I recently discovered a really interesting blog, called Radical Parenting. It's basically parenting, from a teenager's perspective. While some posts could be just the ranting and raving of teens, complaining about the unjustness of their lives and their parents, there seem to be some valid points brought up in many of the topics that are discussed.

One of the most interesting ones I read was called "What Kind of Kid Do You Have?". The article discusses the four kinds of kids that exist in this millennial, highly electronic era. I've seen all four of these kinds of kids, and it was really enlightening to hear the teen's perspective on the effects of parenting on their coping skills.

The first type of kid is called "The Teacup", owing to their emotional fragility. These kids were treated as overly delicate by their parents. The parents worried so much about their physical and emotional health and well being that the kids were not allowed to go out and experience the variety of human emotions necessary to development. This is especially true of FAILURE. The parents prevented them from failing, one way or another, so now that the kids are growing into adults they do not have the ability to cope with everyday pressures and problems. The kids can't handle criticism and fall apart easily under even minor adversity. I saw a lot of these kids in the private school environment where I used to work. It was a small school, and special care was taken with many of the kids to ensure the most positive experience possible, in some cases to the detriment of the child. EVERYONE will fail at something in life; if a child is never exposed to failure while growing up, he or she will be completely incapable of coping with failure as an adult. What we're left with is either a person who utterly fears any kind of change or challenge, or worse, a person who completely gives up at life and barricades himself or herself inside (literally or figuratively).

The next kind of kid is "The Toastie". This is because of the "burn out" factor. These are kids who are heavily loaded with activities from a very young age, or who are heavily invested in a particular activity. I saw a lot of "Toasties" when I was coaching swimming. I had some GREAT swimmers, who really could have been successful swimming in college. Instead, they had spent so much time in the pool, and worked so hard, and sacrificed so much of their free time that they could have otherwise been spending with friends or just unwinding, that they quit swimming, in many cases right at the height of their abilities. They had missed out on so many of the fun things that come with just being a kid (unstructured time, self-driven play, just "hanging out") that they felt the need to drop the activity completely in order to preserve their sanity and stability. It's unfortunate to see talented kids get burnt out on a sport or activity that should be fun and enjoyable. While sports are common ground for "Toasties", they can be found in 4H, Boy and Girl Scouts, pretty much any activity. I worry about my nieces becoming "Toasties". They play soccer and basketball, do gymnastics, swim on the local swim team, and participate in church activities. Their days are heavily scheduled, plus they have year-round school. I'm always amazed when I hear their mom and dad outlining their schedules for the week. I was pretty lucky. While my parents encouraged me to participate in activities, I was never pushed to do so. If I didn't like a sport, I didn't have to continue it. I did not do any sports that ran concurrently (so no multi-sport seasons). I had plenty of down time to play with my friends or do what I wanted to do. And as I got older my parents helped me learn to budget my time so I had enough time to participate in the sports and activities I valued most plus still get my schoolwork done. If a kid wants to quit a sport or activity, it should be because he or she genuinely is no longer interested, not because he or she is stressed out, worn out, or burnt out.

The third type of kid is "The Turtle". This kid has never been taught to work for anything, perhaps because the parents sheltered him or her, or perhaps because he or she fell through the cracks and was passed along from one teacher/school to another without ever being held accountable for anything. These kids are allowed to be apathetic and lazy. It could be that, when the kids who need special help and the kids who are exceptionally high performing take up so much of the parents' and teachers' time, "The Turtle" just gets brushed aside as being neither too bad nor too good to merit much attention. Since they've been largely neglected or ignored, or simply left to their own devices because they were "getting by", they've never learned how to push themselves to be more successful. These are kids who will have NO idea what they want to do with their lives when they get out of high school. They may go to college, but they might not finish because they simply have never been given any kind of direction. Some of these kids are downright slackers, intentionally, because they don't care. As long as they can get by, they don't worry about ever actually being successful at anything.

The fourth kind of kid is "The Tyrant". These are the precious little shits I got SO tired of while working in a private school. In almost every case, "The Tyrant" was created by his or her parents. The parents condition the child to believe that he or she is brilliant, fabulous, talented, and just in general better and more important than everyone else. Many of these kids are pretty smart or reasonably talented, but to their parents (and more importantly to themselves) they are they most brilliant and most talented people on the planet. While they will often put a fair amount of effort into an endeavor, they expect a big payoff and massive amounts of attention and acclaim. Even if they aren't successful in something, they expect to still be recognized for the effort they have put into the activity. Many times I had students completely fair an assignment, only to tell me, "But I worked so HARD on this!!!" What these kids (and their parents) don't seem to understand is, NOBODY in the real world gives an "A" for effort. It really doesn't matter how hard you tried at something, if you didn't get it right. That sounds callous and coldhearted, especially from a teacher, but it's true. If you were living in Africa, and you tried really hard to avoid being eaten by a lion, but the lion ate you anyway, does it really matter how hard you tried? No. Now, not everyone is going to be successful at every thing, every time. Look at Thomas Edison. He failed hundreds, probably thousands of times at inventing useful creations. But he was very successful at some of his inventions. There needs to be a balance. It isn't about just putting in the effort; it's about putting in the effort to get it right.

Now, kids are not necessarily going to slide smoothly into just one of these categories. In many cases, kids will have attributes from several of the categories. A kid may be super-sheltered and fear change, but be a tyrant at the things he or she already participates in. A "Toastie" may become so burnt out that he or she just becomes a "Turtle" as a self-preservation instinct.

The big question is, how do you deal with these kids, either as your own or in a classroom? In a classroom, you are definitely limited in how you interact with these kids and what you can do to improve their outlook. When they are your own kids, you definitely need to take a look at your parenting tactics and see how you have caused these attributes and what you can do to fix them before it's too late. Every parent, and teacher, wants to see kids succeed. While there's little that can be done to fix "nature", "nurture" can go a long way to seeing the next generation become powerful, successful, and a lot less annoying.