FROM my experience as a teacher, there is one thing I have come to discover that is common among students who perform well in school. Their parents are actively and closely involved in their education.

Such children do not only get good grades, but they are also disciplined and carry along positive attitudes.
I personally don’t recall my parents helping us out with homework too often. They were busy running a business schedule.

However, they certainly knew who my teachers were, what I was studying, and whether I was behaving up to their standards. That is the key. It was the standards they defined, not the school.

Nowadays, as children grow older, it has become harder for parents to help them. I believe that is because we as a society have handed too much of parents’ responsibility to the school system.

Schools are now entrusted with the entire responsibility of upbringing children, from morals, to character and of course to academia.

Judging from the look of things, it is clear that many parents don’t feel they are able to provide their children with the support they need in learning.

Many may be busy, or feel they are out of touch. With both parents working full time jobs, it is not easy to juggle everything.

However, lack of the necessary parental care and attention is the main factor for the subsequent rise in the percentage of juvenile delinquency.

The reason is so obvious. The absence of parental instructions causes children to develop irreversible behavioural and emotional problems.

Parents must make consistent efforts to reach out to their children’s teachers. Such initiatives will help parents gain the confidence to get back some of the responsibilities that we as a society have handed over to schools.

The current economic downturn teaches me something unique; that we no longer have a large manufacturing industry at home. Therefore, our major export, if we are sensible, will be our ideas and inventions.

If we don’t nurture the talent within our children, we will be left behind at the international stage. There is a lot to tap from the young generations’ minds.

Fellow parents, it is holiday time and I believe education is not a matter of going to class but a life-long process.
Keep the young generation constructively occupied.

Our churches, teachers, and most importantly parents need to find time for educating children during holidays. Plan for holiday retreats, ingando, camping and school trips to control these energy packed bodies from bursting their bubble.

Having lunch on Christmas with children is not good enough. Education serves as a key to everything.

The author is a teacher at Kagarama secondary school
shebs10@yahoo.com