How Ella Earned Her Earrings
When I was nine, I REALLY wanted to get my ears pierced.
My dad wasn’t particularly a fan – his mother never had her ears pierced – but since my mom did, he didn’t really feel like he wanted to flat out deny it, so he decided instead that he’d use it as an opportunity to get me to do something he felt was important.
The deal was that – in order to get my ears pierced – I had to memorize my multiplication tables up through 15×15.
We had an ancient computer program called Speed Math which was basically just digital flashcards. There were no bells or whistles – it was a blue screen with a big white multiplication problem and then a spot at the bottom to put in the answer. At the end of the set, it told you how many you got right. (You could set how many flashcards to get in a set and also the number range, so you could work on just up through 10×10 or only the 9s or whatever). That was it.
Initially he was planning to make me memorize up through 25×25, but since Speed Math only went to 15 (hallelujah!), that’s what we did.
I worked on it for a few weeks until I felt really solid and then we sat down at the computer and did two sets of 100 (one for each ear) and as long as got at least 98% right, I could get my ears pierced.
A few days later, I was the proud owner of a tiny pair of gold star studs with diamonds in them and I was THRILLED.
Over the next couple of years, my two younger sisters did the same to earn their ear piercings.
Nearly three decades later, I still use those multiplication skills on an almost daily basis. It is wild how useful it’s been.
Last year, Ella started wanting to get her ears pierced and history repeated itself with a dad who wasn’t very thrilled about ear piercing (Bart’s mom also doesn’t have her ears pierced).
Plus, because of how wildly useful my times tables had turned out to be, we both loved the idea of having our girls earn their ear piercing with a useful skill.
Ella was gunning for the same multiplication requirements but since she already knew basically all of them, that was a total no-go for us.
For months, Ella kept bringing it up and finally we told her that if she finished Codeillusion, she could get her ears pierced.
Codeillusion is a coding program designed for both kids and adults that’s pretty thorough.
It has 125 lessons (which average around 30 minutes each) and includes HTML, CSS, and Javascript within lessons teaching Media Art, Game Development and Web Design.
I’d done a sponsored campaign with them in the fall and was super impressed by it. Ella had loved getting started on it, but then she got busy with school and she didn’t get past about 15 lessons.
She was initially a little discouraged thinking it would take her FOREVER to finish it, but when we were both clear that this was the price for getting her ears pierced, she dove in.
Over the next couple of weeks, she spent hours a day working through the lessons (including getting up two hours before school) and then, two weeks later, she was finished.
The very next day, I took her to get her ears pierced and she hasn’t stopped smiling about it yet.
Even better, she’s completely caught the coding bug – she’s checked out books from the library, has started working on some of her own projects, and can’t say enough how much she loves coding (the problem now is finding programs for kids that are as advanced as she now is and that are as engaging and enjoyable as Codeillusion is).
And it’s so fun to see her so proud of herself for working so hard and with such focus to earn something that was important to her.
My parents made me read the entire New Testament to get my ears pierced when I turned 9. Let’s just say that what I lacked in reading comprehension I made up for in determined speed reading. 😉
Love this idea! We’re starting something similar with our almost 8 year old. We’re local (south end of salt lake valley). I’d love to know where you took her and how the process went if you’re up for sharing.
Just to Claire’s!
This feels oddly patriarchal. I mean it is Ella’s body and she should get to decide about her ears and not her dad who really doesn’t have any idea what it is like to be a female who would like to adorn her ears with pretty things. Earning ear piercing… I don’t know. I get wanting kids to have excellent skills, feeling proud, and being invested but this is so divorced from the goal. This feels like a weird association.
To be fair, no legit piercing place would pierce a 10 year old’s ears without parental permission.
And I get that this isn’t something that works for everyone. For our family, it’s been a good fit – I’ve been grateful every day for 25 years that I not only got my ears pierced but also gained a skill that’s helped me daily.
I think that’s awesome! So smart to have kids earn things and if you can find something they are motivated to work for, like getting their ears pierced, even better!
Well, there can be a link between showing sustained responsibility and follow through, because if you get your ears pierced you have to take care of them afterward to avoid infection. Showing that you can complete a study program does demonstrate that kind of stick-to-it-ness. The fact that now you know something is kind of a bonus.
I don’t see Bart’s hesitation as a patriarchal control over his daughter’s ears but as someone from a family that doesn’t see self-mutilation for adornment as a given. As a parent, it makes sense to think twice before letting your kids poke holes in themselves. I guess they are lucky they don’t have a son who wants earrings; that might make gender roles an issue if he learned to code…
The risk of infection as a natural consequence should be enough for one to take care of her ears.
Having one’s ears pierced is not self-mutilation. Are you saying you are against your niece having her ears pierced? I think we can agree that in Western civilizations, a young girl wanting her ears pierced is an event, perhaps even a right of passage, and not self mutilation. I can assure as someone who has a friend who has actually harmed himself with “self-mutilation” that they are not comparable. And we can assume most people are not letting their children poke a hole in his or her ears themselves. This entire post was about how dad’s feel about daughter’s ear piercing. As a mom to a son, if he wants his ears pierced, he doesn’t need to “earn it” and I don’t care if he does or does not want to. I certainly would not worry about whether or not his grandfather’s had pierced ears or if his grandmothers liked it or not. It is 2021 not 1950.
Actually the entire post was NOT about the dad’s feelings…? Weird take away.