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[kev7161]

Yesterday was Parent's Day in some or all of our school. All I know is that I had a full house for my final lesson - - Math. Luckily, the lesson went smoothly (and Math almost always does anyway - these kids are whip smart!) and the kids seemed natural and answered questions effortlessly. I know my kids are making good progress and their grades prove it - - - -- - buuuuutttttt . . . .

The parents (most of them anyway) are a piece of work. One parent was concerned because her child told her (yesterday? last week? last month?) that she didn't understand what I'm saying and what could I do about it? I told her that the child should raise her hand when I say "Ok?" (that's our signal word for are you alright? or do you understand?) and say "NO!" I also suggested that she can come to me between lessons and show me what she doesn't understand. The parent says her child is scared of me (although these kids laugh and play with me all the time - including this child). I told the parent to talk with her child and explain to her that I would never get angry or mean if a child came to me in that way.

But the gist of it is that these parents seem to think that their children should be speaking fluent English by now (2 1/2 months into the program) even though I am certain that most of their households don't practice spoken English at all. They don't see the day-to-day progress these students are making. They understand my commands and instructions. So many quickly raise their hands when I ask a question. They speak short little sentences ALL the time. Some are certainly more advanced than others, but these first graders are reading short stories already. They get FAR more English than any of the other first graders and, in a year or two, the differences should be VERY noticeable.

It's not that the parents seemed angry, but I'm worried most of them are expecting miracles. It was nice that my principal was there and was praising me up and down. Wonderful teacher! Excellent teacher! Thank you sir, may I have another?

[Wocca]

The parents are paying, so
miracles are par for course
in their eyes anyway.



Imagine what their overall
expectation of the child is ....

[Roger]

You know English-medium schools are still brand-new to the mainland, and Chinese parents jump on the bandwagon precisely because they believe this is a TGV that takes their own and single kid to the destination in just a few months.
Only extremely wealthy parents can afford to put their kids through such schools.
And Chinese parents are ruthless. They have no compassion for their kids and their interests for playing, relaxation and recreation. FOr them, young life is about learning and learning.
In HONG KONG, EMI (English Medium Instruction) schools have for decades been perceived as ELITE schools. Mao's China displaced anything to do with elitism; now elitism is coming back with a vengeance. It's not good, really!
Elitism breeds unholy alliances between business and political powers. And that leads to nepotism and graft. Why do these parents want their kids to become bilingual? Only because they want them to secure themselves a place in the foreign sun, then return with lucrative, or potentially lucrative, connections and a foreign passport.

What China needs, I believe, are parent-teacher associations, that is, a structured and organised form of cooperation between parents as tuition payers and teachers as service providers. There should be regular meetings where teachers could give their version of the story about each child to the parents. Someone could be moderator - preferably not a person from the school management.

This way, many kids would be taken out of such schools. Others would replace them. What's more, parents would perhaps learn to modify their feverish expectations and come to more realistic appraisals.

In HK, the change in sovereignty had some similar effect: English was downsized in importance after 1997. Instead, mother-tongue teaching has become the principle. It is widely believed Chinese kids learn "better" in their mother tongue. Fluency in English can also be achieved with English being just another subject. True or not? Some say the English level of Hongkongers has dramatically levelled off. I am not convinced. BUt if it raises the overall academic performance of young learners then this is the way to go.
Putting foreign, i.e. CHinese kids through English education at the expense of their intellectual development is questionable.
And that is what Chinese parents need to understand.

There could be a compromise: kids learn sciences and maths in their mother tongue, world history, geography, PE and extra-curricular subjects in English. Optionally, some kids take extra classes in maths and/or sciences. The latter could take place at secondary school level prepatory to the kids' life abroad.
Research has shown (I cannot cite sources but have repeatedly come across such mentions in relevant Hong Kong media) that kids prepared this way for their study abroad were no less performant at their overseas universities than kids with up to ten years of English instruction (but hardly any English social life).

[winterlynx1]

This is a bit tongue in cheek and certainly non-scientific, but here goes -

All parents are genetically programmed with 'x' amount of anxiety to be directed toward their children - this is not connected to culture, race or political circumstances. If you have only one child, the poor kid gets the full dose of the 'x' - one of several down-sides to having only one child. Other than the obvious solution, the only other thing I can think of is to genetically engineer parents to have a lower dose of anxiety.

Failing that, you principal is probably doing the right thing - reassuring the parent that you're great teacher, that they have a wonderfully smart child, to go home, take two Tylenol and go to bed!

I used to think prep'ing kids for Parent's Night was a bit of a snow job for the benefit of the marketing department. Well, I suppose that's exactly what it is. However, helping the children to put on their best show also helps them to get little relief from parent-anxiety, and that's a very good thing.

The fact that this is China's first experience with middle-class prosperity probably has something to do with the syndrome as well.