Lost Childhood
By Alain Burrese
I teach English at a hogwan, or
private academy, in Kangnung, and though I don't want to condemn my place of
employment, (for it is because of this job that I have been able to live in
Korea and take pleasure in the many things this country has to offer), I would
like to address a problem that I see in this society. This problem is by no
means isolated to Korea. I saw the same thing while teaching in Japan, and it
also is going on in my home country of America. However, it seems to be
increasing at an accelerated rate in Asia, and since I am now in Korea, I will
address the problem here..
The problem is one of lost childhood. It seems like the society has deemed
childhood an unnecessary luxury and a waste of time. Korea has developed to a
point that it is an ever increasing competitive society. (As has much of the
rest of the world.) With the competitiveness of entrance exams to schools and
universities, combined with the competitive workforce, children are being
pressured at an accelerated rate to succeed. (Or at least to fulfill their
parents definitions of success, that more and more is defined by the size of
one's bank account.)
The trend is to put children into school at the earliest age possible, load them
with homework, and take away their time, creativity, and play. And as if going
to public school six days a week isn't enough, most kids have to spend extra
hours at hogwans, loading them down
with even more homework, again, six days a week. When I tell friends that many
of the middle school students stay at the academy until midnight, they retort
with, "I wasn't allowed to stay up that late when I was that age, needless
to say I couldn't stay out of the house until that hour." And maybe it can
be best summed up by a statement one of my students said after I had answered
his questions about school in America. I told him that we didn't go to school on
Saturdays, and that we didn't go to hogwans. He said, "Oh, America must be a happy place."
Yes, if it were only that simple. But to a child it is that simple, and it's
this simplicity and innocence that we are robbing children of today when we
force them to adhere to adult time frames and competitiveness.
Actually, this is not new. Over two thousand years ago the Taoist philosopher
Chuang-tse described a similar situation. Here's Benjamin Hoff's translation of
that story as found in The Te of Piglet:
"The ancient emperor Shun encouraged rivalry in the minds of the people.
Children were born the usual number of months after conception; but five months
after that, they were being taught to converse. Soon they were calling people by
their titles and personal names. Then man began to die while still young.....
This governing provided order in name only. In reality, it produced chaos. It
ran contrary to the light of the sun and the moon, brought harm to the mountains
and rivers, and poisoned the fruit of the four seasons. It proved more deadly
than the sting of a scorpion, or the bite of a dangerous beast."
Children can not cope with adult schedules and demands. Trying to make them
adapt to these exhausts a child's energy supply and leads to stress, which is no
longer an adults-only problem. Many young children today are experiencing
grown-up problems due to parents pushing, teachers insisting and coaches
demanding.
Rather than force children to become adults at an earlier age than nature
intended, we should be helping them develop the abilities to face the
difficulties immediately confronting them. We should be nourishing creativity,
building their self-esteem, and encouraging primary greatness, which is
character that comes form a strong set of values. Childhood should be a time for
experimentation and trying a variety of new activities. Instead of forcing a
child to engage in some sport, or to partake in a certain class, why not let the
child choose? If he or she then looses interest and wants to pursue something
else, so what? This is the time for it. We should be encouraging children to
develop their own interests and then help them realize their own potential. We
should not be making clones of ourselves, or turning them into what we want them
to be.
This situation won't be changed quickly. It will take time and conscious effort
among all those in the society. And the change will slowly evolve through the
generations. It's like the old saying, "If you want to make a lady, start
with her grandmother." If we start now, things can be better for our
grandchildren. If we continue down the road we are traveling, childhood stress
disorders will only rise, giving way to a whole new variety of problems in
society's youth. While we adults strive to figure out what happiness truly is,
and how we can live happily, we can at least ensure that the children of our
societies can live in a "happy place." We can do this by letting kids
be kids.
This was originally in the October 10, 1996 issue of the Korea Herald.