 |
We went to the local health & fitness club recently as a family and witnessed first hand what is becoming both a regular, worsening and alarming occurance – 'child misbehaviour'. My seven year old son was being harrassed, taunted and bullied by two older children in the pool and when asked to stop by my wife, they responded by throwing a plastic float that hit her squarely on the face, followed by verbal abuse and laughter. |
After being forced to leave by the staff, the boys proceeded to continue their taunts and aggression in the changing room and found it very amusing to systematically open other peoples lockers and move clothing and bags into empty lockers, just for the fun of it and for good measure, damaging an expensive mobile phone and placing it back just as the owner came back into the room. Whilst all this was going on, the mother of these miscreants defended their behaviour and would not have a word said against them. Her attitude explained it all...
The more liberally minded might say that this is normal and 'children will be children', but the reality is somewhat different and worrying for the future. Without sounding like 'Old Uncle Alf' having his daily rant, when we were that age, none of us, including our most hardened school bully affectionately known as “Grinder”, would ever dream of behaving in that way. Pranks were expected, but not blatant rudeness, abuse, pilfering and damaging other peoples property. There has indeed been a major shift in the attitudes of youngsters in the last 20 years and we have all seen it; children as young as five being allowed to sit in front of the TV playing computer games instead of more structured activities, lack of discipline in schools, poor diets leading to 30% of Irish children being overweight and 15% obese, teenage binge drinking, drugs, lack of respect, lack of exercise and sports, etc. The list goes on. So what is the cause of these problems? Lack of proper parenting. Full stop. Simple as that. It is a fact that our children mirror what we do. We are their role models. What hope do we as a society have in the future with more and more children being brought up by parents who simply don't have a clue. How many times have you heard about parents challenging why their child was being disciplined by the teacher? Look at the behaviour of the parents passing burgers and chips to children through the school gates because they did not agree with healthy eating policies adopted by the school. What lesson are we giving children when they know that they cannot be punished due to our insane Human Rights laws?. It is a clear cut case of cause-and-effect, when third generation parents who themselves had been exposed to liberal views and never shown the importance of a moral and ethical code, simply pass on their value system to their children. It is actually worse than people realise and not just relegated to lower social groups or disadvantaged families as some commentators would have us believe. Proper parenting is the answer as it dictates how a child is educated, fed, disciplined and trained to deal with life. We cannot blame schools because Ireland has an excellent educational system – widely acknowledged as one of the best in the World, but there is something lacking. There is little or no formal teaching of “Life Skills” such as how to behave, the importance of good manners, how to dress, how to eat properly, the importance of being silent, listening and thinking positively. What a difference this would make to our children's lives.
Consider this; - over a hundred years ago, Dr Maria Montessori developed a radical way of pre-school teaching that has been proven to work. For example, she wrote that during the years 3-6, the child is experiencing various sensitive periods in movement, order, language, learning manners etc. The purpose being to feed into the child's sense of identity by giving him responsibility and imitate the activities of adults. One of the most valuable lessons was the “Silence Game” where the children have to learn that silence is an activity in itself as it helps to develop concentration and self-discipline. She advocated that silence is the fruit of well cultivated and purposeful movement. Why not teach these methods as “Life Skills” beyond Montessori Pre-Schools – as they make so much sense. Government must divert the millions of Euro currently being squandered on poorly controlled Government projects, welfare fraud, tax revenue from cigarettes and alchohol as well as failed infrastructure projects to increase teachers salaries so as to attract the best educators for our children, set up new these new “Life Skills” in the schools and improve awareness for parents. Maybe then we can stem this worrying trend.
Jas Kalsi, Bsc(Eng)Hons, MBA is a Management Consultant and past President of the Ennis Chamber of Commerce |
