BABIES are often a source of joy for parents, but school-age children are often a source of anxiety.

Can my child go to the top kindergarten, district-level key junior high, city-level key senior high school, and then to the Ivy League? The worry list can go on.

Therefore, many stressed-out parents are sending their children to after-school and weekend training sessions that intend to make their children virtuosos in art, wizards at math, literary stylists, polyglots, elocutionists, sportsmen, all in one.

We do not send my 10-year-old son to any of the training sessions, because we find that he is already fully occupied juggling the routine school home assignments.

Each day from the time I pick up my son from school to the time he is in bed, there is a tough struggle between us: I insist he do his homework first, while he is ever on the lookout for fresh excuses for postponements.

And after the homework is done, there begin repeated negotiations over when is the proper time for him to go to bed.

He probably derives no small satisfaction from the fact that he has frustrated yet another attempt on my part to have everything done according to a schedule.

"Minimalist Parenting: Enjoy Modern Family Life More by Doing Less" by Christine Koh and Asha Dornfest (Bibliomotion, 2013) gives me fresh insight into management of family affairs, particularly about education of school-age children.

The book claims contemporary parents are "wrestling with abundance."

Given too many options, they must master the art of being highly selective, and stop aspiring for perfection.

Six precepts

"Minimalist parenting" can be a solution. It is a mind-set that includes six precepts:

1. "Make room for remarkable" - Keep what you love; drop the rest. Sort out your priorities and values.

2. "Know yourself" - Understand the origin of your values. Consider what you absorbed while growing up and whether you want to keep the values you learned.

3. "Know your family" - Recognize how you and the others in your household are alike or different. Remember that people (including you) constantly change.

4. "Trust your decisions" - Hearing your "inner bus driver," that internal voice of wisdom that knows what's right for you and your family, sometimes means quieting the daily distractions and slowing down.

5. "Course correction beats perfection" - Be prepared to make occasional changes when necessary and don't let the fear of making a wrong decision paralyze you.

6. "We're in this together" - In the mad dash to secure the best of everything for your child, don't cling to the belief that reaching one particular goal will make or break your child's future. To build your children's resilience, teach them to learn as they go, to navigate challenges and to develop relationships.

This advice appears so reasonable to me that not long ago after reading this, I began to try this approach with my son.

So one day immediately after picking him up from school, I told him that he was to do everything as he sees fit, with minimal intervention from me, as long as he promised to complete all his assignments before bedtime.

It worked surprisingly well, for he began to view himself master of his own affairs, and the only glitch arose after he turned on the television.

He has to be reminded, and then warned, of his bedtime deadline.

So it is true that putting a family's before- and after-school routines on "autopilot" can make them less stressful for everyone. Still, the plethora of modern e-gadgets means some disciplining is still needed to protect children from the distractions from television, computers and other addictive technology.

That's necessary because many adults have lost control of their own lives after succumbing to the seduction of e-devices.

Many adults have allowed their lives to sink into e-enslavement because they themselves have grown up without being equipped with proper values. In the absence of external discipline, consumption and hedonism become the only purpose in their life.

So when the book cautions us to listen to our "inner bus driver" - the internal voice of wisdom that knows what's right for you and your family - no matter what everyone else is doing, the key message is that people not already inculcated with correct values can never go very far.

For any man, his resilience, his ability to learn on the way, think on his feet and judge what's right and what's wrong far outweigh his excellence in solving mathematical problems.

This realization is sufficient to alert sensible parents to the folly of over-scheduling their children in the illusion of thus attaining artistic or academic perfection.

In education, as in myriad other spheres, less can be more.

Beyond scores

"The key lies in fine-tuning your filters so only the important stuff makes it onto your worthy-of-attention radar. The question goes from 'How do I fit everything in?' to 'What's most important to fit in'?'' the book observes.

Unfortunately, many parents today have regarded their children no more than tools to gratify their own vanities and unfulfilled ambitions.

Children burdened with such high hopes will feel very inadequate once they realize they simply cannot live up to expectations.

Recently an unsolved poisoning case in Qinghua University 19 years ago has provoked much sympathy for the paralyzed victim, Zhu Lingling. But insufficient attention has been paid to the fact that both Zhu and the assumed suspect are victims of an academic institution that prides itself and thrives on fueling cutthroat competition.

Only when we are convinced of the real priority of education will we pay less attention to test scores, and more to personality, character, or sense of responsibility.

So far my son has a minimal role in managing household affairs, but according to the book, having him engaged has solid advantages.

"Involving children in home management may seem like more work at first, but it's as close to a parenting 'sure thing' as you can get," the authors observe.

This is based on the understanding that education doesn't just happen in the classroom, but everywhere.

Taking a broader perspective on your child's learning can help diminish the relentless, illusory search for perfection that captures many parents during their children's school years.

Remember, you're raising a well-rounded adult, not a high scorer. When academic distinction or perfection ceases to be the all-consuming reason for existence, we can find that even boredom has its value.

"Let boredom become your ally ... the skill of self-entertainment is a long-term win," the book concludes.

Children can choose from a plethora of extracurricular activities, so over-scheduling is easy.

Keeping children busy does not guarantee they will succeed, and they could lose out on the "biggest creative motivator": boredom.

According to the book, some children are so used to being always on the go that when unstructured time presents itself, they don't know what to do.

Treat the child as an independent person, not just a scorer to flatter your vanity.