By most accounts, I’m a pretty relaxed mother. A friend termed me “the most bo chap (don’t care) mother in the nicest possible way”. My idea of extracurricular activities for my two-year-old is bringing her to meet my friends at brunches and dinner parties. There are no swimming lessons, Kumon drills, gym sessions, Mandarin or music classes getting in the way of her, oh you know, doing nothing.

And this slacker mum was about to meet Yale law professor Amy Chua, who vividly documented her hardnosed methods of raising and pushing her two daughters in her best-selling controversial memoir, Battle Hymn Of The Tiger Mother. In the book, she candidly called herself a “drill sergeant” who “spared no harsh words” and “fetishises difficulty and accomplishment”. Her routine for her girls included ensuring they practise the piano and violin for hours every day — including during family holidays abroad — and making her elder daughter do 20 practice tests of 100 problems each every night with a stopwatch after she came in second place in a multiplication speed test.

The youthful-looking 52-year-old was in Singapore to promote The Keys Academy, a new enrichment centre that emphasises soft skills, personal expression and communication, as well as academic results to prepare students for admission to “premier universities”. So perhaps just breathing the same air would somehow magically impart some of those Tiger mum skills to me.

Yes, Chua is definitely a believer in attending classes and going for enrichment courses. However, she did say that rote learning and memorising are no longer enough. Does that mean leaving my kid to prance around with a tambourine around all day in diapers is now totally cool because she’ll eventually end up as a President’s Scholar if I simply sign her up for the right courses? Unfortunately not. Here’s what I learnt about doing tiger parenting — the right way — from the Tiger Mum herself.

1. Be rigorous but give your kids the freedom to express themselves. “I wouldn’t be totally in favour of ‘Western’ free play,” said Chua. “Believe me, I still believe in memorising and drilling — I’m a big fan of drilling. The sad reality is you need the (score) numbers; you need to know the basic knowledge.”

However, she added: “But I think that’s no longer enough in the 21st century. I’m at Yale and I see the people getting admitted into Yale, Harvard, Stanford ... It’s not enough to have the high scores. They’re looking for people who can express themselves and seem really dynamic.”

2. Understand the system your kids are in. A big misconception people get after reading her book, said Chua, is that people think she is advocating that method of parenting. “I’m not saying be more of a tiger mum,” she asserted. “As my kids were growing up in America, where there’s so much free time and classes were more unstructured, I felt tiger parenting was a way to correct the imbalance. In Singapore, where the school system is strict and maybe not so fun, I feel the role of the parents and enrichment centres (should go) in the other direction — to balance it. You have to respond to the existing system.”

In fact, she said parents here needn’t “be more of a strict Tiger parent”. “I wouldn’t advocate that when the pressure is so intense. When I was in Korea, some of the most successful Korean kids I’ve seen have parents who aren’t so strict, as the school system is already suffocating. There is no way a child can be innovative and develop their individual personality if there’s no space or freedom given to him or her.”

3. Have some parent-kid distance. Parents convey stress and kids rebel against that, opined Chua. “For example, at an enrichment centre, there’s some distance. But work hard to find good people. I paid a lot of attention to that. You can get so much out of tutoring instead of more misery and fighting (together). Just don’t get a tutor who reminds them of you!”

4. Know your kids’ personalities to outsource effectively. “Every kid in every family is different,” said Chua. “My second daughter Lulu was outgoing and rebellious so there was much stress between the two of us. She hated mathematics when she was younger so I got her this tutor who looked really cool — like a rap singer. I would sometimes think, ‘Are they wasting time talking about music?’ But she ended up doing well for her tests because her tutor made it seem hip and relevant.”

5. Make it fun. “As an Asian parent, I know it’s hard to have fun because I want to fill up every second (with learning),” admitted Chua. “But I learnt that it becomes diminishing marginal returns after two hours because nobody’s paying attention. You have to make things more fun, have some space, lie down to read together or watch a movie together. My husband is very good about that, like bringing the kids for a bike ride or to the water park. To me, they’re just wasting time. But they come back and much more focused and ready to work again. The trick is to mix it up.”

At the end of the interview, I didn’t feel like I needed to run home and break out the multiplication table or purchase a full set of Chinese flashcards for my daughter. Like Chua said, there’s no need to go tiger mum when you’re already in a country like Singapore. But I suppose I could show a little more urgency when she’s older. Speaking of urgency, I did get tips on what’s truly essential in a young child’s early development: Potty training. Chua’s advice: “Be confident; children can detect your insecurities instantly. Be like, ‘We’re going to do this now’. They’d get it.”

I’ll let you know how that turns out.