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Are You A Helicopter Parent? — Merina Smith
American families have changed in the past 30 years. Parents are older and children are fewer. This combination of changes has led to a lot of parents who hover over their child’s every waking moment. They enroll their children in numerous lessons and activities, arrange play dates, help with homework, demand little by way of chores (but supervise what few chores they actually require), influence teachers and school administrators as much as possible on their child’s behalf, and continue this behavior into college. The charming designation “helicopter parents” has consequently entered the lexicon.
As the mother of five children, I often felt guilty that I didn’t give my children enough time. I sometimes thought that I should be playing with them or supervising them instead of doing some necessary task. Parental confession: I can count on one hand the number of times I helped with homework. They were on their own in choosing their friends, and in a whole lot of other ways.
I will admit, though, that I was a bit of a helicopter parent with regard to music. I spent countless hours at the piano with them, and many more nagging them to practice. With varying degrees of competence, they are all musicians and, I think, grateful for the training.
We are friends with family members of the very successful pitcher Roy Halladay. His parents recognized his athletic talent at an early age and systematically worked with him to develop his arm, get him coaches, etc. Needless to say, it paid off. He is known as a very disciplined pitcher who has worked very hard at his craft.
Given examples like that, I do understand the need for some helicopter parenting. Kids don’t naturally have a lot of discipline in developing their talents. The idea is to figure out what those talents are and assist them in getting to the skill level where the activity itself is so rewarding that they push themselves to play harder music, throw a faster pitch, etc.
I have known many parents over the years, most with one or two kids, who are full-blown helicopter parents. I remember one only child who took piano lessons with the same teacher as my kids. He was a talented boy, but played three instruments and took tennis and other lessons. Sometimes at recitals he’d play his piece and then fall asleep while the other kids played. I don’t think he got much downtime.
With our large family, we had to be with our children mostly as a family instead of individually (music was an exception). We had dinner together every night, attended church together, and enjoyed playing games, hiking, and doing other family things. Two parents can’t hover over five children. I sometimes wonder, though, if I would have hovered more if I only had one or two children. I suspect I would have.
I don’t think all hovering is bad. But I do wonder what the right amount is and how parents figure that out. Sadly, parental wisdom frequently seems to come after the task is more or less completed.
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As per comment #12, I do believe it’s a generational thing. My parents (the Greatest G) set pretty high standards in terms of education/long term career goals and didn’t really have to hover because all of my friends’ parents were exerting similar pressure. The parental mantra in my first 18 years of life was all about the GGGs- Good grades, Good college, Good job and oh- by the way- we encourage the two semesters abroad but you better take on a part-time job to contribute to this even though we can afford it and then you’re on your own after graduation.
P.S. After a brief discussion with my dad today about this post and thread, he felt compelled to remind me of my good fortune: “You wanted for nothing but were expected to achieve.”
Mine was more a Jane Goodall style of parenting. Observe, only interact if life or limb is threatened.
My four spent a lot of time with the children of good friends; one friend had five, another two. Now that they are all young adults they occasionally run into each other at parties and coffee shops. From what I understand they all enjoy recounting our adventures and weekends in the mountains, all the different roles they played in the group and how they all interacted with each other.
They run down the line until they get to my youngest (the youngest of them all) and wave their hand dismissively while saying “And Sam? Sam was raised by wolves.”
I’ve thought a lot about modern family planning, the consequences of seeing children as an exception rather than a rule– viewing children as a liability to protect ourselves against, until we’re feeling financially/emotionally stable enough to handle it (whatever that means). I so wish that the default would swing the other way, that we’d see children as wealth and blessing, with “planning” as the exception.
But that’s another soapbox for another post. My real point is, in such discussions, often you hear people protest that if they have more than X number of children, they won’t possibly have time for them all! As you point out, that may not be so bad, if “time” means insufferable micromanagement.
I’m the eldest of six. We were (happily) neither helicoptered nor neglected. :)
I am deeply attached to my own daughter but not inclined to hover. And as we add more children, my hovering capacity will be maxed out . . . which is probably good.
I never considered myself an HP but I’ve been way more involved with my kids (7) than my parents were with me and my siblings – which didn’t take much since they were definitely anti-hover types. If Mom ever helped me with school work I don’t remember. Dad read our report cards and if there was anything below an A we’d get a good scolding. I’m pretty sure that was the normal amount of parental involvement for my peer group. On the other hand, my oldest son used to joke that smother was another word for mother. When he left for college he said he wasn’t going to call for six weeks and then he’d call only every other week after that. He ended up calling almost every night. Not because he couldn’t hack it, but I think he was just used to talking about his day with us.
I don’t think any of our kids were homesick when they went off to college. I don’t know if that means we were successful or or parental failures….
From a conversation with my son,
He concurred that JoALT and I were successful in that regard. He graduates/commissions in mid Jun.
Since I was an Instructor Pilot for brand new USAF pilot wannabes, I was better equipped for driving. He heard about it when he blew a redlight (on the orange side of yellow) with me in the passenger seat. Otherwise, it was debrief after the ride.
When my oldest was a youngster we went through a program called “Parenting with Love and Logic”. They talked about the three parents: the drill sergeant, the helicopter, and the consultant. They wanted you to transition from being a helicopter or a drill sergeant to becoming a consultant. Here’s what I found: that’s all a load of crap. It sounds great in the weekly meeting you go to, but in practice it simply doesn’t work. I’ve come to the conclusion that in certain areas and times of your kid’s lives you have to be any one of those kinds of parents. Sometimes you have to bark orders and threaten holy hell. Sometimes you have to stand over them and make sure they do it and do it right. Other times you can give advice and let the kid work it out. but if you think you can be the consultant all the time, telling the kid “Well, you let me know how that works out for you”, then let me prepare you for something: your kid will be mediocre.
As an example, let’s talk about music. I am supremely confident that either of my two girls could go on to make a living playing music. But I tell you, the first few years were hell. They both play piano, one plays the violin, the other cello. Getting them to practice was just horrible. You’d think I’d asked them to chop off a finger and boil it for dinner. But now, I can hardly get them to stop playing. I think with these talent type things, whether it’s music, sports, art, drama, whatever, you have to push them over the tipping point. I really don’t think most kids would get there on their own.
Spin, I think the difference from Helicopter parents I’ve seen or heard from (Amy Chua) is that they cannot turn it off. I always had to balance Thomas against my military service (to whom I’d been indentured except for a 3 day period after my divorce in 1997). I had to rely on the help of others and that prevented me from being a Helicopter Parent –When JoALT came into our lives, she provided continuity that my previous arrangements didn’t have. Still, the goals above dictated our responses to any stimuli he provided — but the service to the goals were paramount. I actually wonder if Helicopter Parents cannot see that their behavior is overkill in response to the goals.
This sounds right.
If I am paying $$$ for something, a class or lesson or whatever, my child will put in the time and respect worthy of my outlay. So, if you play an instrument, you practice every day, especially weekends when you have extra time. If you are taking a class, you complete the assignments. If you have made a commitment, I will do everything short of killing you or doing it myself to make sure you complete your commitment. I won’t sit in on your class, hovering over you, but I will sit in on your practice sessions, hovering over you and making sure you practice those parts over and over that you have trouble with, keep proper tempo, etc. You will show me your prep for debate before we head out in the car. Etc.
Spin, that is absolutely true about music. There are a few exceptions, but most kids will not practice on their own when they begin lessons. You have to insist that they practice. It soon becomes clear whether or not they have sufficient talent to make the investment worthwhile. Though some with talent never take off with practice….
Mama Toad, sounds like you and I have spent significant amounts of our life doing similar things.
Merina, thanks for this post, I’ve been thinking a lot about it.
I think the difference between our parenting and the helicopter thing is that while we have high expectations, and demand much from our children (according to what we judge to be their abilities), we don’t protect them from failure or physical adventure. My five year old just went squealing past the house on a Big Wheel, flying down our very excellent sledding hill. We have ropes hanging off trees and a very high tree house. The children who have passed the “knife test” have their own swiss-army-style knives. We frequently kick the tadpoles out of the house and laugh at boredom. We also shove them into classes and activities they might prefer to avoid and demand that they do their best. With six tadpoles and two busy parents (Papa Toad runs his own business and I homeschool, volunteer in many activities or am sick, depending on the season…), I can’t hover too much. I can, however, keep you in from going out with your friends until you complete the summer job applications we talked about…
Mama Toad, love your comments. I think the main thing here is that the kids know that there are high expectations and that they have responsibilities. They are allowed to fail, but not allowed to not learn from their failures. Toad Hall sounds like a wonderful home! Being further down the road than you–all grown now and the last one has only a year of college left–I can say that while there have been young adult challenges and more to come, I am very happy with how everyone has turned out, and of course, thrilled with the grandkids!
The discipline issue is very hard. It’s true that kids generally need external “help” to buckle down and get good at something. It’s also true that kids often resent parental pressure to achieve in a particular area. In particular, children resent feeling that they are being used as proxies to fulfill parental dreams (even though to some extent it’s really very normal and even reasonable to do that). Figuring out when to press and when to give up is thus very challenging.
The thing is, it’s not just a question of talent, though that is one issue. Even if a child is talented enough to excel at something, it may not be worth investing the resources (and enduring the unpleasantness of the intermediate work) if the activity doesn’t match with their interests and inclinations. A person can have the raw skill for a particular sort of achievement, and yet be temperamentally unsuited to it. But of course that can be hard to judge when a person’s character is as yet impartially formed.
My ideal would be to demand that all my kids apply themselves to some activity or achievement (whether music or sport or the science fair or the school newspaper… the list of “approved” activities isn’t endless but I think it’s pretty long), but to be fairly flexible about letting them figure out what they want that to be. But I realize there are all kinds of pragmatic difficulties in making that happen. Your own time and resources aren’t limitless, and kids aren’t that good at figuring out what they want, and let’s face it! Parents do have vicarious “dreams” for their kids. Maybe just try to be generous about letting those go if we realize that it’s not really helping the kid anymore? Of course I’m not pretending that any of it is easy.
I think large families can help with that (which is to say, the pressure is much greater when you only have one or two children). It’s less painful for Mom that Billy simply isn’t going anywhere with the piano if Mary, Susie, and Jimmy are, and perhaps easier for her to recognize his other strengths. (Of course, the risk is favoritism towards those who go along with Mom’s dreams — but Mom’s dreams might be less demanding when she has more children to take part in them.)