asian mums more kiasu on academic performance, it happens all over the world. ang mo mums more kiasu on sport and leisure activities.


i recently watched a tv programme, it was about mums sending their daughters to do baby dancing competition, they train 4 hours a day, have to put on over extreme glamorous (in fact awkward looking) adult-like dance suit, and have to travel to all places to join the competition (from Ireland to Scotland to England). Ang mo are just like asian but their interest are on sport, appearance, singing, talents and sport, they wish their kids to be famous, look good and earn big bucks, we asian are more academic and career minded, we expect our children to be lawyer, doctor, engineer, business man, etc.

singapore education std seems to be on the increase but uk GCSE and A-level difficulty seems to be falling never-ending.


maybe we the parents are one of key parties to be blamed, from few months old we already explore our kids to all kind of brain training and enrichment courses, when they get into primary we hire private tuition irregardless of their ability, if they are weak more tuition, if they are strong still more tuition but on advanced level, the list goes on and on. If the young ones are already equipped with such a vast amount of knowledge, the schools and educational teams must upgrade the secondary school to even higher standard in order to bridge the transition from primary school smoothly. so maybe in 20 years time the university lectures materials will be used in secondary schools…

Like the minority, we don’t have the TV in the living room, only in a specific room for special occasion.


I saw a parent who commented that getting away with TV/PC is not a solution as they need to learn how to be self-disciplined. I disagree with this idea though, just imagine a person who is a drug addict and wanting to quit drug, how on earth can you expect him to achieve it if the supply of drug is not ceased?

i guess it is about stick, carrot, habit and appropriate environment; stick is the punishment, carrot is the reward, habit is the daily routine to do his work from young, environment is rid of distraction like tv/pc/game consoles, so apparently for the sake of the children i am afraid the parents must sacrifice the privilege of watching tv after a long hours day at work.

i think interaction with parents, adult and kids is the best way to stimulate children interest and thirst for knowledge. All kinds of puzzle games will work IF the parents are involved, younger age children will have to be instructed and stimulated along the way till they are a bit older. i have seen parents who spoil their kids with expensive gadgets but never participate their activities, so this will not be effective and fruitful at all.


my friend who works in gifted school in switzerland suggested me to bring children to visit museum, get them explore to all kind of knowledge as much as possible when they are young and encourage them to discover their strength and interest.

hope this info will help you.

my dd age of 3 is extremely stubborn and always demand the parents to submit to her will, for example, if my wife suddenly walks away to downstair while she is upstair, she will cry, scream and demand the mum to go upstair to bring her downstair with her, she will not walk down by herself as if she thinks she is on the losing side. Sometimes she might have nightmares, there is no use or whatever to comfort her, she will scream and scream for 15 mins, 30mins, 1 hour..., the only way to calm her down is to bring her to downstair and let her scream till she is happy, very reluctantly I have to smack her leg very very hardly in order to stop her, or else she will keep screaming for AGGEESSSS...., this happened in the past weeks at 1am, 2am, 12am....


we pray to God for help, and thank God for listening to our prayers, she is a lot better now. Anyway, i don't and I won't cane her because it is a crime in UK, i tried naughty corner method (learnt from supernanny on tv), but because of her stubbornness it can take too long to get her back to the very corner, so nowadays we will only put her on that naughty corner and ignore her completely until she submits to the punishment, no snack, no food no nothing, we just treat her as transparent, even my 5yrs old son joins us too Btw, our son is completely different our daughter, he listens and follows rules.

so i suggest supernanny method plus complete ignorance if she doesn't comply.