34. Some more parenting tips

 

Oh Wow! So we are parents now. Can we believe it?.....

Karen and Joshua were on top of the world. Karen had become mother of a cute baby girl, Tina. She had been preparing for motherhood for quite some time. They had read a lot of books and surfed the internet for the tips so as to become the most ideal parents.

Let’s share some of the knowledge that they gained.

Parenthood is a boon given to all the living beings for carrying on the process of generation ahead. It is a wonderful feeling of creation that only the parents can understand. However, once you become a parent it is not for just one day but the entire life. It is full of responsibilities and sacrifices, too.

A few important responsibilities for the parents towards their children are:

v Proper Nurturing

v Taking Good Healthcare

v Real Education

v Instilling Positive Values

 

Let’s examine them one by one!

Proper nurturing

The first and the foremost thing to do is to keep your expectations under check. Parenting is a gradual process of learning, too. It all begins with love, care and warmth for your child. These are natural feelings given by the nature to the parents. Don’t be miser in showing them. A hug or a cuddle is all it takes to show these to your child. Interact with them in a real sense. Talking to them, while watching television or with your work brought home from the office or during WFH, so common these days, is just an eye-wash and done just for the false satisfaction. Your children long for your response to their stories. Listen to them and respond with full attention. Keep positivity alive and be their friend, mentor and confidant. Remember, your children will remain children for you during their entire life.

In case of improper nurturing, such as in disturbed families, the children see the quarreling; shortages; absence of one of the parents due to death, divorce or sickness; or other similar problems, the children do not attain natural physical and mental growth. Either, they become too much meek and coward or, gain aggressive demeanor. If we pick up family background of the criminals, most of them come from disturbed homes or pick up bad company, which again is the sign of improper nurturing.

Taking good healthcare

Our health issues have grabbed the eye-balls during the Corona pandemic. Remember, children and old people are more susceptible to it. However, besides this, regular healthcare of the children should never be ignored. Don’t overlook slightest symptoms. Of course, you don’t need to be paranoid about it but one should be vigilant. It begins with vaccinations. In their early age, visit to a good pediatrician is very helpful. Monitoring of their growth, both physical as well as mental, should be your prime concern.

According to the latest report published by the Government of India as up to 2018, 30 children out of every 1000 do not survive in our country. It is because of improper healthcare facilities. Therefore, if you are lucky enough to get proper healthcare for your children, don’t ignore. The children are delicate creatures and need good healthcare.

Improper healthcare may result in stunted growth, health complications, disturbed academics, behavioral problems, mental delinquencies and even problems in the social adjustment. Irregular healthcare, ignorance of health issues such as eye-related, dental problems, stomach-aches, headaches or any other physical/ mental agony, may be damaging in the later stage of life.

Real Education

Education holds prime importance in our lives. It is the duty of the parents to arrange for proper education of their children. Starting from basic education, middle school, senior school, college, up to professional or vocational education should be monitored thoroughly.

As per Government statistics, nearly 85% of urban and 69% of rural population is literate but cross your hearts to tell, if literacy means education in its true sense? It is very urgent that the children do not do only rote learning but it should be applied in nature too. Our new NEP-2020 is a right step in this direction. Please refer to my article “NEP-2020-What does it mean” on this space or on my blog Education 2020 (link: eduofday.blogspot.com). Proper education should necessarily be holistic in nature. The child must come out of the portals of the institution as the one blessed with the best of attributes like compassion, care, discipline, punctuality, synchronization with others, honesty, communication, social skills etc. besides the brilliance in the academics.

Lack of this real education, may result into the person going for criminal activities, in order to get some short-term gains. An example can be taken from the life of Osama Bin Laden. He was highly educated but it was used in the wrong direction and the result was 9/11 disaster that changed the world suddenly into drastically.

Instilling Positive Values

Our values hold a very important place in the life. Believe me, it all begins at home. A well-endowed, culturally-rich family reinforces the life of the children with positive value system. Such a child is never a failure and comes out strongly out of the challenging situations, unscathed.

If the parents do not instill good values, the children are bound to pick up the negative ones. It is very easy to get into the bad company and take up wrong attributes. Therefore, cautiousness about the children’s company is a must.

Takeaways

These tips are only few in numbers. Attributes such as Compassion, Courage, Humor, Thoughtfulness, Presence of Mind, Wit, Wisdom, Simplicity, Practical Approach, Helpfulness etc. play very important role in the children’s life.

Although, it is too early for Karen and Joshua to implement but they are vigilant parents and Tina is really lucky to have them as her parents.

#Parenting #ParentingAdvise #ParentingTips #Parenthood

The author R C Verma has shared some of his personal experience in the form of this article. Please post your critical views in the comment box here. This is also available for reading on www.lucknowcity.co.in in the education section.