[Education is my second passion in life. It has become so not only because I did not have a very satisfactory experience myself when I was in the schools during the Cultural Revaluation, but also the comparisons I have been able to make while our children grow up in the UK. ]

I feel that the Chinese and British education systems are very much different, and so are the parents’ attitudes towards this subject. I have no intentions here to judge which one is better or worse but I do think there is something that we could learn to improve ours, especially if we want our children to be more independent, creative and innovative when they reach their adulthood.

Like many other Chinese parents, we used to ask ourselves questions like what we need to do for our children. Should we do this for her today or should we do that for her tomorrow? But what we have learnt over the years has changed the content of the question. Now it has become a very simple one: what can we do to support her on what she wants to do herself?

In general, it is widely accepted by parents here that children would achieve the best of their potentials when they do things that they enjoy. So if anything comes up outside the school curriculum, such as playing musical instruments, drawing/painting, dancing, etc, the parents would ask the child first whether s/he would like to take it on or not. If the answer is “Yes”, then the parents will find out what they can do to support that initiative. Otherwise, the idea is dumped.

Over here in the UK, the respect from parents to their kids’ decisions is phenomenal if compared with what it is like generally in China. The relationship between the two generations is far more relaxed and on equal terms. This gives the kids a much wider scope of freedom with developing their own thoughts and ideas. This is also reflected by how they address each other in the family - instead of calling Mummy or Daddy, the first names are commonly used, which I guess that most of the Chinese parents would find it very uncomfortable with (me and my husband included!).

Yet at work, amongst all the Editors-in-Chiefs I have worked with, they all prefer to be addressed by first names and I confess that I found this quite difficult at the beginning, as I was so used to address people with such high status by their titles such as Professor or Doctor. But now, not only have I got so used to this myself but also started wondering if small things like this had anything to do with mothering innovative thoughts and ideas. 

(to be continued)