Recently a friend shared with me that during remote learning her preschool son had to prepare a project for the online portion of the class. When all of his fellow students presented their projects, he was embarrassed because most of the other offerings were perfect…a little too perfect. In fact, it was pretty obvious parents had “helped” to make them. This is not the first time I have heard a story like this. Over and over again my fellow educators share stories of parents doing a child’s work or blatantly feeding them answers during live classes. I know it’s well-meaning on the part of these adults, everyone wants their child to succeed. But, I’m begging and pleading as an educator stop!

I’m about to get on a soapbox labeled process, not product. Here is why this concept is important. For kids, especially young kids, school is not about finding the correct answer. It is about learning how to find the correct answer. It’s about the process of trying something, getting a less than satisfactory product, and then trying something different. The “mistakes” are literally where the learning happens. Here are three things your child gains by doing it on their own, even if they have to struggle a little bit.

Creativity: It can never develop if you are overly concerned with the end result or “getting it right”. Can you imagine if Picasso’s mom had said “The nose doesn’t go there”? Sometimes the strange stuff is the good stuff. So, it doesn’t matter if their snowman looks like a snowman or a puddle of white paint with 10 eyes. It’s their snowman and it’s great!

Problem Solving: Tenacity is not a glamorous attribute but it is a vital part of solving problems. Thomas Edison famously had over 2,000 designs for a light bulb that failed and he burned thru a small fortune creating them before he developed one that worked and made him a wealthy legend. The stakes are significantly lower for your 1^st grader but the benefits of learning thru trial and error are priceless. Letting your child try different things until they get a result they are happy with will serve them well in all their future endeavors.

Confidence: Confidence is a byproduct of hard-earned success…and failure.  Confident people walk into every situation knowing no matter the circumstances, they can figure it out. No one hands them the right answers and they get things wrong as often as not. But, they learn from it and they do better next time.

Let me be clear. Valuing process over product doesn’t mean you shouldn’t help your child. They need you to encourage, to point out holes in their logic, and tell them you believe in them as you dust them off after they fall. But helping means guiding them not doing it for them. When you are the coach and cheerleader to their quarterback you are gifting them with the ability to do the hard work of skill-building, self-evaluation, and learning from their missteps. Let them be proud of the work they did and then help them confidently say. Next time I will do even better!

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Online learning programs have become increasingly popular since the “suspended class, ongoing learning” (停课不停学 tíngkè bù tíngxué) initiative, but XRS education (学而思), an online tutoring program based in Beijing, has recently got into trouble for displaying “vulgar videos, inciting puppy/early love among other issues”.

The Beijing Education Bureau has arranged negotiations with the company aiming to perfect the information security system, strengthen content examination, and to make individual companies take greater responsibility for the content they provide. After an official warning, the institution immediately removed the content deemed offensive and unhealthy.

XRS education isn’t the only company running into problems with the Beijing Education Bureau, homeschooling app BBG (步步高) has also been condemned for displaying what’s deemed as “adult content” while other online learning programs have been exposed to promoting video games.

Stronger supervision, “heavy fist” correction, and providing a “radiant” learning environment for adolescents were labeled as necessary steps by the Bureau towards a healthier online learning experience. Since “adolescents are still internally developing, they are easily prone to vulgar culture and harmful information, and the blind emulation of such practices could lead to harmful effects.” They also issued a dire warning: “If platforms aren’t disciplined, government agencies will interfere.”

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