair.
So depressing.
It’s such a “first world problem” to have kids stressed out from parents expecting too much from them. Far more typical is the kid stuck in a low-performing school with teachers who have few expectations and parents who don’t care.
Our country is filled with girls who get pregnant at 14 because having a baby makes them special (at least for a little while) or boys who join gangs because it gives them a sense of accomplishment.
Do we really think that the problem of too many kids thinking they become surgeons is a compelling societal issue?
I love that Snoopy book by the way. I read it to mean that biology isn’t destiny- if you are short and clumsy you aren’t going to join the Bolshoi, but if you love ballet you can work in PR for a ballet company or build sets or design costumes for the ballet- or play the violin to accompany ballet dancers. Snoopy is a dog but he doesn’t let that limit him. If your kid isn’t going to become a surgeon but still wants to help people and is fascinated by the medical field is it wrong to encourage him/her to become an EMT? Become a pharma sales rep who helps surgeons understand how to use new valves or mesh devices? Get a degree in hospital administration and run a surgical facility?
What’s so bad about encouraging kids to aim high?
I read the Washington Post article. Sometimes I wonder how there could be so many miserable people who delight in tearing kids down. It’s as if they want to create a nation of losers so they can feel superior to them.
Of course luck and being born healthy and in the right circumstances matter a lot. This is not exactly a profound insight. However, children are inspired by the myths we tell them, and I think Snoopy saying “You can be anything” is a great message for young kids. They’ll have plenty of time to learn that the world isn’t always fair. But it’s far better for them to start off dreaming big and believing that with hard work the world is their oyster.
Careful. I went to beauty school. All my life I wanted to cut hair. I got a scholarship to beauty school out of HS, but dropped out and went to college to resolve a roommate situation my best friend was in. I still cut hair when I can. Can’t say that I get any more satisfaction from my college-path day job.
Edit: I got the college degree. I didn’t earn the cosmetology certificate so, even though I am eligible for management in my multi-billion dollar company, I am not eligible for a chair in a salon. I guess I couldn’t be anything I wanted to be. 
Maybe when I retire…
I’ve never told my kids they could be anything they wanted to be. That’s just nonsense. People have different interests, and gifts that need developing through hard work.
I think you should care about kids and encourage them, but you also need to teach them to be realistic. There are ways to be encouraging and give them opportunities without giving them false promises…
I’m not seeing how telling a kid to reach high is a false promise.
You don’t get to be a prima ballerina without years and years of practice- sometimes excruciatingly so. But do you tell your chubby 6 year old she’s unsuited for ballet and should learn to crochet instead if she really wants to dance? You don’t become a neuroscientist without years of schooling and training and lab work and difficult grant applications and following false leads. But do you tell your 11 year old who wants to find a cure for grandma’s dementia that she should become a nursery school teacher because getting a degree in early childhood education is cheap and easy?
What am I missing? I live in a pretty diverse neighborhood. The first gen kids (many born here, some born abroad) really and truly reach for the stars even if they need a plan B. The non-immigrant kids are all looking for an easy paycheck- a couple of them want to “run a hedge fund” even though they have no clue what that means (or that you need to be really, really good at math and other “hard stuff” to do that) or become a sports agent (again- you need math- NFL players aren’t hiring agents who need to count on their fingers).
What is a false promise when you are raising a kid? That it’s easy to find a cure for cancer? No kid believes that- otherwise it would have been done already. Why not raise your kids to think that anything is possible WITH hard work and talent???
@choatiemom: I’m not putting down hairstylists. And I cut hair in while I was in college. I was awful at it. But even Vidal Sassoon probably had to deal with angry or crazy customers. But most hairstylists are on their feet all day. They might deal with customers like my grandmother, who, although charming and polite most of her life, was rude and difficult to deal with during a period of illness near the end. (I was thinking of her when I used the example. She told me some awful things she said to her hairstylist of many years. I thought that the hairstylist had patience of a saint). I think there are websites where hairstylists complain about the miracles customers expect of them. While being a hairstylist might allow a creative outlet, it also is a difficult customer service job. If you reread my post, I’m talking about the realities of life - most jobs- even dream jobs - aren’t dream jobs all the time. I’m sure that even Olga Korbut got sick of chalking her hands all the time and falling off the vault.
@Blossom: I don’t think anyone would say kids shouldn’t aim high. I think it is great to dream, it is great to go after goals. My objection is to platitudes that don’t mean anything.
I’m sensing an excluded middle here, I’d say.
Perhaps the author could write a followup article, “Better, more realistic books for three year olds” -
[ul]
[] Santa Claus isn’t real
[] Neither is the Easter Bunny.
[li] Life is pointless because everyone dies anyway.[/li][/ul]
I prefer my toddlers pragmatic and jaded too.
It’s not a platitude to tell your kid that you are prepared to help them achieve their goals to the extent that you are able, if they are willing to do their part.
I see parents who spend every weekend driving their kid to travel soccer tournaments and attending games and bringing supplies/selling refreshments who can’t spare ten minutes to drop the younger sibling- who is not gifted athletically but has other strengths- at the public library for the free robotics class on Saturday afternoon. The gymnast has a private coach and expensive lessons and money for hotels for away championships but the kid who wants to become a scientist or play the violin is supposed to “figure it out” on his or her own?
Why is “the sky the limit” for the athletic kids but not everyone else? And it’s only a platitude if your kid knows you don’t mean it.
I think there is a HUGE difference between telling kids they can do anything they want to and setting unrealistically high expectations. (Her 1st point)
Really, I think a lot of this is especially harmful to low income and/or first gen college kids. They/we already have a crap ton of realities facing us every day that tell us that we’re never going to amount to anything- bad school districts, affordable college, etc. Having someone who truly believes that we can do anything, and instills that in us- that we’re NOT limited- can be a huge boost to these kids.
Yes, as kids become older, they’ll understand that they realistically are probably not going to be in the WNBA but is there really any reason to tell a 5 year old that? Personally, I don’t think so. Let her dream and work towards that. She’ll understand probably by high school that she isn’t going to get there but in the mean time she’s developed a love of basketball and was always encouraged to perform at her highest ability.
shrug
Every so often, one of the kids I teach starts talking about medical school. And it’s a kid who is pulling a solid C in my math class. It’s typical a sweet kid, one who is busting his/her tail for that C. One who will be a wonderful spouse, a wonderful parent, a wonderful lots of things.
But not a doctor.
Nope, not everyone can be what they want.
I’m 5’4". I’m let’s say “athletically challenged.” Not ever in my life, not in my teens or 20’s or at any other time, would a career in the WNBA have been a possibility. No matter how hard I worked, no matter how much I wanted it, it was never going to happen.
Fortunately, my ambitions were in other areas, areas where I have found success.
Pre-schoolers are one thing, but at some point, yes, everyone has to realize they do have limitations. So yeah, that chubby, uncoordinated kid should take dance classes as long as they make her happy, but at some point realize she’s going to face that she’s not going to star in an elite company. That kid who pitched in Little League will most likely not be an all-start in the Majors, but that’s okay. He enjoys baseball.
The problem I’ve seen, which usually self-corrects quicker in physical pursuits, is when someone gets closer to adulthood believing they can be whatever they want “because I believe I can.”
So at a college I used to work at, students in remedial math who avoided science in high school because they didn’t like it or get it or some other reason, announce they’re pre-med, and kill their GPAs trying to get there, failing or eking their way through the pre-med curriculum, without a prayer to get in medical school, but determined because they “believe” and they’ve always been told by a million motivational posters, that that’s what counts.
@blossom --I didn’t read the article as opposing athletic or academic aspirations; I think it makes the same point regarding both.
I liked the article. I think one can be realistic and still have dreams. I also see a difference between interests and ability. The chubby dancer who takes ballet for seven years and never gives up? She may not become a ballet dancer but she may move into another form of movement, or she may still find a place within the world of ballet, just not as a dancer. I have a friend who was a good high school musician but he didn’t have it to move further. He still wanted to work in music. He became an agent representing music groups. He loves his life; he gets to go to shows, find promising musicians, work with them on all aspects including music. So, I encourage kids to dream and have interests. As they grow older and discover more about themselves and what they can do, I would broaden their scope of possible careers (“I want to be a doctor” becomes “I want to work in the public health field”) and discover how they can use their abilities within the fields of their interests.
I never had a dream. Still don’t. So I don’t understand those who do. I ask the following questions out of my own ignorance.
If you wanted to be a ballet dancer but you didn’t have the talent (or the body type), would a career doing something else in the world of ballet be enjoyable? Or would staying in that world be a constant reminder that you couldn’t dance professionally?
Similarly, if you didn’t have what it takes to be a physician, would a career doing something else in health care be satisfying, or would it be a constant reminder of your broken dream?
A friend is a nurse who recruits patients for clinical trials- mostly cancer- and thought she was going to be a physician. In her case it was money, not talent. She needed a paycheck and nursing was the lowest cost way to get to get there in a hurry while still maintaining her interest in curing/helping/healing people.
She contends that her current job is an absolutely perfect fit. She needs a strong grounding in the science of cancer to understand which kinds of patients with which types of cancers (and co-morbidity) is appropriate for different trials and protocols. She needs strong people skills to encourage reluctant patients while not giving them false hopes about a cure (half of them are getting placebos- by definition, although she doesn’t know which ones). She needs exceptional empathy to keep patients in the trail even when they want to quit due to side effects and exhaustion. And she needs fantastic bedside skills and communication skills to keep the doctors and researchers informed but not lose sight of the humanity involved- these people are both datapoints on a spreadsheet, and actual mom’s and brothers and someone’s husband.
Would she have benefited from being told at age 10 “we can’t afford to pay for college and med school for you- so dump your dream now and get realistic in a hurry”? I don’t think so. Did it harm her professionally to think that she was going to be a doctor some day? Doesn’t seem like it. Did she get pragmatic really quickly when she had to? Of course- like any adult who isn’t psychotic. Did she need to hear repeatedly when she was a little kid “people like us don’t become doctors”? Gosh, how depressing.
I think she’d be working in an elementary school somewhere checking kids for head lice (nothing wrong with school nursing by the way- but her job pays WAY better and she says it’s much more interesting) if she hadn’t dreamed big as a little kid. I suspect she’s right.
As a young kid, I was up for a major scholarship which changed my life when I got it. I went for a test followed by an interview at age 10. 40 years later, I still think there was an element of fate in why I got it.
All other parents were busily preparing their kids for the interview and grilling them while my laidback dad was just looking around and I found a sports magazine (one I would have never had access to in my small town) and was thumping through it. I was a major cricket fan and could recite every player who was on the national team, their statistics etc. But this issue, I stumble upon stories related to recent major field hockey championship that India had won, profiles of the team members etc. Since I had nothing else to do, I was reading those stories.
I walk into the interview and one of the questions was do I know anything about sports (this is an educational scholarship). I was happy that I know so much about cricket and start talking and they go do you know anything about hockey. I say a little, they go what was the recent championship India won, then onto who was the captain, who are the other star players, who did they beat to win and so on. So something like 40% of my interview was concentrated on a topic I spent 15 minutes reading about in a magazine that I never would have read anywhere else about a sport I never followed at age 10. What are the odds?