Battle Hymn of the Tiger Father
Like Amy Chua, Mr. Gao was also a professor in an American University. I read Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother even before my daughter was born. But the pushy and harsh parenting of Amy Chua really scared me. And I determined not to be a mother like her(Because in her book, she had bad relationship with her two daughters).
But these days after I read this book, I really admire Mr. Gao's parenting. Her daughter Qian Gao was self-driven, hard-working, responsible and well-rounded girl. What was more important is that he and his daughter had a good and intimate relationship.
Like Amy Chua, Mr. Gao was a Tiger Father. He planed for his daughter's future career when she was 5 years old----to be a lawyer. Needless to doubt, Mr. Gao was a sophisticated father. Because being a lawyer can make her daughter to be the upper class in Amercia. When I read this, I was ashamed with my own father, who gave no suggest for my career all my life (Actually, as a city water company worker, he couldn't give any suggestions). Planning for the future career is the short part of all the Chinese parents and school education. Many people including me don't even know what they really like to do. But for Qian Gao, she had so many years to prepare for the dream job. So you can see the difference with her and Chinese students.
My husband Eric went to the University of Michigan to pursue his two-year graduate degree. I was with him there, too. But we know little about the K12 education in America. Many years as an unsuccessful businesswoman in this society, the most important thing is to know the rule of the game well before you play it. And for my daughter to make the future success in America, we must know the rule of how can she stands out in Amercian schools.
The rule is:
1. practice many math problems and pre-learn courses.
2. recognize more vocabulary and read massive English books especially classic literature.
3. take SAT as early as 10 years old.
4. learn a third or fourth language.
5. dance, musical instruments for displaying on the stage
6. composition skill
7. take at least 8 AP courses.
8. attend a lot of competitions such as math competitions.
9. do part-time jobs.
10. talk with or work with successful adults.
I have already checked the list of all the 38 AP courses, and found the following AP courses are interested:
Calculus AB; Biology: Chinese: Computer science A; Japanese; Macroeconomics; Microeconomics; Phychology
I happen to have learned all these courses. And I will suggest my daughter to learn them. Although she is only 4 years old :-)
After read this book, I got a deeper understanding with American K12 education. It is said American K12 education is not as solid as Chinese education. But it is a misunderstanding. Because although the demand of K12 education is lower than Chinese one, if you wanna be excellent, you can pre-learn a lot of high level courses and explore more interests. The little after-school homework makes it possible. Meanwhile in China, all the students no matter talented ones or bad-scored ones must be in the same pace. There are no access for talented students to explore more.
I finally got to know the benefit of American K12 education, thanks to Mr. Gao's book.
