Years before I got married an uncle told me ‘when you decide to marry, you must evaluate your partner first and foremost as a mother to your children’. It’s great advice (assuming you’re planning to have children), but it begs the question (which I saw someone post on Twitter, hence this post): what are the signs someone will make a good parent?
As always, when I see a good question, I pass it on to my wife. Here are some of the signs we think are reliable.
Curiosity / excitement / earnestness
Kids ask a lot of questions, and are very receptive to exploring things. Grown ups who get equally excited about learning (or re-learning), trying new things, and taking things apart or fixing them, will find it easier to engage with children, and to nurture / channel the children’s innate desire to understand the world. In contrast, grown ups who show no enthusiasm in exploring new ideas, or reading up the answer to a random question, are more likely to be the kind of parent who tells children off for asking too many questions, or who responds with ‘because I said so’ or ‘I don’t know’.
Similarly, grown ups who like to play will, unsurprisingly, be engaged parents. Finally, children are famously earnest and outspoken. It’s a great quality, especially to people like me who grew up at a time when irony was in the zeitgeist (happily, the zeitgeist has moved on). Grownups who can engage in serious discussion (which does not mean dull and not lighthearted!) will find it easier interacting with children.
Being a good teacher
This is somewhat linked to the above. People who like explaining things, and who are good at tailoring their teaching style to their audience, will obviously have a lot to offer to their children.
(Does this include people who like to mansplain? I’d say yes to an extent. It’s better to have a teacher who’s trying to impart information for your benefit, or because they enjoy the process, than one who’s doing it to show off their cleverness. But someone who’s teaching as a form of self-validation is still better than someone who has nothing to offer! The only risk there is that a dull mansplainer is likely to turn learning into a boring chore for their children.)
Self-awareness & emotional self-regulation
I consider honesty one of the most important virtues, and honesty with one’s self the most important one. I think most people are self-aware deep-down, but the vast majority delude themselves in one way or another. The more honest a person is with themselves, the better parent they are going to make: parenting involves making a lot of very consequential decisions for other people, so you want the person making those decisions to know their reasons and intentions behind these decisions.
Are you hiring a tutor to cram your kids because it’s the right thing for them, or because their getting into Cambridge will reflect well on you? Are you teaching them piano because of your love for music, or because it sounds refined? Are you inviting particular classmates over because they’re your child’s best friends, or because of who those classmates’ parents are? More generally, are you doing things for the benefit of your child (good parent) or your own (bad parent)?
And this is the big stuff, but there’s also a huge number of occasions where understanding yourself and your reactions will make you a better parent. Are you tired and in an irascible mood? Then you might want to step away from hands-on parenting and hand the reins over to your partner. Are you prone to anger and exasperation? Do you dislike being interrupted when you’re concentrating? You’d better learn to control that, because sleeplessness and children’s propensity to cause accidents / make mess / ask for stuff (as my daughter did right after I typed ‘make mess’, to have a 10 minute playfight (and as my son did after the last sentence, for the same reason)) &c will drive you crazy otherwise.
In general, a parent needs to know how to calm down and relax. It is inevitable that a parent will feel anger and frustration; the question is, how good they’ll be at dealing with that and moderating their response.
Which brings us to…
Good humour / sunny disposition / comfort with chaos
People who are naturally optimistic / can see the funny aspect of a bad situation / can quickly adapt to changing circumstances will find parenting easier than those who are pessimistic / likely to be easily stressed / like things to be just so.
Even the best-behaved children will (on purpose or accidentally) do things that are, to say the least, inconvenient for the grown ups around them. Many of these make funny stories years later, but unless you’re able to see the funny side in the moment, you’ll just spend 5-10 years feeling very, very stressed.
Ok so these are the qualities you should look for. Let’s make it concrete — these are the kinds of behaviours that (I think) suggest someone will be a good parent: they…
enjoy board games, pool playfights, going on swings, or climbing random stuff for fun
ask a lot of questions; when they are asked a question, they try to come up with an answer (rather than shrug it away)
are good at explaining things in a fun way
are calm and measured / they do not snap or lose their patience
admit their blindspots / are vocal about their shortcomings (in a genuine way, not the hackneyed ‘I have impostor syndrome’ spiel)
are not hot-headed — they take time to calm down before responding in an argument
laugh / joke even when in difficult situations
do not get irritated when plans change
(Am I just describing my own behaviours, and labelling them signs of good parenting? Is this whole post a not-so-humble brag? No. I am good at playing and engaging with my children, and I am self-aware (my asking this question is evidence of that! (albeit weak evidence — there are many people who are smart enough to fake self-awareness in exactly this manner). I am not patient, I do lose my temper and snap much more than I like, and I am not good at teaching (I like explaining things a lot; but I’m not great at flexing my approach if people are not receptive to the way I teach things.)
(Or is this whole interjection an attempt to demonstrate my self-awareness? This is closer to the mark — because I prize honesty and self-awareness, being recognised as honest and self-aware matters to me. But still no — the point of the preceding paragraph is to make an ethical appeal: trust me. I am not writing this to show off what a good dad I am. I am writing it because it’s my honest answer to what I thought is an interesting question.))
None of the above are sufficient or even essential on their own. Plenty of people are naturally moody or pessimistic, or not much into playing games, or easily stressed, yet make excellent parents. But I do think children need all the above qualities in their life, so if you are considering having children with someone, I strongly advise you to consider whether at least one of you has each of these attributes.