Raising a Gifted Child: Capturing “Parentable” Moments

1. Raising a Gifted Child: Capturing “Parentable” Moments David Yun Dai State University of New York at Albany A workshop at the Chinese University of Hong Kong May 27, 2011

2. Activity 1: Get to Know Your Child • Name three things you particularly like about your child (behaviors, performance, attitudes, personality, etc.) • Name three things you don’t like about your child or you would like to see improved

3. Discussion: What might have eluded you… • I now realize that my child may have the following characteristics that are potentially desirable and need to be encouraged and properly channeled • Intellectual and academic: • Social: • Affect and personality:

4. Activity 2: A Brief Survey: Do you do the following in your parenting? • Demand straight As in school Yes No • Expect your child to play a music instrument well Yes No • Set up strict limits on TV time or video games Yes No • Attempt to limit the amounts of time on social, athletic, or volunteer activities Yes No • Expect obedience Yes No

5. Discussion: Are you a “tiger mom” or “lion dad”? Are you tough-minded or tender-minded with your child? Does it work for you AND MORE IMPORTANTLY for your child? Subjuct matters: Skilled performance (e.g., piano, billiads) Academic knowledge (math, science, literature) Entrepreneurship and business Creative writing, composition, and invention Western and Eastern beliefs and value regarding the child

6. Discussion: The nature of schooling A competition game or growth process? Schooling, a competition frenzy? Do we produce “high achievers” who are preoccupied with “success” but have no “inner life” (deep interests and intellectual curiosity, concerns about life and existence or social justice)? A recent case of a Harvard post-doc back to China and end up in a mental hospital…The lack of social skills can be fatal

7. Activity 3: Write down three areas of strengths of your child (talent & personality) • Strength1 • Examples? • Strength 2 • Examples? • Strength 3 • Examples?

8. Discussion: GROW out of Four forms of agency Expressive, intellectual, instrumental, and social agency Personal initiative Selective affinity, Maximal grip At the edge of chaos

9. Activity 4: Write one incident of your child noticeably experiencing negative emotions • Incident • Academic or social? • Mainly endogenous (from the child) or exogenous (from the environment)? • How well did he or she cope? • What did you do?

10. Discussion: Coping as a moment of growth: • Building your child’s personal strengths and resilience as an important goal of parenting • Setbacks and failures are important for growth • Turning something negative to positive is a major coping skill (Steve Jobs) • You can help…but don’t make it worse…

11. Activity 5: Write down three careers you would like your child to pursue • 1 • 2 • 3 • Suppose you hope your son will go to medical school to become a doctor but he wants to an actor and he is actually quite active with a group of young performing artists in an experimental theater. Would you support him? • Yes No

12. Discussion: Your value orientations • Do they match what you identified earlier as your child’s strengths? • Do they show more of what you prefer or what your child prefers? • What kind of value orientations do your preferences and attitudes reveal? • Security, prestige, wealth, happiness, contributions to the society

13. Sum Up: Cope and Grow as parentable moments. • What parents should do (IPHER) • Identifying strengths and interests; • Provide opportunities, support, and resources; • Help your child cope with stress, negative events and emotions; • Encourage personal initiatives that stretch their minds and enrich souls; • Respect their need for autonomy and their academic and career choices. • What parents should not do • Controlling and enmeshing parenting • Focusing on “success” and utilitarian gains instead of personal growth

14. Questions and Comments? ddai@uamail.albany.edu THANKS!!!