Pedagogically-speaking, the consensus is that mentoring and tutoring works. Maybe parents can’t help their children with a topic. But the one-on-one interaction (or one-on-few) works very well in helping them learn to solve the problem.

Obviously, children have to learn on their own. And parents shouldn’t turn the mentoring relationship into a helicopter situation, where they are just solving the problem. But there’s a fine line here, and where I have knowledge about a subject matter that exceeds my child’s, I think it’s very beneficial (to her and me) to help them work through problems.

Oddly enough (or maybe not), we find that in the workforce, pairing new employees with experienced employees is the best way to get the new employee up to speed.

Regarding my daughter and her math …

Because it’s fun. Because I can. Because I know the material *much* better than she does, and it will be several years yet before she knows more about this particular subject than I do (or perhaps never). Because it keeps me fresh. Because she needs encouragement, and girls don’t get much encouragement re math and science (certainly not from the YW at Church or their leaders).

About the joy: I’m one of those of whom Blain spoke who have not “reproduced” (such a bloodless word), but for 30+ years, I’ve shared a few parenting ups and downs in connection with four remarkable offspring of a dear friend.

One in particular I fell for when he was 3 days old. Have never gotten over it. He is a charming, beautiful, gifted person, and like many, he hated school (started too early) and was super-shy about putting himself forward socially. He didn’t want to go on a mission at 19, and his parents wisely applied no pressure. When he was 21, he was ready to go. I was very apprehensive. I knew first-hand the unique trials of a mission. I prayed, “Just don’t let him ask to be be sent home early. Don’t let it be so hard that he quits.” I almost quit early on in my own mission, and I knew others who did quit, and who never quite got over it. (Elder Richard L. Evans once said to a missionary-preparation group, “Don’t quit. If you quit, you have to explain why your whole life.”)

Well. Then came the joy. “Surprised by joy” is apt. The joy for me was not about the fact that he became a senior companion very quickly, or a district leader unusually quickly, or an assistant to the president, though he did all that. The joy was how much he loved it, and about the fact that in EVERY picture we ever saw from his mission (and there were bushels), someone had an arm around this 6’6″ angel–whether it was a companion or the mission president or the president’s wife, investigators or members or street vendors! They rejoiced in his very presence.

The classroom as well as the home can offer such joy. One example: a boy who, I thought, didn’t belong in a particuar Honors class. He wrote poorly, hardly ever participated, wore a baseball cap low over his eyes. Everyone in class knew he was struggling. Then one day, small groups of students were trying to make some sort of graphic capturing of sections of Dante’s Inferno. Cruising around the classroom, I looked over John’s shoulder, to see an artistic rendering of one canto that made me gasp in amazement. The other students couldn’t believe their eyes either. In a later class, I called on John to read a poem aloud. Again, we all were astonished at the meaning and depth he conveyed. And on the last day of class, John played on the guitar a short poem he had set to music. I believe every person in the class felt the joy of learning more fully who John really was.

Thank you, Margaret, for yet another rich, sweet insight.

However, a psychiatrist friend advised me never to start looking for that acceptance before the child is at least 22.

Yeah, that’s about right. You may get it sooner than that, but if you do, count it as a gift. ..bruce.. (father of nine)

1. There are others going through worse things than me.
2. “…all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.” D&C 122:7
3. I only appreciate the blessings when I have something to compare them with.
4. I am following in Christ’s footsteps as I am stretched by saving others.
5. It teaches me gratitude – one of the highest forms of love.

Ray, thanks to you also for sharing your struggles to raise your foster son. I have faith that they will bear good fruit. You’re an inspiration to me. Maybe with such good examples I’ll be able to learn this parenting business fast enough and well enough to do some good.

One of the pleasures of Facebook is to have contact with former students — I knew them as troubled or confused or self-aware teenagers, and they have become functional adults. It’s a good reminder that the hulking individuals that fill my classroom are not really adults, but still in development. Congratulations to your son on any and all of his achievements.