It’s only natural for parents to want their children to do their very best in school, as it sets them up for the rest of their life.

Some moms even play classical music like Bach or Beethoven for their baby in the womb, hoping that they will of give birth to a little genius!

But sometimes that desire for their kids success can actually be harmful to the kid, especially when their parents treat them more as a learning machine than an actual kid.

I know when I was young, the last thing I’d want to do was study all day. I wanted to go outside and play with my friends, you know, kid stuff!

So when this 5 year old’s parents made him study everyday, he resisted by answering quietly. When his Mom told him to speak up, he decided to comply, and yell every answer at her!

Check it out!

I should answer loudly every time? Okay!

My wife and I take turns in tutoring my son who just started school this school year.

He is generally doing well in school but we still tutored him over the weekend to give him the impression that school is serious and that we were intent on him taking it seriously.

My son rarely pays attention whenever we tutor him during the weekend as he just wants to play with his siblings. We have 3 kids and my son is the eldest.

But OP said even when his son was paying attention, the tutoring session was still a struggle.

And whenever he would pay attention, he just stays silent whenever he doesn’t know answers to questions.

Or  he would answer with the most soft voice he could muster, despite the fact that he was very loud when playing or in general.

I would often scold him for this and he still persists on doing this every time (the not answering and answering softly thing).

And this particular way of acting out was how OP said his son’s malicious compliance started!

My wife was tutoring him yesterday afternoon when during tutoring she could barely get and answer out of him or was answering very softly.

My wife had had enough and finally scolded him for answering this way and asked him to answer loudly whenever someone would ask him a question.

Anyone on this subreddit probably knows by now where this story is going, this kid proceeded to scream all the answers to my wife’s questions for the rest of their tutor session.

But instead of being mad, OP thought it was absolutely hilarious!

Where was I the whole time you ask? Rolling on the floor laughing beside them at the fact that my son managed to pull this off.

My wife couldn’t really do anything about it since I was the “strict” parent.

I would like to clarify that this tutoring is only a review of the week’s lesson and would generally last from 10 to 20 minutes only.

And OP assured the comments that his son wasn’t being disrespectful, just mischievous!

Also, what he did was not acting out but just being playful. This is why he was never reprimanded for what he did because we know he is like this.

It wasn’t like full blown shouting or anything more like playful shouting.

We never force the issue because he is still young and needs his space to play, sing, dance and interact with friends (in fact we encourage him to do this more than the reviewing.

Sadly it just needs to be done and the teacher sometimes asks us to do this so there’s that.

Seems like this kid is going places! If he’s still that young and knows how to turn someone’s own request against them, he sounds like a pretty smart cookie!

Reddit thought OP’s son had an amazing case of malicious compliance, but also felt sorry that OP and his wife were pushing him so hard.

This user suggested that if OP and his wife really want their children to learn, then they should make learning engaging for the boy!

This user agreed heartily, saying that specifically reading every day will help their kids learn and train their critical thinking skills.

And this user turned the tables,  asking OP if he would like to have someone forcing him to work on his weekends.

Finally, this user, whose parents did the same thing to him as a kid, told OP that all it did for him was burn him out!

Let the kid play outside!

Let him live a little and give him a juice box and a jump rope, not a book and a notepad!

If you liked this post, you might want to read this story about a teacher who taught the school’s administration a lesson after they made a sick kid take a final exam.