Parenting month 65: kindness and confidence

We have always been concerned about T being too shy and quiet in public. Getting into kindergarten was a near thing, not because of his abilities or behavior (preschool staff could testify that was not a problem), but the fact that he had to be able to perform in front of strangers at some point in any assessment. In the end the kindergarten assessment was helped by the fact that the school took a very sane approach to how the assessment was done (observation over a period long enough for him to get comfortable with the setting, and long term assessments by the preschool carried weight), and the fact that he was changing himself (right around the same time preschool staff happily noted he went from a very quiet kid to someone who occasionally had to be told to be quiet.)  But the next step is how he would act as he got exposed to a larger world.

One advantage of not having many scheduled activities for my son is that I get a lot of time with him as he has been growing up. So we get to interact with many people and things. And he loves it. I think even from the beginning all of these outings have been mini-adventures and he got to practice being brave, even though he knew he was not.  As he has gotten older we've been giving him more space to interact with others (and his little sister).

This is my hat

This month was marked with play dates, a trip to Chicago, and some other events in new spaces. Some anecdotes:

1.  Playing with a couple of older and more rambunctious boys. At one point T told them that they needed to play gentler around his younger sister and be more provident (that is a word that they use at his Catholic school). That got a "what does that mean" type of reaction as they went on their way. We were surprised that he could be so confrontational.

Can you see the catfish in there?

2. Chicago. We went for my father's 100 day remembrance. There were a couple of times where we stationed him in front of a door to greet people. And he did (in a place where he knew almost noone, and certainly not any of the aunties and uncles who wanted to talk to him). Curtesy is turning into his way of dealing with the big unknown world. And there are worse ways to react.

Here is how to put on a wristband

3.  At a church event where we were invited by a chinese family who did not know what was going on, he  taught the kids the games and cheered when they won. Later at the Easter egg hunt, once he got his limit, he went around the field helping the younger kids find Easter eggs.

4.  Taekwondo. One of the moms commented that her daughter liked it when T was at class, because her daughter is also one of the smaller ones and T is closer to her size, and because T is controlled enough that he does not threaten to run her over during sparring.

Like a lot of asian american upper middle class suburban parents, we are somewhat ambitious about where we think our kids will be academically (*pause as people who know us, especially my wife, finish laughing*)  But as we learn what some of the practices in our area are like, we also want our children to be sane. When we watch T and how he has grown, we often jokingly ask "can we keep him?", because we realize that while he is still a kid, he behaves much better than we can reasonably expect kids of his age to behave. While in no way we are going to cut back on our quest to keep him academically challenged, we are very thankful that he is turning out kind.