ABSTRACT

Today parents are faced with increasing expectations to attend to their young children’s learning and cognitive development. South Korea and Singapore are well-known for their competitive education systems and for consistently topping international student assessment tests. They also share an inflated private tuition industry, fuelled by the assumption that parents are compelled to invest substantial resources and time to support their children's development and education. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Seoul and Singapore, the article explores how middle-class parents of pre- and primary school children negotiate seemingly conflicting aspirations of academic achievement versus emotional well-being and resilience. The findings unveil how parents strive to cultivate positive attitudes towards learning through management of time and space in everyday life. In particular, it draws attention to the moral imperative to raise children who enjoy learning, as a way to reconcile parents’ twofold aspiration to upskill their children and cultivate their emotional well-being.

摘要

今天，父母面临着越来越多的期望，以关注他们年幼的孩子的学习和认知发展。韩国和新加坡以其竞争激烈的教育体系和不断在国际学生评估测试中名列前茅而闻名。他们还共享一个膨胀的私人补习行业，这是由于父母被迫投入大量资源和时间来支持孩子的发展和教育的假设。基于在首尔和新加坡的民族志田野调查，本文探讨了学龄前儿童和小学儿童的中产阶级父母如何协商看似矛盾的学业成就愿望与情绪健康和复原力。研究结果揭示了父母如何通过管理日常生活中的时间和空间来努力培养积极的学习态度。特别是，它提请注意培养喜欢学习的孩子的道德要求，以此来调和父母提高孩子技能和培养他们情感健康的双重愿望。