Why today’s parent should just go back to school

The sad story of a girl in Bungoma who sat this year’s Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examinations and got 277 marks and later died because of poor results and her behavior is tragic.

It is tragic because although it is not very clear what might have caused the death of the student, 14, it is clear that parenting was a major cause of the differences between the teenager and her parents leading to the tragic death.

Clearly, parenting is becoming more difficult and overwhelming than in the past. The pace and demands of modern life, high standards of perfectionist parenting, mounting workplace pressure, longer work hours that spill over into private lives thanks to technology, lack of affordable child care and policies that are unfriendly to families have all teamed up to make parenting in Kenya an uphill task.

An uphill task

As recent stories from homes, schools and all over tell, raising our own children seem to have become both very demanding and an uphill task. We have all sorts of outside forces, seen and unseen, competing for the attention of parents and children alike. Little wonder that the generations before us look at us and openly announce that they would not want to be parents with the responsibility of raising children in today’s world.

What is interesting above all these is that effective parenting information is available from many different sources. However, applying that information in our daily parenting experience is where the rubber seems to be meeting the road. It’s just chaotic.

For one, parental control and discipline in recent years has drastically changed and with it, family life has awfully changed. Once upon a time, parents were totally in charge and children did only and exactly as they were told. Today the reverse is the case in many homes. Clearly, the current wave of relaxed discipline has had negative effects even in schools leave alone the home front. It has not only weakened parental authority but also left children without the guidance they need to make good choices and approach life with confidence.

Pressure to make ends meet has resulted in robot and absent parents, with the greatest culprits being fathers. Whether in schools, church or children’s social events, the number of fathers who are too busy to attend these functions is on the increase. Go to a school education day in a typical primary school and you will notice that mothers outnumber fathers.

Children need to be taught the right values for survival but where from? Unfortunately, what they learn from parents and examples in their environments and the media is not encouraging or worth emulating. Mentorship programs do not exist at homes, in religious institutions, and in most educational spaces.

Teens have always experimented, and for many, smoking, drugs and drinking seems like no big deal, unfortunately. Today’s children aren't just doing cigarettes and beer; with other high-end cocktails of drugs being easier to get than ever, children today are becoming increasingly savvy about ways in which they can get high. And the media doesn't help, with endless movies and television shows portraying students partying and experimenting on a regular basis.

Research in Kenya now shows teenagers drink more than ever before. The official advice in Kenya is that no alcohol for under 18s, but statics from agencies shows that underage drinking is already a big problem between 12 and 18 even as Nacada reports show that 4.9 million Kenyans aged 15 – 65 years were abusing at least one drug or other substance.

Unfortunately, cell phones and the internet often raise other issues for parents. For today’s children and teenagers, immersion in the internet is huge. Many reckon most of teenage socializing is now officially digital. Their credibility with their friends has completely been linked to being current. As many parents wonder who their children are constantly texting and chatting with, children seem very confident on the net although in actual fact they have woefully immature skills for handling it. Many parents know far less than they should about their child’s online life.

Although with the information explosion parents now have new understanding of how children develop, there is new stresses and pressures on parents, not just to produce children who are compliant, but ones who are emotionally and relationally healthy as well. As it goes, as a parent provides structure and discipline to teach your children to be responsible and caring, you also need to keep their emotional well-being intact.

The other challenge which parents face from children and teenagers is to give them resilience. Children need to be taught that life is not only about happiness but success has failure, its cousin too. This means they need to practice coping skills, and this applies to all issues in life, including examinations.

What is certain is that if there was a school where parents could be taught some basics on parenting, we shall have a whole lot of us.