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Two weeks ago, my daughter's preschool teacher approached me as I was dropping her off. "Jessica, can I speak with you a moment?" she asked.

Immediately my mind jumped to, "Oh no. What has she done now?" My daughter can be a fabulous, wonderful child...or one big tantrum in pink shoes.

"I wanted to ask you if I give some extra time to Camille - specifically to work on reading. She knows how to read, you know," said the preschool teacher.

I breathed a sigh of relief. Reading? My kid's teacher wants to spend extra time to help my child get ahead? Hmm. Don't have to think about that for long!

"Yeah, I recently noticed she could read," I said. "I had nothing to do with it, but it seems like she's figuring out what words say all around her."

Immediately after saying that, I wished I hadn't. What kind of parent barely notices when her kid learns to read?  I mean, it's great the teacher noticed - my kid gets extra attention. But it got me thinking: how did I become so oblivious that my kid's teacher had to mention my daughter's new skill before it really resonated with me?

As parents, my husband and I are pretty good about reading a story to the kids before bed; and lately, we have The Boy, who has totally exploded in reading (at nearly eight years old), read to his little sister. But, I remember going out and buying books for my son when he was in preschool, and I remember working with him on letters and sounds. Frankly, it was torture for both of us. He wasn't interested, and I wasn't patient. I never did anything like that for The Girl. Sure, she has some of her own books - but when it comes to educational and extracurricular activities...well, let's just say it stinks to be a second child and have busier, more tired parents. She's definitely gotten the short end of the stick compared to what we provided for The Boy when he was younger.

And this reading thing specifically - well, I knew one of my daughter's favorite things to do is sit with a notebook and copy down words she sees. And she likes to ask me how to spell words so she can write them down too. That she can read shouldn't come as a surprise, really.

But it is a somewhat painful reminder for me about how much more ambitious I was to be an excellent mother when my son was little (whatever that means - I had an idea of perfection, and at that point I still wanted to attain it). Now, I'm a little less ambitious with academic and extracurricular stuff. Okay, a lot less.

At the same time, my focus has changed. I used to ask my daughter if she'd rather be beautiful or smart - the correct answer, in my mind, being smart. But one day, my mother-in-law mentioned something to me: "Jessica, don't you think the better question would be, would you rather be beautiful, smart, or kind?"

I think about that a lot in my parenting. Given limited time, resources, whatever - what's the most important thing I can teach my children? And my mother-in-law is right: it's to value people and to be good to others.

So my daughter taught herself to read, and her teacher will pick up that cause and turn her into a scholar. I'll be successful if I help her build a strong, loving, character.