The Core Connection
“Two Kinds”:
“When Success Leads to Failure”: http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/08/when-success-leads-to-failure/400925/
There is nothing stronger than a bond between a mother and daughter. “Two Kinds,” a short story by Amy Tan, and the article “When Success Leads to Failure,” by Jessica Lahey on The Atlantic, both examine the roles in this mother-daughter relationship along with its impact on development. They both explore the importance of the relationship between a mother and daughter in the child’s development by discussing the effects of a mother who is undermining her child’s future success, a daughter who has no passion for what she does, and the reactions of the mother and child to success and failure.
A mother has a strong impact on the life of her daughter, and Tan’s short story and Lahey’s article both explore the effects of a mother who is becoming an obstacle for the daughter’s development. Lahey’s article examines the importance of a mother’s encouragement in the development of learning in her child. Lahey writes:
We taught Marianna that her potential is tied to her intellect, and that her intellect is more important than her character. We taught her to come home proudly bearing As, championship trophies […] and we inadvertently taught her to protect her academic and extracurricular perfection at all costs.
It is necessary to encourage children to take risks rather than win awards to develop skills that will help them in the future. “Two Kinds” demonstrates another example of a mother who is undermining her daughter’s development by showing the misery of too much parental pressure. “And after seeing, once again, my mother’s disappointed face, something inside me began to die,” explains the daughter in Tan’s short story (Tan 212). The mother’s pressure will lead to her daughter’s obedience. However, it will cause sorrow for the daughter that makes the experience harmful in development. The mother lacks encouragement to teach her daughter the importance of developing skills. The influence a mother has through encouragement and demands for obedience can have a destructive effect on the development of her child, but a child’s development can also be damaged by other factors.
If a child lacks passion for what they do, they will put in less effort, which is damaging to their development. Both Tan’s short story and Lahey’s article explore how the development of a disinterested child will be impacted. When being forced into playing piano, the daughter in Tan’s story complains, “When my mother told me this, I felt as though I had been sent to hell” (Tan 213). The hatred the daughter feels for learning the piano leads to her lack of correcting mistakes and ultimate failure in the concert. Lahey's article examines the effects of a lack of passion arguing, “Her child has sacrificed her natural curiosity and love of learning at the altar of achievement” (Lahey). A child performing a task that they are not passionate about will lead to less future success because of a lack of effort. If a child has an interest in achieving a goal, they will persevere and welcome failure as an opportunity to learn. But, if they are working without passion, they will not care about lessons learned and make improvements, which is ultimately detrimental to their development. The attitude of a child is an important part of a mother-child relationship when examining its effect on development and future results; additionally, the consequences of these results has a significant impact on a child’s development.
The reactions of a mother and child after a success or failure has a tremendous effect on a child’s development. A mother must encourage her child not only after success, but also after failure. “And contrary to what she may believe, in these more difficult situations she is learning,” writes Lahey in her article (Lahey). Failure leads to learning, which helps a child develop by making improvements for future success. A child’s reaction will be shaped by the reaction of the mother; a mother must be encouraging and supportive to ensure her daughter will react positively. In “Two Kinds,” the daughter explains, “But my mother’s expression was what devastated me: a quiet, blank look that said she had lost everything” (Tan 217). A child must learn how to react to success and failure, and a dejected response from a mother leads to frustration and depression for the child. Children are impressionable; both Lahey’s article and Tan’s short story examine how detrimental a lack of encouragement is for the development of a child after a success or failure.
A mother and her child form a fundamental bond. Maintaining a positive relationship between a mother and child is essential to the child’s development, which can be harmed if a mother puts too much pressure on her child or lacks encouragement, if a child has a lack of passion, and if a mother reacts negatively to successes and failures of her child. While Tan’s short story is a work of fiction, it relates closely to the article by Jessica Lahey in exploring the important aspects of this mother-daughter relationship. Both fiction and nonfiction works discuss the same features of the relationship with two different perspectives; while the article provides analysis, the fictional short story provides a potential situation that explores similar ideas. Both works unite in teaching how to construct the important elements of the strong mother-child relationship that is a foundation for the child throughout their development.
Pictures:
Failure quote: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/60/6f/5d/606f5d7e76ed9aceac2d4638af80021a.jpg
Mother-child relationship quote:
I’m Proud of You picture:
Child development picture:
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