It's that time of year when kids get homework - and over-zealous parents make a mess of it for them, writes Fionola Meredith.
With the new school term fast approaching, parents and children across the country are gearing up again for those hectic weekday mornings. No more leisurely summer holiday breakfasts, where mum has time for two cups of coffee over the papers, and the kids get to loaf around in their pyjamas till 11am. But it's hard to get back into that highly-organised rhythm. Pretty soon, there's bound to be one of those awful school mornings when you all get up late, realise that the lunchboxes are still in the car from the day before, reeking of blackened banana, and - worst of all - homework has been completely forgotten. That's when you come up against one of the classic parenting dilemmas: should I just do their homework for them?
It's 20 minutes and counting until the school bell rings, and the children are still running about upstairs, yelling that they can't find clean pairs of socks. You know it's the wrong thing to do, but maybe just this once . . . ?
Most of us draw the line at actually doing our children's homework for them, but there's still the knotty question of how much assistance we should give them. And even if we want to, are we really up to the task? A new British government-commissioned poll indicated that seven out of 10 parents find their children's homework too tricky to be able to help them. As parents, much depends on our own educational backgrounds. For instance, I'm happy to provide an overview of modern continental philosophy, but ask me to do long division and I'm stumped.
But while many parents are left bewildered by their offspring's homework - peering uselessly at the questions and making tentative suggestions, most of which are quelled by a withering look from the young scholar - other parents just can't leave well enough alone. Known as "helicopter parents", they're to be found incessantly hovering at their children's side, providing a high level of guidance - whether it's wanted or not. According to many educationalists, this over-zealous style of parenting is becoming increasingly common. In fact, a recent extension of the term is Black Hawk parents; named after the combat helicopter, it's applied to those who cross the line from relentless interference to definably unethical behaviour, such as writing their children's assessed coursework for them.
Educational psychologists say we're doing our children much more harm than good when we give in to these ultra-controlling tendencies. Dr Madeline Levine, an American psychologist and the author of a controversial new book, The Price of Privilege, says parental pressure is creating a generation of discontented and maladjusted children.
Levine believes that over-intrusive parents are seriously damaging their children's development. By refusing to let them make their own mistakes, they stifle their offspring's ability to build a sense of independence and self-worth. She says, "The most dangerous feelings a child can have are of self-hatred, yet parents are unwittingly instilling those feelings by expecting so much".
And it's the pampered children from well-off homes who are really feeling the effects of this relentless parental scrutiny. Levine thinks that high-earning - and high-achieving - parents are particularly prone to burdening their kids with a pervading sense of personal failure, by driving them impossibly hard to succeed in every area of their lives. Other educationalists see the phenomenon as a symptom of "loving neglect", where cash-rich but time-poor parents lavish their youngsters with all the latest technological gadgets and gizmos, but rarely sit down and hear about the minutiae of their child's day at school. Yet somehow they can squeeze in the time to march into school and challenge the youngster's teacher about a mark that was lower than expected.
While most parents don't take the urge to interfere to quite such lengths, it's best to be aware that there are untapped depths of perfectionism and control-freakery within many of us. As we bend down to put the requisite parental signature to yet another piece of homework, most of us take a quick check through the grubby scrawl to see if it looks half-decent. After all, if we're putting our name to it, we don't want it to reflect badly on us. It's all too easy to get over-involved, hooked on that vicarious thrill when our children succeed. But when it comes to schoolwork, we're doing them a greater favour by standing back and letting them go it alone - even when it's only 20 minutes until that school bell rings.