Success is probably shown best in the day-by-day drama of the family literacy classroom. It is now mid-afternoon at Sims Park, and the parenting class turns to a review of terms studied previously�parents who are autocratic, permissive, or authoritative. Kou Xiong says he is �strict like a commander.�

�I know you and Houa have strict rules in your family,� Alice Schafer responds. She hopes Mai Lee is listening�there have been hints that Mai is losing control of her adolescent children. Kou and Houa worry that Mai�s children may be vulnerable to gang activity.

Houa goes to great effort to keep the Xiong children away from any association with the gangs beginning to form in Chandler. �Last night my husband working. At 4:00 I drive my children to basketball at high school. Then I drive them to soccer at middle school. Long time gone. We get home at 9:00.� Their seventeen-year-old daughter works as a cashier at Grand Foods grocery store. The sixteen-year-old son is a cashier at a Chinese restaurant at the mall. Two sons (ages 12 and 14) have newspaper routes. All these children also play basketball or soccer. �In the summer we pay lots of money to keep children in soccer program. They work full time. No time to go other places.�

Houa smiles, �Kou says I am good mom.� Houa and Mai are becoming friends in the class, and Houa may be able to coach Mai in keeping her children out of harm�s way.

Alice underscores the need for parents to be consistent with their children. And throughout the afternoon she assures the students, �We are all good parents. We all love our children. We make mistakes as parents, because we�re human too, and we try to correct our mistakes. We try to be the best parents we can.�

What is a misbehavior? The concept of different standards in different families is acknowledged, but Alice asks if the class can agree on a list of behaviors that none of them would tolerate.

�Is it O.K. to bite?�
�No!�
Biting goes on the board.
�Is it O.K. to spit at other kids?�
�No!�
Spitting goes on the board.
�Is it O.K. to smoke? Kou and Houa, I know you have said absolutely �No smoking.� � The Xiongs nod. One wonders how Megan Wittrock will answer, since her own jacket smells of cigarette smoke after class time breaks.

�Megan, is it O.K. for Kimberly to smoke?�

�Not now,� Megan�s faint smile shows she is thinking.

�When?� Alice presses gently.

�When she�s sixteen,� the answer is quick like lightning. �If she�s old enough to drive, she�s old enough to decide if she wants to ruin her lungs.�

Alice asks next whether the parents tolerate hitting. Most assert immediately that no, it is not all right for children to hit, but again Megan, a more independent thinker, has her own take on the topic.

�Megan, is it O.K. for Kimberly to hit other kids?�

�If someone has her in a corner, and they�re right in her face, and she can�t talk them out of it�yeah, it�s all right to hit.�

When asked to name a misbehavior of Kimberly�s, Megan�s immediate answer is �talks back in a disruptive manner.� Alice invites her to be specific. �When I ask her to pick up her room, she sasses back, �I ain�t gonna pick up my room!� �

Alice�s forte is mimicking the children and the parents in their talk. With saucy turn of the head against upturned shoulder, she mimics what children sound like, �I ain�t gonna pick up my room!� The parents smile and nod. Alice has nailed it exactly. She knows what they have to put up with. They become less guarded in discussing problems with their kids.

Parental loss of control is pursued to underscore other points in the lesson. It�s easy to launch into a tirade, but parents should think about how the words affect the child�s self-esteem. Alice goes into her theatrical mode to illustrate: �You bad boy. You idiot.� Her voice rises in pitch and volume. Her face appears heated. �You stupid boy. I�m going to give you away to the first person that walks by my door.� Then in calm tones Alice explains: �We can not talk to children this way. This is exactly what Mai was telling us. The biggest fear children have is that they�ll lose Mom and Dad. They don�t know if you�ll come back.�

Alice drives the point home, �When kids talk back, it doesn�t help to launch into a tirade screaming �You are a bad kid!� � She knows the class is with her now, and she uses the moment to return to Megan. �When Kimberly talks back to you, you just bend down to her level, look her directly in the eye, and say it quietly and firmly, �Kimberly, talking to Mom like that is not O.K.� �

Megan�s impassive face does not reveal what she thinks about this advice. But at some level and for some reason, she is deciding to speak out. Alice asks Megan �When Kimberly talks back to you, why do you think she acts that way?�

�She is angry at her mother,� is Megan�s answer, flat out.

The question has released a torrent of analysis and explanation, in language more typical of a college course than an adult basic literacy class. �It�s my parenting skills. First, I was an autocratic parent. Since my husband had no backbone, I had to be the disciplinarian. My dad was an autocratic parent, and that�s how I did it.� Megan�s voice is steady, unemotional, as though she is analyzing a case study in a textbook.

�Then when Kimberly�s Dad left her, I became a permissive parent. Her biological father doesn�t want nothin� to do with her.� Megan says things were made clearer to her recently. �About a week and a half ago, I dreamed about Kimberly, and then I looked it up in a dream dictionary I have by Freud. It said she was resentful and angry toward the mother�that would be me.�

Megan has never listed Kimberly�s good behaviors, but today in class she has printed a neat list down the page. Megan reads the list to the class:

�What does �passionate� mean?� Kou Xiong asks.

Suspense hangs in the air. Does Megan hold a grudge regarding Kou�s blunt rebuff earlier, when she was complaining about having her kids at home? Evidently not. Looking directly at the Xiongs, Megan explains. �Passion is when you really care about something. Like when Gootsang insists on taking all her baby dolls along. That would be passion.�

Kou and Houa nod in understanding across the horseshoe.