Cultural differences in parenting

Chinese parents order their kids to get A’s, but western parents only ask their children to try their best. Why are cultures so different in their approach toward their child’s success? In several essays, the authors explore these differentness in western cultural parenting vs eastern cultural parenting. When it comes to parenting, different cultures have their way of raising their children, when it comes to music, academics, and extracurricular activities. In the essay “why Chinese Mothers Are Superior” by Amy Chua. She talks about how she raises her two daughters to be the best at everything they do. She says that Chinese children are more successful in life then the western children, she even thinks when it comes to Chinese children there better at doing school work like math, sciences, and health. This is because Chinese people are better at parenting and raising their children to be successful “from what” Amy Chua says. She begins talking about what her daughters can and can’t do, one activity was playing music, she begins talking and this is what she states. “Can’t play any instrument other than the piano or violin” (Cha53).

Wow is what most people might say because it takes time to play these two instruments and you must focus more when learning how to play them. Well there was an author who disagreed with Amy Chua and he was kind of outraged by her statements, so in contrast to what Amy Chua states David Brooks who wrote “Amy Chua is a Whip”. States “practicing a piece of music for four hours requires focused attention” (58). Brooks was basically say that no one can focus that long without taking a brake because the brain only can take but so much information in at a time.

Secondly Amy Chua then goes on to talk about her daughter’s academics, she wants her daughters to be excellent in all that they do without taking any shortcuts. She knows that life is hard and situations come up where your force to think fast, about the choses you make so she wants her daughters to be ready for any situation that may arise in their life’s. She states that “Chinese parents demand perfect grades because they believe that their child can get them” (Chua55). She wants the best for her daughters so by disciplining them and making them study hard so that they get good grades, she is showing that her Chinese daughters can do anything that they put their minds to, so long as she demands them to do as she says then they will get perfect grads all the time. Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld, Amy Chua’s daughter who wrote “Why I Love my Strict Chinese Mother”.

Compares why it was good for her mother to be demanding. She states that “Knowing that you’ve pushed yourself, body and mind to the limit of your own potential” (Rebenfeld60). She is saying that her mother pushed her and her sister because she knew that they have petechial to succeed and overcome any obstacle that they my face in life. Sophia Chua- Rubenfeld knew her mother was tuff and faced the fact that, Amy-chua was doing this to make her and her sister take responsibility for not owning up to their mistakes, She was tuff and she did not let them get away with taking the easy way out in life, she knew if she disciplined her daughters when they got school work like, test, and other academics wrong they would come out to be victorious in all that they did in life. This is because she loves them as Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld says, and she knows that her daughters have what it take to achieve lifelong goals that would make them superorder when it comes to working in the work force. She also states that “if I died tomorrow, I would die feeling I’ve lived my whole life 110 percent (Rubenfeld62).She knows that she has worked hard and thanks to her mother she can say that when she dies she will feel “Great.”

Lastly Amy-Chua talks about her daughters extracurricular activates she believes that her daughters don’t have time for fun and games. She states that “Chinese parents understand nothing is fun until you’re good at it” (Cha54). She goes on to say that children on their own never want to work, so in order to keep her daughters minds focused on their academics she prevents them from doing the following activates. Amy-cha tells her daughters that they can’t attend sleepovers, have a play date, be in a school play, and watch TV or play computer games. This is because Amy-Chua does not want her daughters to lose track of what is important in life, and what is important is that her daughters don’t get any grades less than an A. she believes that if she lets her daughters do what they want.

They will not make the best choses for themselves, so she forbids them from doing these activates to make them more responsible women. In contrast to what she talks about David Brooks who wrote “Amy Chua is a Wimp” states that, “she’s protecting them from the most intellectually demanding activates because she doesn’t understand what’s cognitively difficult and what isn’t”(Brooks58). Brooks thinks that she is not letting her daughters be free, and she is keeping them sheltered and by doing this she is not letting them get a taste of what life is really about. He feels as if Amy-Chua let loss and let her daughters have a bit of freedom they can also learn by interacting with other people, but by Amy-Chua coddling them they will never the interacting skills need to interact with others in the work force.