What makes a good dad?
Everyone’s talking about Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s (GMA) State of the Nation Address (SONA) that it seemed out-of-touch for me to not write a column about it. But then, Jinggoy Estrada had apparently beaten me (as early as 2007) to the title I wanted to use, the “State of the Nation, Undressed.” I contemplated another cheeky title, the “Various States of Ursula Andress(ed)” but decided that making analogies to the quintessential Bond girl in Dr. No might lead to me to lose my GP rating in this paper’s Health and Family section (especially after watching her get spiced up for dinner in Mountain of the Cannibal God). It then occurred to me that my son was born at about the same time GMA first became president. Interestingly, my daughter also came into this world just a few months after Erap went to Malacañang. So as a father, I’ve been “serving” for roughly the same length of time as their two intertwined presidencies. And I thought that perhaps it’s about time I made some sort of assessment of myself, too. A SONA, if you will, on my term so far as the father of the Republic of Montemayor.
As with any SONA, I, of course, need to have a catchy acronym to spell out the goals that I want to be evaluated against. GMA, for example, wants her administration to be remembered for a 10-point legacy program, which she coined as BEAT THE ODDS, where B is for balanced budget, E is for education for all, etc. But these kinds of goals are often difficult to measure, unrealistic, and, as one company I used to work for put it, too BHAG (Big, Hairy, and Audacious Goals) for my taste. How can I objectively measure if I am a good dad? After some reflection, I decided to use the amount of time that I involve myself in my children’s lives as the general measure that I would use in my inaugural father’s SONA. Specifically, I would rate myself based on the amount of PRIME time I give to my kids (P for physical, R for recreational, I for inspirational, M for managerial, and E for educational).
In his 2008 dissertation, “What Makes a Good Dad? Contexts, Measures, and Covariates of Paternal Care,” Dr. Rong Wang says that parenting involves different activities that meet a child’s physical, social, emotional, and cognitive development needs. He distinguishes the four types of parental care activities as physical, recreational, educational, and managerial activities. Each type is linked to one aspect of child development needs. According to Dr. Wang, “Physical activities contribute to children’s physical well-being; educational activities are linked to children’s cognitive development; recreational activities and the managerial activities ensure children a fun, stimulating, and secure environment in which to grow up.”
We dads sometimes think that our role in child-rearing is limited to just recreational activities. We act like the “Disneyland Dad” or the dad who always treats his kids to fun times and leaves all the responsible but mundane day-to-day parenting to Mom. That is not what being a good dad is all about. Dr. Wang cited one study’s findings that “…merely spending time with fathers (by going out to dinner or seeing movies together) was not related to children’s life satisfaction, but children tend to have high levels of satisfaction when fathers provide encouragement and talk over problems (authoritative parenting).”
In another study involving a different group of parents and children, he reported that fathers “participating in leisure activities with adolescent children does not affect adolescent children’s emotional distress, delinquent behaviors or academic achievement. Instead, talking with children about things going on at school is positively related to children’s well-being.”
Our children need to see that we fathers are a part of all the facets of their daily lives. We need to be accessible to them to talk about their questions and concerns. They need to see us actively participate in school activities and in other routine tasks involving them such as car pools, doctor visits, practices, shopping, basic grooming, etc. I would add, however, a fifth element to Dr. Wang’s list, which I call inspirational activities. These are the mentoring moments that fathers provide their kids for moral direction and to help them become better persons. Fathers provide this not just through direct one-on-one talks with their children. Perhaps more important are the indirect moments when we teach our kids via the way we act and the choices we make. I learned this from my father. He might not have passed some of the measures above, but if there is one face I see whenever I encounter a question of right or wrong, it is his.
Now, you might ask me how I think I stack up against my own SONA’s PRIME time. Unfortunately, dear readers, I think that I would have to follow Romulo Neri’s example and exercise executive privilege on this one (as perhaps all of us fathers should). Besides, I would like to state in very clear terms that there will be No-El(ections) in the Republic of Montemayor in the foreseeable future. My children can only push for Charter Change when they reach 21 and not in 2010. At that time, they can seek their own independence and convert our family into a Federal system. Hopefully, however, they’d let me watch over my grandchildren from time to time. For regardless of what kind of father I ultimately turn out to be, I’ll never stop trying. Unlike GMA, I have no term limits. Fatherhood is forever.
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Please e-mail your reactions to kindergartendad@yahoo.com.
