Back in the days, our forefathers never attended modern schools. They only attended biblical education for the purpose of adulthood baptism and confirmation into Christianity during the era of missionary movements in the country. Despite the fact that they didn’t attend educational schools, these people did not fail to adhere to rules set, perhaps by their traditional authorities, and children at the time never failed their parents in any way. They had so much respect for their parents and had good behaviour, manners and at the same time were well-disciplined.
Relatively, nowadays it is the other side of the story. Children are in an era whereby their parents sit at home and send them to school with an expectation of them coming back with good behaviour, manners and utmost discipline, of course not forgetting education, which is the main aim of sending them to school. Well, in my view, I feel like such parents are failing to do their part of “parenting”. Parenting includes some of the minor teachings such as in my culture, boys nod their heads when receiving or giving something, and girls bend their knees when doing so. It also includes ways of greeting elders with respect, being sent by an elder and do whatever they request, and being able to follow instructions, just to mention some.
To spare the rod is to spoil the child. Therefore, parents should also be involved in their children’s education. Teaching your children all these three things at home helps the professional teachers to educate your children very well, because failing to do so means an extra burden on them.
Instead of teaching the school subjects, they are busy teaching your children how to perhaps say thank you when given something, how to listen when the teacher wants to say something, and all other things that children tend not to be lectured on from home.
This parental or home education in simple terms, requires no much of any parent’s time. No timetable is set for this type of education, like any other classes; neither a fixed location to teach your children manners or how to behave. You could for instance be out there for shopping with your family and while walking around in a grocery shop, your kid accidentally bumps into a person and they didn’t bother to say “sorry”, then something has to be done. A good solution is to make them apologise to the person that moment so that next time when they do it, they would know what to do. In such a way, one is already educating.
I, therefore, greatly support the engagement of parents or guardians in the behavioural, mannerisms and discipline education of their children, and not the school. Understanding teachers would help in doing so, but some of the straight-forward teachers would not be held to account for your children not knowing the basics of good behaviour because we all know that charity starts right at home.
Let’s stop the question of “What do you learn from school, if you don’t even know how to say thank you”? to our own children, and get involved in teaching them whatever we think they should know before going into the outside world, be it in the streets or at school. On the other hand, in the absence or fading away of Sunday schools and biblical education, parents can still do that at home since the Bible plays a significant role in early childhood development education. In addition, a God-fearing child is a well-disciplined, well-mannered child with good behaviour.