Removing the training wheels

Last weekend, I took my family to the pasar malam for our usual “get out of the house” outings and bought my son a Ben-10 120 pieces jigsaw puzzle. A simple yet uninspiring act you may ask. But do think of the thoughts of a six year old child ready to take on the world that he had come to be exposed so far – all games and play.

The next day on a Sunday morning, he got up quite early to start on this “fun” thing with his mother helping him. They were half way thru when I got up and I noticed that my wife was doing most of the piecing together while my son was just moving around the pieces sorting out the colours for her to lay them correctly. Before I can even finished making my coffee, they finished with the puzzle. And my son proudly showed me while from a distance, my wife said she did most of it.

That evening, after our weekly swim and his swim lessons at the club house, having rested a while from a hearty dinner, my son came to me and ask me to help him with the puzzle after disbanding all of them. This time, it will take us longer than “his” first try earlier in the day.

I don’t considered myself to be very regimental on his school works, tuitions, taekwando, tennis and swimming lessons, even making small little attempts to train him to be a triathlete for his participation when he’s old enough, I want him to be more vocal and to develop an analytical mindset. Bordering on opinionated, critical, objective thinking and to set everything with a plan for implementation and then execution with ease. My wife always says he’s too young for these. I really beg to differ, and I constantly do it quietly when she’s not around.

I told him to sort out all the corners and edges before starting to put them on the board. Next, sort out all the different shapes, those with 1 nook, 2 nooks, 3 nooks, opposite nooks and what have you. It took him a while to figure all these out and after about 20 minutes, he was ready to begin piecing them together on the board. I was just there beside him to talk him into planning or strategizing his play without lifting a finger to help him.

I can see he was getting very excited with his achievement each time a figure or picture began to form on the puzzle. He seemed to be able to piece them together with each identifying almost with accuracy where each pieces goes.

He finished just as fast compare the time he spent sorting out the different pieces. And again, as he did in the morning, but this time, proudly show it to his mother telling her that he put the whole puzzle on his own. I kept quiet and allowed him that victory seeing him having that deep sense of accomplishment and most of all, ownership of it from his own efforts with no pretence whatsoever.

So, despite the fact I did nothing other than imparting my wisdom to him, and hopefully he will begin to think constructively, analytically and critically so to bring about a change to his well being and his perception. You could say this is something like macro management, setting a mild vision statement for him while he sets out about his goals. A very basic principle of mindset borrowed from the corporate world to tackle challenges ahead.

Most times, it is not how old a child should be exposed to independency or interdependency, but subtle lessons here and there to start the mould process rolling and hopefully, when they grows, the mind is in-tuned to handle matters proactively in this ever changing world.

The question now is, do we still need the NEP now that Malaysia is like a fully grown middle aged person passes maturity for the uptenth times? Does our "Princes and Princesses of the Earth" still need the training wheels on? Anyone out there have anything to say about it?
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