Push a Little! Check More Often!

My son, Regie, been choosing between computer science and computer engineering since he stepped high school. His impression is that engineering requires high mathematical knowledge. He is now 4th year high school and getting close to college. A day before school started, I checked his timeline and read his tweet, "Ewan ko ba.. kinakabahan nga ko sa College ee... gusto ko din kasi Animation kaso yung income iniisip ko". Second day of school, when he started doing his prerequisites for his Math subject, he felt frustrated and thought that he is not good enough to take up engineering. Hmmm, now I know why he was anxious to step college. So I asked him if he wants to change his mind of pursuing his dream. He just looked at me with his meek eyes and gave me no answer. I never said a word. I never doubted, and I know that he never gives up, but I never pushed him hard to do better in Math. He is a History geek and why would I be mad if he lost his interest in numbers and formulas.

"Nose bleed"

"What duh.....?!!!!!!"

Day 2 of his prerequisite exercise, I noticed that he was so confused. I challenged him by saying, "Are you tired? You want me to answer the rest of the problems for you?". Looking exhausted yet determined, "No, I can do this, Nanay. Just give me some more exercises to refresh what I have learned from the previous school years". So I did, I helped him by giving more exercises similar to the problems in his book.  After he completed his target prerequisites for the day, his exhausted looking face became pleasant. Then he said, "I think I can easily recover, I'm having fun with Math once again". I asked, "So you're good with computer engineering course again, huh!". He replied, "A little push is all that I need and I can get there myself."

As he was solving the last few portions of his Math prerequisites, he just laughed out loud as he realized the tricks and discovered the secrets of Mathematics. Well, he's really having fun with Math again.

Hmmm, what did I get from our anecdote?
- Kids these days are in to social networking. If other kids do not want their parents to invade their privacy, not with Regie and his kid sister, Nadine. They never put their Facebook posts and Twitter tweets to private. I'm trying not to miss every single post and tweet they made. One of my friends told me to leave them alone, give them privacy and not to religiously check their timelines 'coz they are not getting any younger. Why would I? They might not be able to share all of their instantaneous thoughts to me. Checking their timelines is one way of knowing how they feel and what they are getting into. I wouldn't know that Regie was confused on what to take up in college if I did not read his tweet.

- I was surprised that at his age, he's trying to balance between interest, capability, and income. When I was at his age, I was so idealistic that I never cared about salary as long as I got the profession that I love. Maybe because he is so considerate and he knows our expenses, how costly it is to send them to school and provide their needs. Sssshhhh, I've read this in his twitter, "Daming bayarin. JS, field trip, graduation, retreat, etc. XD"

- My understanding in "Encouragement vs. Praise" got deeper. I recently read in a parenting site that encouragement is more helpful than praise. Encouraging children by giving the descriptive outcome of their actions and decisions would help them become self motivated. While praising children by telling them how others react on their accomplishments would give a lot of pressure that make them feel anxious of not satisfying others' expectations rather than to focus on their interests. As a famous line in a classic commercial goes, "Supportahan taka!".

Still a lot to discover about my kids and come across to many lessons on how to deal with them. And I cherish every single detail of our interactions, and I never want to miss their posts and tweets. Because these are my ways to get to them closer and closer; make me feel confident that they doing well; and there's a bright future awaits them.