On proper education for children (The role of parents)

Juvenile delinquency, out-of-school youth, minor offenders.  We often hear these words.  We read from the papers and heard from news children committing various crimes, being sold to prostitution, made to be drug couriers and peddlers and the like.   There are also petty crimes on the street being committed by these young children, who are supposed to be in school, attending classes and enjoying the life of school children.

Gone were the times, where parents eagerly send their children to school, and happily fetch them after school hours.  Gone were the times where parents patiently spend their times teaching their children in answering their assignments and help in making their school projects.  Those times were gone.

When after receiving their children's report card, parents just let their nannies affix theirs signatures, and let the latter attend the PTA meetings.  Busy in their livelihood and looking for ways and means to provide their families are the primordial reasons of these parents when asked about these.

How can then we expect better education for our children if parents commit all of these?  Will we give all the blames to the teachers and the school?

Parents play an important role in developing their children's education.  We all knew that parents are the first teachers of the child.  So after sending their children to school, and let the teachers take over their part, their role as first teachers will not cease and be limited to their own abode.  The role is a continuing task, even if their children are already at school.  Their role includes the provider of good food set before their children's table.  These good foods are vital for their children's health development, both physically and mentally.  How can you expect the children to be attentive in school, when in the first place they were not fed properly at home?  Their minds could be anywhere else during classes, thinking of how to feed their hungry stomachs.  While it is the role of the teachers to feed the minds of the students, it is the role of the parents to feed their mouths.

Secondly, parents are bound to give emotional stability of their children.  While values are taught in school, it is also the parents' role to be the model of these values to their children.  If possible, parents should never let their children witness a fight against their spouse, as well as to their neighbors, in which way, children will comprehend more on the values taught in school.  Parents are also duty bound to give comfort and love to their children in order for the latter to become more confident in facing the outside world.

On this modern world where children are exposed to high technology or the computer world, parents are also obliged to provide proper guidance to their children.  Children can easily gain information with just a click of the mouse of the computer, which is now very accessible in the neighborhood.  When left unattended, these children can easily access inputs and ideas not suitable of their ages.  It is then proper for the parents to regulate their children's access to the modern world.

Fourthly, parents should also monitor the academic performance of their children.  Even if it is already the role of the educators in school, parents should also be involved on their children's performance by way of monitoring them, on how they rate in each activity in school.  In such way, parents will know how far their children have become on their age.

Most importantly, parents are required to give ample time to their children.  Not just ordinary time, but quality time, where children can share their laughter and grief with their parents.  Bonding, they might say. Play together, eat together and laugh together.  In such a way, the children will become strong, both physically and emotionally, with their parents.  And in so doing, juvenile delinquency and the minors caught breaking the law will be avoided.

DORIS A. SANORIA

Master Teacher 1

Alaska Elementary School

Alaska, Mambaling, Cebu City