It's a question most parents have: How do you balance the need to keep your child safe and protected with the desire to see them grow up with the ability to handle all of life's challenges?
You may have seen the story about the Washington DC area parents who got in trouble for letting their two children, ages 10 and six, walk about a mile from a local park to their house along a busy city street.
They call themselves free-range parents.
They are trying to teach their children to be independent through progressively increased freedom and responsibility. Free- Range parents believe that our society has caused us to be too protective of our children and therefore they are not learning the kinds of skills that they will need to be healthy functioning adults.
Think this is not mainstream? Then check out this WebMD article on whether Free-Range Parenting is right for you.
At the other end of the spectrum are Helicopter Parents.
Actually, that’s not true. The new term is Snowplow Parenting.
Snowplow parents take helicopter parenting to a new extreme. They want to push out and clear away all the obstacles that might occur in a child's life so they never have to experience any kind of failure or pain.
Helicopter parents hover over their children to make sure that everything is okay. Snowplow parents actually do the hard work of life for their children.
I know one mother who wrote her child's college papers for him.
That’s a Snowplow parent.
So what’s the middle ground?
Psychologists have documented that experiencing challenge and failure is actually an important part of developing independence and resiliency as a child grows up.
They’ve also documented that being overprotective results in, as this teacher says, “children destined to an anxious adulthood, lacking the emotional resources they will need to cope with inevitable setback and failure."
The middle ground is really about planning to fail. What does this look like? It's helping your child learn to fail in healthy ways. Here are a few suggestions.
Focus on effort not outcomes
Focusing on earnest effort as opposed to always having successful results acknowledges that not everything we do is going to work.
This doesn’t avoid failure.
However, it does help to avoid having children measure their own self-worth against their successes and failures. More importantly it develops intrinsic motivation that helps them to take satisfaction from giving their best effort.
Focusing on effort instead of results won't shield a child from the inevitable disappointment that occurs when something doesn't go their way. It does put the emphasis on the child’s personal growth and what was achieved, rather than the mistake or failure itself.
Sara Blakely wanted to be a trial attorney. One problem. She failed the LSAT miserably. So, instead, she sold copiers door-to-door for seven years.
Then she came up with the idea for a body shaper she called Spanx. The company grew rapidly and in 2012 Blakely was named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People.
Blakely said in a Bloomberg Business interview, “My attitude to failure is not attached to outcome, but in not trying. It is liberating. Most people attach failure to something not working out or how people perceive you. This way, it is about answering to yourself.”
Emphasize the importance of learning from failure
Thomas Edison famously quipped, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work."
When failure is seen as a way to learn new information and get better at what one is doing, it becomes a positive instead of a negative.
Asking questions such as “What have you learned from this?” and “What would I do differently next time?” puts the focus on extracting value from the situation.
Back to Sara Blakely, the Spanx founder. She was asked by Bloomberg about the best business advice she had ever received. Her answer?
It probably came down to my father. When I was growing up, he encouraged us to fail. We'd come home from school and at dinner he'd say: 'What did you fail at today?' And if there was nothing, he'd be disappointed. It was a really interesting kind of reverse psychology. I would come home and say that I tried out for something and I was just horrible and he high-fived me.
This type of attitude fosters a child’s ability to adapt and innovate. It also removes any stigma related to failure.
What’s important is not the outcome, but what is learned.
Provide a safe, loving, environment in which a child can fail
This blog post from Bright Horizons, gives several tips on how to do this. It’s definitely worth the read, as it gives guidance on what to do when a child asks for help, asks for an answer, doesn’t do as well as expected and what to do when something goes wrong.
It also gives advice about what to do when you struggle with letting your child fail. The post concludes:
"Providing opportunities to develop skills of resilience and coping within a safe, loving, and supportive environment are the best way to prepare children for life's challenges. In the wise words of Ann Landers, "It is not what you do for your children, but what you have taught them to do for themselves that will make them successful human beings."
Sometimes providing that safe, loving environment means allowing others to do it for you. That’s the value of summer camp. You probably knew this was coming from me, but at camp, children learn to do a lot on their own.
I’m not the only one saying it. Psychologist Michael Thompson says the same thing in this HuffPost Blog:
I believe that children develop in profound ways when they leave their parents' house and join a camp community. Learning to sleep away from home is, of course, a critical step on the way to independence. Part of the challenge is beating homesickness, which may be hard for some children, and which, by definition, your parents cannot help you do.
Kids know they have to do this sooner or later. As my son once remarked with horror, "If you can't learn to sleep away from home, you have to live with your parents for the rest of your life."
But beyond that, there are things that, as a parent, you cannot do for your children, as much as you might wish to. You cannot make them happy (if you try too hard they become whiners); you cannot give them self-esteem and confidence (those come from their own accomplishments); you cannot pick friends for them and micro-manage their social lives, and finally you cannot give them independence.
The only way children can grow into independence is to have their parents open the door and let them walk out. That's what makes camp such a life-changing experience for children.
At Pecometh we work to create a non-competitive community where campers are encouraged to try new things, knowing they will not be good at everything.
What’s amazing is that it’s not just the staff that contribute to the emotionally safe environment, the campers themselves pick-up on the cues provided by their counselors.
On our Challenge Course we talk about Failing Forward. We teach participants to make a plan, try out a strategy, then evaluate and make adjustments.
We also use the Rule of Threes: try an idea or approach at least three times before you give up.
These same ideas are put into practice throughout our camp program. For example:
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Each day we have Cabin Clean-Up Awards. Campers get feedback on how well they cleaned up their living space. They either get an Excellent or Needs Improvement. Regardless of the result, each day is a new opportunity to succeed.
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Skills activities such as Archery give campers the opportunity to try, learn, repeat. Even if the first shot is a total miss, the camper is encouraged to keep trying. The goal is not to learn to hit the bullseye in one session but to improve.
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Campers are responsible for their own preparedness. They’re instructed to bring their water bottle with them at all times. They need to bring a towel with them when they have pool time or waterfront on the schedule. They take turns setting the table and they bus their own dishes. What happens if they forget something or things don’t quite go as planned? They learn from it, but we’re there to help, as well.
Does it make a difference? Thompson’s own interviews suggest it does:
By the way, when I interviewed college admissions officers about how they view campers, they say that they think former campers are more likely to succeed in college because they have had successful experiences away from home, and they are always impressed by seniors who have been counselors looking after younger children. Camp helps build confidence and identity; it also builds leadership skills.
Yeah…if you want to help your child succeed, then failure is good for a child. At camp, it can be fun, too.
Are you ready to let your child exercise their independence in our safe and caring camp environment?
Even if you're not sure if you're ready, check out our summer camp brochure. We have all kinds of programs where your child can learn new skills, make new friends, and gain confidence!
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Topics: Camp