Taking your pre-teen child to boarding school is harmful

By EDWARD OWUOR

With cutthroat competition for the few spaces in top secondary schools, primary institutions have come up with tough measures to ensure students pass KCPE.

One of the measures is setting up boarding facilities for children as young as age seven. This is driving parents to send their pre-teen children to boarding schools so that they can concentrate on improving their grades.

But experts are raising concern that taking children to boarding schools early is detrimental to their development.

Dr Frank Njenga, a psychiatrist, says parents are doing their children a great disservice. "It is not a wise move to take a class one or two pupil to boarding because at that age the child need parental care, " he explains.

He says a child taken to boarding at that age grows up without knowing who their parent is. "Foolish parents think learning is just about school, but it is also about developing relationships. The child needs to be in the home environment so that they can see how the parents relate and other siblings so that they can also learn to cultivate relationships," he says.

Chuka University College Department of Education Chair Dr George Muthaa says sending children as young as age seven to boarding school is wrong.

Development

But owing to many parents busy schedules and competition more parents are being forced to take their children early.

But experts are cautioning parents against doing so because it will affect their children’s development at a later age.

"It is inappropriate to take a child who in lower primary to a boarding school because they are need parental care and guidance," says Muthaa

The doctor says children at that age need the home environment, which is the basic school, crucial for their character formation later in life.

"We have made learning more academic than it ought to be. Learning should not just be about books. A child need to develop intellectually, spiritually and mentally so that they grow up to be wholesome individuals who can face the challenges of life head on," he says.

The educationist says when parents take children to boarding at that age; they deprive them of precious opportunity to bond so that the children can learn to open up to their parents at a later age.

"When you take your child to boarding at class three, you cut an opportunity for creating a relationship with your child. And if you did not forge a relationship at this age do not expect the child to open up to you when they are teenagers," he says.

Muthaa says society has failed to incorporate other values that should be taught alongside education.

"As parents, teaching fraternity and community we have been caught up in this craze of passing examination and we forget the important of other crucial values. What is the point of raising book worms who cannot face the challenges of life?" he poses.