Tanith Carey talks about the dangers of being a 'tiger' parent in new book

Who doesn’t want the best for their child? You don’t need to be Peter Andre, banging on about loving your kids, to experience that parental surge, that urge to tell them: you are the best, my little cub – you can do anything!

But, as Tanith Carey, author of new book Taming The Tiger Parent cogently explains, sometimes your idea of ‘the best’ can be counterproductive. Worse: it can even be damaging.

“It is both the best of times and the worst of times for our children,” says Tanith. “The tragedy of all this over-investment is that we are not producing a brave new world of brighter, more accomplished, wunderkinds. Instead we are producing the most anxious generation ever.”

By forgetting the importance of play, downtime and unconditional love, parents are, with the best intentions, often approaching parenthood as if it’s a race.

The worrying evidence presented in this tome, alongside practical parenting tips and solutions, includes facts such as that one in ten children aged five to 16 in the UK has a clinically diagnosable mental health condition, and the education system’s test-heavy production-line approach could be to blame.

Tanith is a journalist and mother of two girls and the title of her latest book is a reference to Amy Chua’s bestseller Battle Hymn Of The Tiger Mother. Amy, an American lawyer, writer, and legal scholar raised by strict Chinese immigrant parents, caused a stir with her 2011 memoir. The book tells how Amy coached her two daughters, Sophie and Lulu, to master the piano for two hours a day (or else face the threat of their teddies being burnt), offered withering Simon Cowellesque putdowns if they presented her with a handmade birthday card and called them fat in a bid to encourage exercise and healthy eating.

Amy Chua (who said in the Daily Mail that the backlash she received after the book accused her of being The Worst Mother In The World, but she would do it all again) claimed her parenting style came from overwhelming love and the urgent wish for her children to succeed in a competitive world.

However, as Tanith explains, Amy’s book is just one of many examples of how parents can inevitably take the wrong approach when they find themselves trapped in this world of Baby Einstein DVDs for newborns (hands up, I bought one of these) and iPad learning apps for toddlers (a phenomenon that has even resulted in the term ‘iPaddy’ among affluent Oxford Mumsnetters to describe their darlings’ technology-fuelled strops). When I first picked up Tanith Carey’s book, I thought: well, competitiveness is one parenting fail that I have not fallen into. I am a shambolic and decidedly free-range parent – you need only see the mess and chaos of my family hovel, with its rainbow scrawls of crayon up the walls, and the screaming banshee I turn into in the build-up to the average stressful schoolrun to see that. The other day, I idly asked my Amber, aged five, the middle-class question: ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ Without hesitation, she replied: ‘A burglar’ (‘because I’m good at sneaking around’ was the explanation later).

And, this is honestly not a ‘humble brag’, I laughed my head off. ‘No hothousing helicopter mothering, no Oxbridge-obsessed maths tuition for me: she will be free-willed, happy and non-conformist if it’s the last thing I do’, I assured myself.

However, we are all prone to falling into the trap, even single, working accidental mums like me who find it a minor victory if they manage to get everyone out the door clean, fed and mostly sane of a school morning.

Thanks to Tanith’s calm and collected look at our parenting behaviour, I now know that even I am prone to Tiger Mum tendencies.

 
Here in Oxford, parents are often willing to sell the family silver – or an organ – to get their brood into the best independent schools in the country. However, it is not just the upper-crust mums who should think about putting their claws away: state schools can breed competitiveness as well.

When I moved to a rented flat above a shop in Cutteslowe, to start work at the Oxford Mail, I was shocked by the panic I saw in other mums’ eyes when the topic of school places came up. When I eventually made a couple of mum-mates (not an easy feat: one who I met in the park literally grabbed her child and ran away when I told her I was a single mother), they warned: “Are you going to put yours down for Wolvercote? I would, but don’t hold your breath – people are killing themselves to get theirs in there.”

Cutteslowe Primary School, which seemed like a bright and breezy hive of activity with an impressive headteacher when I visited, was in special measures at that point and no mum I met seemed keen to let their child be part of a school experiment if they could scramble for a place at a ‘better’ state primary. One childminder I knew (who shall remain nameless) said there were a few parent-governors she could introduce me to in case I wanted to try to boost my chances of a place at Wolvercote.

As Oxfordshire state primaries have recently been ranked in the bottom 10 per cent of state schools in UK, it seems local parents are looking for ways to minimise the impact of poor results on their children’s education.

However, as Tanith explains, school league tables started off, thanks to a silly season article in the Daily Telegraph comparing education results, as a push to help failing schools improve. Soon, the panic was exploited and psychologists have noted that children feel pitted against each other – encouraged to find out which Oxford University Press Biff and Chip book they are on.

“The result is that schools have become as pushy as parents and vice versa, creating a self-reinforcing combination which is frightening for children of all ages,” writes Tanith.

“Now, they are such an integral part of our education system, it’s easy to assume that school league tables are a fact of life globally. But Britain is in fact relatively rare. Most countries, even high-performing ones like Japan and Canada, don’t have them.

“The message children get from learning is that learning is not about immersing themselves in a subject. It’s about cramming enough information into their skulls for the next test lurking around the corner. The result is that children become treated not so much as individuals but as footsoldiers to triumph over other youngsters in other parts of the country, and ultimately, the world.”

For girls, obviously, the pressure is worse. Tanith, whose last book Where Has My little Girl Gone? explores how to make sure your daughters feel secure in a world that expects them to be both a babe and a bluestocking, has solutions, though, and they are refreshingly simple. Playtime, with cardboard boxes ideally, and maxing and relaxing with your children is best for their wellbeing, which is also easy on the pocket. By happenstance (I was between homes and partners as well as many other pillars of support when school application time rolled round), my five-year-old is enrolled at New Hinksey Primary – an inclusive, diverse city school where pupils’ individual spirit is championed and cherished. I’ll trust the lovely teachers, helpers, and myself to encourage Amber’s fabulous creativity and zest for life. I’m sure she’ll be fine... and won’t become a burglar.

Final wise words to Tanith: “In this sink-or-swim environment, it’s easy to assume that pushy parenting is the life-jacket required to keep our children’s heads above water. It can be painful too to know that what we have done out of love may also have caused harm.

“As parents, it’s our natural instinct to protect, but sometimes we get too close – and care too much – to see the bigger picture.”

* Taming The Tiger Parent by Tanith Carey, published by Robinson, is £8.99 in paperback. Visit tanithcarey.com

* Also check out Sir Ken Robinson’s Changing Education Paradigms:

KNOW THE SIGNS

Warning signs that you are a tiger parent...

* Do you use school open days as opportunities to find out how classmates’ work compares with your child’s?
* When you see another youngster do well, is your first question to yourself: ‘Why can’t my son/daughter do that?’
* Do you feel physically nervous before a child’s exam, sports match or parents’ evening?
* Do you find yourself wondering about how other parents are getting their children to achieve more than yours?
* Do you turn things into a competition for your children when they don’t need to be, like who cleaned their plate first?
* Have you ever inflated your child’s achievements to other parents?
* Are you irritated when other people’s children show talent? 
* Do you find it difficult to congratulate the parent of another child on an achievement?
* Do you lack meaningful relationships with other parents? Have you worked through several relationships at the school gates?
* Do you view new arrivals in your child’s class as possible rivals – and try and find out what levels they have attained? Have you developed a pattern of insisting on special treatment for your child for fear they will not otherwise get noticed? 
* Do you subscribe without question to theories like Malcom Gladwell’s 10,000 hour rule, which proposes that with this amount of practice, anyone can become an expert at anything, from violin to chess?
* Do you find yourself racing or driving dangerously to get your children to different extra-curricular activities?

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