- Image by Massa Coletiva via Flickr
For most parents, the idea of teaching is nothing more than helping their child memorize whatever has been printed in the textbooks. Whether parents are not interested in going beyond it or whether parents feel that they are incapable of going beyond it is important question.
In both cases, you will be sending a very bad message to your child. It is natural for the child to have queries and doubts when studying. Nine times out of ten, parents scold the child for such queries and try to focus on teaching whatever needs to be taught.
This will send the message across to the child that mere submission to authority is sufficient to solve the problem. When you criticize the child for being inquisitive and asking questions, you are basically teaching the child that curiosity is a bad thing. Once this message goes across, the child will lose interest in working hard and participating in real education.
Parents are product of their education system. However, this vicious cycle will have to end somewhere. Apart from academics and marks, you should focus on practical advantages and benefits as well.
Education is all about learning and falling in love with learning. If the child is encouraged to be curious, inquisitive and research for answers, the child will automatically start learning even if you stop teaching.
As time goes by, you will find that the child surpasses the expectations of his or her teachers because he or she is not operating on some artificial parameters. Rather, the child is more interested in satisfying curiosity and is prepared to go to any extent to achieve the goal.
It is this ideal situation that you should be aiming for. However, if you treat education and teaching as nothing more than the lessons provided in the text book, you would only be doing a disservice to your child. In the long run, this is going to work negatively.
