More than a decade ago, Southern Weekend published a report entitled “My Child Will Float in the Sea by Rafters.”
In his article, the author ponders,“Chinese students are trading mental disabilities for so-called higher degrees.
Today, more than a decade later, the pursuit of advanced degrees has become more and more fanatical. The list of famous schools, the ranking of US News, the Super Cow Kids… are the topics of concern and coverage in this era of education.
But in fact, the head school is only the last 1% of the children, it has nothing to do with the vast majority of people. However, in order to be this 1%, parents and children do not hesitate to pay a lot of costs.
Children have more pressing problems and need help.
These children make up a large and hidden group during the annual American application season, known as the “silent majority.”
On the other hand, in order to deliver more successful cases of Hayeps Ma and gain fame and prestige in Vanity Fair, major institutions of higher education and study abroad are all “competing” for good students, that is, those “basic” excellent children.
In this regard, Ye Xiaofan felt worried,’If everyone’s focus is always a good student what should the rest of the ordinary children do?’
So, “Get into the Academy” and then what? The story of “hollow disease” and “fall of graduates from famous schools” has also been staged more frequently in this era.
With such concern and questioning, Ye Xiaofan founded the search for education.
Students should not just look at the results. Whether it is Niuwa, Puwa, or the children abandoned by their parents,they should be seen and cared.
(Note: In order to protect the privacy of students, the following names are pseudonyms)
01From ordinary children.
"I was only admitted to Rochester, and I feared I might embarrass you."
This year’s Meimen season, Ye Xiaofan from the circle of friends “invisible.”
Especially in the first few days of April, the offer wiper burst WeChat Moments, the major institutions and media statistics a rattan school offer, reported the story of a famous cow baby, as if to celebrate a grand ceremony, but Ye Xiaofan’s personal WeChat Moments no longer share any list and news information.
“This is a very cruel act,” Ye Xiaofan said.
He knows that there are still a lot of families who are scowling at the moment because they are not recording very well. Those dazzling lists and deeds will only make these children and parents feel frustrated. “Some children are tutored by the same teacher, and they wonder why others can record well, but they can’t.”
In addition, when the whole society uses “Dato” to measure whether an institution or a student is good enough, people’s definition of excellence and success becomes too single.
Ye Xiaofan founded the search education, although every few years has sent students to MIT, Stanford, Yale and other top schools in the world. These students are intelligent, capable and have their own flashes, but the most moving thing for Ye Xiaofan and the whole teacher looking for education is the story of Puwa.
Student Henry is one of them.
Henry isone of the topstudents in Beijing who suddenly decided to study abroad. The first time I met the boy, HenryHe didn’t prepare for AP and SAT scores. What’s more, his son liked to play video games.
But in the latter contact, Ye Xiaofan found that Henry was not playing games at random, he had his own ideas and thinking. “He will comment on the lack of taste in China’s domestic games, compared to foreign designed games have more taste.”
Ye Xiaofan went deep into Henry’s family and gave the family a series of books. He told Henry’s parents that in the future, many industries will be gamified.Love to play gamesNot necessarily a wrong thing, the key is to see where the game’s ability to use to go.
From the beginning, Henry’s parents were opposed to his son playing games, and later accepted and tolerant. After the attitude changed, something magical happened in the family.
When the child has a relaxed environment, the rebellious psychology and emotions of adolescent boys disappear. At this point, Henry began to reflect on why he played the game.
With Ye’s advice and encouragement, Henry began to study the mechanism of game addiction. In those months, Henry interviewed many people, teachers, classmates and counselors. He also became interested in pedagogy, psychology, philosophy, and began reading Kant and Mischel.
He eventually turned his findings into a 5,000-word essay. “He came up with three mechanisms that make gaming addictive, and that’s a pretty good summary.”
The story is far from over here.
So, can we apply the “timely feedback” mechanism of game addiction to learning? For example, how to make children addicted to learning? He thought with Henry.
Later, Henry went to his primary school, and successfully persuaded the primary school principal to come to two classes as a control group to conduct the experiment.
In fact, at the time of submitting the application, the experiment had not yet produced results, but what moved Ye Xiaofan was that after gettingLuoChester and other schools.Admission offer After,Henry went back to school to finish the experiment.
At the end of the application season, Ye wanted to invite Henry to give a speech to share, hoping that his experience would inspire more children. Henry was joined by students from MIT and Stanford.
But at the moment he got the invitation,Henry’s first reactionwas to flinch–‘he told me that Mr. Ye only recordedRochester–Not what Hayepsi Ma and eveneven the first30 have notentered, will not give you shame.”
“That makes me feel bad. I told him you had to come. I told him thatalthough you are an ordinary child you have done something extremely extraordinary.”
Ordinary children, do not ordinary things, like fireflies, even in the dark, in the corner of no one’s attention, but also strive to flutter wings, sparkling.
Such examples and stories are everywhere in the search for education.
02
"Mom, just give me up and have another baby."
Another boy, Ryan, had an even worse initial “base plate” than Mike.
“He is really addicted to playing video games,” because of the game problem, the family is almost always at loggerheads.
Ryan’s school performance is not ideal, the whole grade more than 600 children, he ranked more than 500. TOEFL is only 50 points, and “like to copy the homework, let other students to the homework from the QQ.
Ryan’s father is strict in education, in order to control his son to play games, he installed a camera in Ryan’s room, and the camera also has a horn.
Once, at ten o’clock in the evening, Ye Xiaofan received a phone call from Ryan’s mother, in a tense tone. It turns out that Ryan threw the camera head into the water and broke, and the father and son clashed.
The process of quitting internet addiction is not easy. At the height of the conflict, Ryan said to her in pain, “Mom, you can give up on me and have another one, just as if you never gave birth to me.”
This is also the reason why Ye Xiaofan insisted on doing parents’ classes over the years. He found that sometimes a child’s problems require the whole family to make changes together.
Fortunately, Ryan’s mother is willing to make changes for her son. She learned quickly in parenting classes.She learnt to express her love for her son directly and to show unconditional tolerance and acceptance.When Dad saw Mom change, he changed with it.
Surrounded by understanding and tolerance, after half a year of twists and turns, Ryan has also undergone great changes. The most obvious was the rapid increase in standardized scores, which resulted in”a 111 on the TOEFL and a 1500 on the Sat.
But the most exciting part continues.
One time he wentWelfare home was originally for the deaf, but another group of childrenChildren with autism caught his attention. Ryan found that these children were easily isolated and even bullied by other normal children. To help them, Ryan made a picture book, “It is specially for normal children to see, popularize relevant knowledge, hope autistic children do not encounter discrimination. ”
In addition, Ryan wrote an email to PICC.
Surprisingly, when everyone thought that the high school student’s email would “go unanswered,” the other party actually replied. The other side wrote back to tell Ryan that they were grateful for Ryan’s letter, but the plan could not be used, because they looked for the exact calculation, Ryan was wrong, the insurance is made out to lose money project.
This experience, although it ends in failure, conveys the kindness and empathy of a teenager. The experience was written into Ryan’s paperwork. Eventually, he was admitted to a top 15 liberal arts college.
03
Children lying flat is not lazy, is helpless
“Lying flat” is a state that millennials and many children share.
Some parents complain that their children are lazy and can’t be pushed, but after contacting many children who are labeled “lazy” by parents, Ye Xiaofan feels more compassion and empathy with children.
“when parents judge their children are lazy, the background behind their children is actually helpless. Perhaps the goal set by adults is too high, children feel that they can not achieve, just lie down flat. “
Ye Xiaofan took “a lesson on the cliff” as an example of the classic text.
Some children know that they want to enter the top 10, the top 20, but he can’t do it, and some children will fall into deep guilt and remorse, behind the “lie down,” anxiety, depression, game addiction…… These problems will slowly emerge.
Just like the father at the edge of the cliff, “parents can actually be a resource for children, especially in providing moral support.”But it is a pity that in reality more children feel pressure and anxiety from their parents.
So, when our children can’t push, we parents should think, are we saddling our children with too many expectations, or setting them too high a goal?
It is also important for children to experience,even failure and wrestling.
In addition to “lie flat,” Ye Xiaofan observed that many of the children of this generation are very strong superego, but theego is weak, namely, “I understand the truth, but actually can not do it.”
“Because we teach children too much, but let them experience too little. All words can only enter the human superego, not the ego and the id.”
Mia described her life as”one foot in heaven, one foot inhell.”
Mia’s parents are senior intellectuals, and her father taught her when she was a child, “only 100 and 0 points in life, even if you get 90 points.” For a long time, Mia was afraid of failure.
Until one time, she really experienced failure.
Mia loves music and once participated in a music campaign organized by Sony. The selection scene experts gathered, Mia’s song was not selected by Sony. When she came back, Mia cried bitterly.
After the mood calmed down, the teacher who sought education took Mia to repeat and think. Mia recalled that many of the people she interviewed with that day were very strong, but none of them were selected in the end, which made Mia think that the natural nature of the competition must be to choose a champion, but not winning the champion does not mean that it is not good.
Later, Mia simply made a music website, similar to the “loser alliance.” This site only accepts songs that are not “fancied” by big events such as Sony.
04
Don't be obsessed with schools and rankings
In the face of changing times, let the child become a bird
This year’s application of the United States, the head school, the Red Sea has been rolled into the “Black Sea.”
But even if the child finally succeeds in “squeezing into” the top schools, is it really the end of the road?Ye Xiaofan has heard and seen many of the highly educated giant babies of this era.
Ye Xiaofan told me a story about being an HR friend. Once, aPenn Whartonundergraduate
Even more surprisingly, during the interview, the mother walked into the conference room with her daughter. The mother speaks more than the daughter. In the end, the girl was not hired.
It is true that it is a glorious thing for parents to enter a famous school, but in order to pursue the glory of that moment, many parents are too infatuated and attached to the ranking on the list.
Moreover, “there are a lot of things that don’t have much to do with children,” Ye said,”The important thing is what you want your children to learn in college.
In fact, there are many schools that are very good, but because they are not ranked high, they are unknown, and they are not noticed.
Siobhan SouthernUniversity, for example,which many parents may not have heard of but which produces as many Rhodes scholars as Berkeley each year, is billed as the undergraduate Nobel Prize.
In the US News list,Siobhan Southern Universityhas been ranked low, “because the school’s president is relatively lofty, he is not willing to stick to the standards of USA News,” said Ye Xiaofan.
There’s another school, Reed College, that didn’t even make the US News list. Some of Ye’s students want to be product managers, or want to work in a field that combines art and engineering in the future, and Ye will recommend Reed to them. When students said they had not heard of the school and did not want to consider it, Ye told them thatSteve Jobs graduated from Reed.
The other two schools, William and Mary and Minnesota, are also very fond of Ye. “These two schools stipulate that professors must take undergraduates to do research.”
On many occasions, Ye Xiaofan was asked about school selection.
But the logic behind people’s obsession with rankings is ease of employment, which is certainly understandable. Some time ago, ChatGPT hot, parents and children anxiety about the future workplace and employment environment changes.
Ye Xiaofan said tolet his child become a bird instead of a monkey standing on a branch and worrying that the branch would break. “If we base our sense of security on rank, education and external environment, of course we will worry that the branches will break.”
Schools should put aside “vanity fair” and return to value.
Happily, this year we also heard of many children voluntarily giving up Ivy League schools in favor of schools that are not well known but are genuinely interested in.
Ye Xiaofan is also a father, back to the school election topic, Ye Xiaofan’s answer is, “am I to send a resume for a moment of glory, or want my children to have the ability to rely on and rely on all their lives, I no doubt choose the latter.”
So, I chose schools based on which one would give my child wings and turn her into a bird. If she can turn into a bird, why do I worry if the branch will break?”
05
epilogue
The whole interview lasted more than two hours, a group of us were sleepy in the interview room, but after Teacher Ye Xiaofan spoke, he was like a light.
At the scene, his golden sentences were frequent, and each sentence was full of philosophical thinking, and each of us listened with breathless attention.
What impressed me most was that Professor Ye gave a set of data, whether it was transferring or applying for graduate students, 90% of his students did not look back for them, and they were all applying by themselves.
We are curious, this is not to cut their own “money”?
Teacher Ye said the following:
Finally, we asked Mr. Ye what he expected from looking for education in the future.
Teacher Ye said that he hopes to turn all the concepts of “search” into a school before the age of 70. “The hallmark of success in the future is not going public, not going big, but starting a school.”
Every child can be happy in this school.
