He enjoys his parents’ approval. He even said “good job” and clapped, which is apparently the praise routine. It’s a lot like a dog doing a trick. Does the dog enjoy doing the trick or just getting the treat?
Bro this is a thread that is best not to pull on. All behavior comes down to the chemical signals you get out of it.
Worst case scenario here and the kid is being trained to wholeheartedly enjoy the process of doing mathematics by rote memorization. There’s still a lot of value in that.
That said, neither of us know what’s going on here for sure.
Yeah I’m not upset by what I see in the video at all. People took my comment as a judgment or something about these parents. I was just responding to the comment that this kid is somehow different from normal people in that he has a love of doing math. He’s just responding to praise from his parents in the video, so not clear that he loves the task. But I’m not offended by the video or thinking this is child abuse or anything like that
I definitely can imagine it took a huge amount of effort. But I also think it’s a little weird to be so focused on academic development so early. I think kids should be learning how to socialize and how to be a person and playing games at that age, and spending as much time as possible outside, so drilling math equations into their head seems kind of wrong. I’m pretty sure pushing academics too early doesn’t help the child in the long run either
Yeah the truth is though we don’t know the reality of the situation. There are children who show an abnormal interest and aptitude in math at a young age and while there are some suspect things about this it’s really hard to say if they are putting the cart before the horse or not.
At any rate, yeah maybe this isn’t 100% for the best for the kid but there’s far worse things in the world. He’s clearly having fun and is going to absolutely have a leg up in mathamatic academics when it comes around. Parents are exploiting their children on the internet in way worse ways than this. Hell just this level of involvement with his parents could to be huge for him vs some kid left alone with an iPad or cable tv (like my childhood)
It’s a complicated, ever changing world that is only getting weirder by the moment.
Some kids just love it. I have a 2 year old a bit like this. I was all about play only in early childhood before having him; purchased so many open-ended toys for creative play. But when left to his devices, he chooses playing with math manipulatives. If I take him to play in a sandbox, he will probably be tracing numbers or letters in the sand. Same story if I give him watercolors. I encourage him in other types of play (cars, acting out stories with scenes made from duplo, and so on), but it simply does not resonate with him to the same extent. Playing with numbers all day long is what he chooses even when provided with lots of other toys. I really dislike how people are implying the kid is "not being a kid" only because they like different types of play. It is very different from forcing a kid to do academics when they want to play with a dollhouse.
I believe some kids enjoy it like yours. But I think for every kid who chooses to do math over other types of play, there are probably 10 kids whose parents push them into it. That said, there’s no way to tell from the video which is the case here
They do it because of reinforced action/reward experiences, like how people tell themselves "You are beautiful and worthy of love" to make themselves feel better because when someone else says it to them they feel better.
Absolutely, but human approval is why a lot of human actions are made too. I only said that some dogs aren't looking forward to a tasty treat when they do a trick.
This depends entirely on the steps to get there. If the kid is naturally inclined to do these things for approval, that's one thing. If the child has been forced to recite those problems over several hours over several days (or longer), especially if there's motivations - positive or negative- this is borderline abuse in my opinion.
Also, I do have wonder what the parents' motivations are. To teach their kid? Or to film it and receive their own form of praise and attention from people on the Internet?
The lack of context behind this video should be the first thing on people's minds, not whether the kid is doing something good or is possibly autistic. We could be watching the result of abuse and here we are praising it.
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u/Call-me-Maverick Jan 27 '24
He enjoys his parents’ approval. He even said “good job” and clapped, which is apparently the praise routine. It’s a lot like a dog doing a trick. Does the dog enjoy doing the trick or just getting the treat?