what we learned was more than earrings
“Mom! We’re Getting My Ears Pierced Today, Right?”
After my daughter’s swimming lesson today, as we were getting ready to head home, she asked, “Mom! We’re getting my ears pierced today, right?”
My mind immediately went blank. “Oh right.”
A few days ago, we had definitely agreed that we would go after swimming, but I had completely forgotten. My daughter, however, remembered.
“Okay! Let’s go!”
I called the store to ask about an appointment, and they told me that if we came right away, they could pierce both ears at the same time. And just like that, we unexpectedly headed off to get her ears pierced. When we arrived, two staff members came out. After choosing a pretty pair of earrings, my daughter sat in the chair. She was nervous, but she was trying her best to be brave.
“One, two, three!” Click-click! Both ears were pierced at exactly the same time.
One second later, she started crying as if her whole world had fallen apart, “Waaaaaaah!”
She cried in my arms for quite a while. I held her tightly and said, “It hurts a lot, doesn’t it? But when you fall down, it hurts really badly at first and then after a little while it gets better, right? This will be the same. You’ll feel better soon. You can handle this.”
Then I pulled out my secret weapon: ice cream, “How about we stop crying and go get some ice cream? You’ve waited so patiently all this time while Mom got herself ready, so Mommy will buy you an ice cream.”
Ice cream must truly be a cure-all for young children.
She immediately stopped crying and clearly announced the name of the ice cream shop she had been wanting to visit. As she ate her ice cream and sniffled a little, she suddenly started looking at herself in the mirror.
She looked at the right side.
Then the left side.
Then she tilted her head.
The earrings looked beautiful on her, but what I noticed most was the pride on her face. She had endured something painful. She had done it. And she knew it. Watching her, I found myself thinking:
“My little girl has grown up so much.”
The Story Actually Started One Year Earlier
Last summer, when my daughter was four years old, she told me for the first time that she wanted to get her ears pierced. I couldn’t say yes. To be honest, as someone who grew up in Korea, the idea of a young child getting her ears pierced seemed unimaginable. When I was growing up, ear piercing felt like something college students did. There were also many adults who looked negatively at students who pierced their ears at a young age.
So I told her no.
Then she asked me, “But one friend in my class has earrings, and another friend does too. Why can’t I?”
I couldn’t answer her very well. The truth was, I couldn’t clearly explain my reasons. I had simply grown up believing that young children shouldn’t do it. Why not? Honestly, I didn’t really know.
I worried about whether she could take care of her ears afterward. I worried about infection. But if I’m being completely honest, the bigger reason was that I simply wasn’t used to it.
So I told her, “Can you wait just a little until Mommy is ready? When Mommy asks you to try a food and you say, ‘I’m not ready yet,’ Mommy waits for you, right? This is similar.”
To be honest, I secretly hoped she would forget about it once summer break started and she stopped seeing her friends with earrings every day. But she quietly waited.
It Became Time for Both of Us to Think
As I thought about what I would say if she brought it up again, I found myself asking more and more questions. Then one day, a thought occurred to me. Why can my daughter’s friends get their ears pierced, but my daughter can’t? I asked other moms. Most of their answers surprised me.
“My daughter wanted it, so I let her.”
“I wanted her to have them, so I got them done when she was just a few months old.”
I live in Canada now, so why was I still holding on to standards that had been formed while growing up in Korea? Why should my daughter be prevented from experiencing something that is completely normal in the culture she is growing up in, simply because of my own comfort zone? That was when I started asking myself questions.
Why am I really against this?
Is it truly for my child?
Or is it because of my own upbringing and familiarity?
Looking back, those six months were not only for my daughter, they were also for me. People often say they want their children to develop critical thinking skills. But how often do we examine our own thinking as parents?
This experience became an exercise in critical thinking not only for my daughter, but for me as well. Eventually, after about six months I made up my mind.I told her, “Mom is ready now. If you want to do it, you can do it anytime.”
But this time she said, “I’m not ready yet. My friends told me they use a gun to make holes in your ears. I think it will hurt too much.”
I couldn’t help but laugh.
Of course, it was a dramatic explanation, but at the same time I realized something.
She had been doing her own research.
She had been asking her friends questions, gathering information, and forming her own decision. The year before, she had been ready and I wasn’t. Now I was ready, and she wasn’t.
I calmly explained how ear piercing actually worked and told her, “When you’re ready, come tell Mommy.”
Another six months passed.
What My Daughter and I Were Really Practicing Was Decision-Making
My daughter turned five and summer vacation arrived once again, I asked her, “Is there anything special you want to do this summer?”
Without hesitation, she answered, “I want to get my ears pierced.”
At that moment, I knew. This wasn’t because her friends were doing it. It wasn’t a passing impulse. If she still wanted it after an entire year, then it was truly her own choice.
Getting her ears pierced was the result. But the real learning happened during the process.
Without realizing it, she had practiced an important decision-making process. She expressed what she wanted, she talked with her mom, she waited, she reflected, she reconsidered, and eventually, she acted.
Looking back, this small experience contained a process that is difficult even for many adults:
Setting a goal → Discussion and dialogue → Waiting → Gathering information → Reevaluation → Final decision → Action → Accepting the outcome
What I Want to Teach Is Not the Right Answer, but the Ability to Think
Many people associate critical thinking with academics but real critical thinking is developed through everyday life.
Why do I want this? Why don’t I want this? What other options exist? Do I need to decide right now? Will I feel the same way later?
The people who can ask themselves these questions become the owners of their own lives.
That is why, in the STEAM education programs I run, science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics are simply tools. The real goal is to develop the ability to ask questions.
These fields naturally require constant questioning.
Why?
How?
What other methods are possible?
Is there a better solution?
The ability to explore, to fail, to try again, and to build one’s own understanding.
I do not want children to become people who simply arrive at the correct answer quickly. To be honest, AI already does that much better.
Instead, I want them to become people who can think for themselves, make decisions in uncertain situations, and get back up after they fall.
I Want to Be a Parent Who Can Debate with My Daughter
I am someone who lived in the past.
My daughter is someone who will live in the future.
My experiences are valuable, but they are not necessarily the right answers for her future. That’s why I do not want my daughter to become someone who simply follows what I say. I want her to become someone who can express her thoughts, someone who can persuade her parents, and someone who can also listen and consider the thoughts of others.
Soon, my menopause and my daughter’s teenage years will arrive at the same time. Many people describe that season as a battle. Even I feel nervous thinking about it already. But I am not overly worried.
If she has spent her childhood practicing how to talk, how to wait, how to think, and how to continue difficult conversations, then I believe that season can become a time of explosive growth rather than conflict.
Today, my daughter got her ears pierced. But what I saw was not a pair of earrings.
I saw a young person learning to express her thoughts, wait, reflect, decide, and act.
And that is the most important lesson I hope to teach as both a parent and an educator.
Not a person who simply thinks what everyone else thinks, but a person who can think for herself. A person who can get back up after falling.
That is the future I hope for my daughter.
And that is the direction of education that I believe in.
Getting her ears pierced took one day. Developing the ability to think and evaluate for herself took one year.