Above: Some well-to-do parents like to send their children to ballet school. Ballet is regarded by them as an
elegant, upper class.
Talent requires sacrifice
Overloading your kids may harm growth in childhood
By Kwok Kar Bo
Talented children, no matter whether under parental pressure or out of their own will, strive especially hard to win over others in every aspect.
Law Kit Ki, a quiet and courteous 11-year-old girl, is one of these bright, self-motivated students.
Having studied piano from the age of 5, she has won more than her fair share of prizes and will likely attend the International Young Pianists in Concert in Singapore in July.
Yet her musical development does not affect her academic results. She has topped the class for years and managed to earn scholarships since Primary 1.
Above: Some well-to-do parents like to send their children to ballet school. Ballet is regarded by them as an
elegant, upper class.
“Kit Ki works very hard, but she is not as active as I would like her to be. I would like her to play more and have strong will at times,” said her mother.
Meanwhile, there are other talented kids who cannot be tops in everything.
Cheung Yau Man, 10, has high expectations from her parents. Her father, Mr. Cheung Hop Kie, has spent a lot of time and money on Yau Man to make her a great piano player. He accompanies her to lessons, practices, and competitions.
“She is too young to understand the masterpieces she practises,” said Mr. Cheung. “She needs someone to teach her how to pour feelings into the music.”
He firmly believes that a good environment can help produce genius. Therefore he makes Yau Man practise two hours every weekday and four to six hours every day on weekends.
Unlike Kit Ki, she is having difficulties with school work and has little time left for playing with schoolmates. Among her few pleasures are a stroll for a few minutes and endless amounts of chocolate and ice-cream.
Then there are the Chan sisters, Joyce and Tracy. They are studying Form 2 and Primary 6. Both perform piano for the Ling Leung Church Kindergarten Orchestra.
They swim well and have won many medals.
The elder sister also plays clarinet in the Wind Band of the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, while the younger one plays double bass.
Certainly, the two bright sisters are the pride of their parents. However, they spend over $10,000 per month on their activities. The kids are long disposed of television for the sake of their concentration.
In contrast to the Cheung and Chan families, Chan Chung Ling, a little girl learning ballet at the Hong Kong Dance and Arts Institutes, does not receive any pressure from her family. Although she is praised for her dancing talent, her mother, Mrs. Chan Tang Shiu Ying, has not looked for a better dancing school for her.
“I do not want her to become great in any field. As long as she is happy, I am satisfied,” said she.
Kwong Yan Lok, 12, also plays the piano and studies ballet. His ballet skills have already won him a whole year scholarship at the Jean Wong School of Ballet. But somehow football is his favourite diversion.
His mother, Miss Amy Yim said, “Ballet and piano are only supplementary activities which I would like Yan Lok to learn alongside with school work. I let him participate in these activities on the principle that more knowledge makes a more confident personality. I do not expect him to excel in these areas.”
Prizes can be an aspiration for children to better themselves, but a happy childhood does not necessarily work on them. As long as parents allow their offspring to develop according to their interests and pace, they are happy.
Said Miss Anna Hui Nana, executive officer of the Centre for Child Development at Hong Kong Baptist University: “The most precious thing about childhood is their particular way of thinking, which is pure and uncontaminated from the complicated world.
She warns the parents that, talented or not, children must play. Playing is important for children. Playing is the world of children. Children lack this learning, curing and growing phrase are more likely to become insufficient in some aspect of their later parts of lives.
“Many talented children have a tendency to become mature earlier than other children. If they can still preserve happiness, this may happen of their own accord rather than under external influences,” she said.
