Many of the parents of "schoolboys" and successful professionals are at a loss as to how to educate their children well. There are many such stories around us.

Why is home education so difficult for parents? Perhaps we need to start with the mindset of home education to trace the root of the problem. Wan Wei, the principal of Shanghai Pinghe Bilingual School, summarizes the educational model of most parents into six thinking models. Through the establishment of a more logical, structured and scientific thinking framework, we can find the secrets inside the "black box" of family education.

--Editor

My friend Lao Li's middle school daughter recently had some problems: withdrawn, anorexic, unwilling to socialize, unwilling to go to school. Old Li has a degree in science and engineering and works for an Internet company. His personal career is very successful, but there is nothing he can do for his child's education - Lao Li recently sent me a request for help. His problem is exactly what many families are plagued with, and I believe that a solution to this problem can be found using 6 thinking models.

Model 1

Thinking about Expectations and Support for Homeschooling

Some people use two dimensions to measure homeschooling, the first being support and the second being expectations. In this way, homeschooling is categorized into four types: low support and low expectations, low support and high expectations, high support and low expectations, and high support and high expectations.

Low-support low expectations, i.e. laissez-faire type. Most of our previous generation received this type of home education. Because of the many siblings in the family, the parents were too busy to take care of the children, so the children grew up in a very relaxed environment, and were left to fend for themselves.

Low support and high expectations, i.e. authoritarian and authoritative. Jia Baoyu in Dream of Red Mansions has a collection of thousands of favorites, and is only afraid of one person, that is, his father, Jia Zheng. Jia Zheng's family education of Jia Baoyu is of this type, extremely demanding, and will not move, shouting "sins", "animal". As soon as Jia Baoyu heard his father's call, he was as disoriented as if he had been struck by lightning. Some of the fathers around us are similar to Jia Zheng, usually busy working, no time to accompany the child, the child once the results are not good, they are very angry.

High support and low expectations, also known as the spring breeze and rain type. This is the type of homeschooling that the rest of the Jia family practiced on Jia Baoyu, with Jia mother being the most popular. This type is often thought to have spoiled and indulgent consequences, but I don't think it can be generalized.

High support and high expectations, called "tiger parents". There are some full-time parents who devote themselves to their children's education, giving them the utmost care and attention, and being extremely demanding. Many people respect this mode of family education, that will bring the child's "happy growth", in fact, this is also different from person to person.

"You belong to that type?" I asked Li. I asked Li. He thought for a moment and said that the mother of the child should be high support and high expectations, and he belongs to the low support and high expectations.

I nodded and said, "Based on your daughter's situation, you and the Mrs. might want to try High Support Low Expectation."

Model 2

Education is better to be ineffective than counterproductive

Lao Li said that his daughter especially likes to play with her cell phone, but he especially can't tolerate her looking at her cell phone during meals. The company's main goal is to provide the best possible service to its customers," he said. Once, he really can not help, the daughter's cell phone smashed.

"And then?" I asked.

"She didn't talk to me for a month." Lao Li said, with some chagrin and frustration in his tone.

In terms of educational outcomes, our education can be categorized as "positive" education, "zero" education, and "negative" education.

Many times, parents are too eager to win, the result is counterproductive, not only failed to get results, but also bring serious consequences. The fact that the old Lee smashed his daughter's cell phone is a "negative" education.

In the case of not being able to do "positive" education, it is better to be ineffective than to be counterproductive. In other words, if parents don't know what to do to make a difference, they'd rather do nothing than do nothing.

Model 3

Education is like a black box. It's not easy to attribute, you just have to keep trying

Li is an engineer, and he's good at attribution. But the problems of education are too complex for simple attribution.

Some of the kids are doing very well, and the parents are sharing their experiences, so can you copy them? No.

Because they're so good at what they do.

This is because it is impossible to prove that there is a causal relationship between the experience they present and the child's development. You can't find two identical children with different parenting styles and do comparative experiments. Even identical twins in a family have markedly different personalities, so so-called successful educational models are often impossible to disprove.

Even in a family with low support and low expectations, a "golden phoenix" can emerge. I have a colleague who is like that.

This is the first time I've ever seen a child in the world who has been in a state of shock, and I've never seen a child in a state of shock!

Therefore, we often see our children as a black box, and are not clear about the mechanism of operation inside the black box. We can only try different inputs and see what the corresponding outputs are.

Old Lee says the black box is familiar to him. Deep learning in AI is this kind of model, constantly "feeding" it with big data, and finally trying out the right parameters to come up with a model that works well enough. But why this parameter, we do not know. Each child's modeling parameters are different, some children are sensitive, some children are practical. We have to keep trying with different kids.

Model 4

The ****ness of education is to let the child grow self-driven

"Is there no ****ness to education?" This is another question thrown out by Sr. Lee.

"Of course there is ****ness." Here's my take: we have a model that relatively most people recognize called self-driven growth.

People have an engine in their black box, which in psychology is called "motivation theory". When we study human behavior, we first need to study its motivation. "Education is not about indoctrination, it's about ignition." This idea is based on the theory of motivation.

Life is not a sprint, but a marathon. Many people stop running halfway through the race, lose their motivation, and the engine dies. Throughout our lives, the time we spend learning in school is after all short, and most of the time we have to face the world alone. Therefore, we now put more emphasis on stimulating the inner motivation of the child, so that the child's inner engine is fully powered and will not stop in very bad situations. It is better to be able to grow stronger with each setback and stronger with each encounter.

According to Lao Li's description, her daughter should still have internal motivation, her daughter is dissatisfied with her current situation, there is anxiety, and she does not make changes, and her parents say more and she is angry.

In a case like this, the child is probably stuck in a quagmire and wants to break free, but can't do it on her own. I said to Lee, "She really needs your support, but you don't understand her. She doesn't need what you're giving her, and you're not giving her what she needs. What she needs is for you to awaken her inner strength with your unconditional support."

Model 5

Education Requires Thinking in Mirrors and Lights

"So what am I supposed to do?" Old Lee asked.

At the all-school staff meeting after the winter break in 2021, I gave an opening speech on the theme of "Mirrors and Lights". In the speech, I mentioned that there are two types of human attitudes, one is the mirror and the other is the lamp. The mirror shows the truth and the lamp shows the way.

Children are independent beings who come and go because of us. Each child has his or her own destiny, and it is their creation if they meet parents who constantly reflect and grow throughout their lives.

"You are powerless to educate your children, aren't you?" I asked.

Old Lee nodded.

This is the helplessness of many parents. Just because a parent's career is going well doesn't mean the parent is perfect. Our children are a mirror of us, and if we don't see them as objects of education, but as a mirror that maps out our own shortcomings, we should actually be grateful to them."

We all have shortcomings, but colleagues, subordinates and even leaders will not directly point out our shortcomings, but the child will. If we are obsessed, our children will remind us in various ways.

The mirror is used to look at yourself, and the lamp is used to warm and illuminate others.

Model 6

Tiny changes can also bring about changes in the family system

Old Lee seems to be thinking.

In fact, the family is a system. If something goes wrong in one part of the system, the root cause may be in another place. Chinese medicine is a kind of system thinking, so you can't treat the headache and the foot. I said to Lao Li: "The root cause of your daughter's problem may lie in you and your wife. And you should not complain about your wife, you can not change her, you can only change yourself."

The wonderful thing about systems thinking is that when you change any part of the system, the whole system changes. And when there is a problem with a child, there is a good chance that the very thing that needs to be changed and enhanced is the parents themselves.

If you think of dads, moms, and kids as the "three bodies" of astrophysics, it's a very unstable system, and any small change inside or outside of the system can have unpredictable results.

The downside is that it's hard to build a model with stable expectations; the upside is that making a small change in any one part of the system can lead to unexpected feedback.

I promised Lee that I would take the time to talk to his daughter if she didn't object. The focus of the conversation with her will be on how a person can stand on their own two feet. The family doesn't matter if it's good or bad, and you can't choose, you should take all the experiences and encounters as nourishment for your own growth process.

(The author is the principal of Shanghai Pinghe Bilingual School.) (Readers: Wan Wei)