By Felix Khanoba
The Registrar/Chief Executive of Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN), Professor Olusegun Ajiboye, have expressed the need for parents to always provide their children with the support and guidance needed for their proper growth and development.
Speaking on RayPower FM virtual discussion programme on the topic ‘Growing Moral Decadence in Classrooms and the Blame Game,’ Ajiboye advised parents to do better in raising morally-sound children, adding that many have failed in that responsibility.
The TRCN boss expressed concern at the idea of some parents placing the moral responsibility of children at doorstep of schools and hoping that the teacher would perform some miracle.
“There is no school equal to a decent home, and no teacher equal to a factual parent,” Ajiboye said.
He urged all parents to stand up to the responsibility of taking care of their children, maintaining that no parents should bring a child into the world if they are not ready to take care of it.
Ajiboye who lamented that parents have become slaves to their children, maintained his strong belief in the efficacy of corporal punishment in putting children straight.
“I am a believer of the fact that if you spare the rod, you spoil the child. Children should be disciplined. Corporal punishment is allowed in schools. The law recognizes it.
“However, there are people to administer that; either the principal or the vice principal. We recognize that there can be excesses. That is the reason the law says that there are people that should do that. It is not for everybody. If we generally abandon the rod, what is happening now will be a child’s play to what will happen in the future,” he said.
Also speaking, Professor Mopeola Omoegun, a Fellow of the Counselling Association of Nigeria, disagreed with Ajiboye on the issue of corporal punishment, adding that it has negative impact on the children.
While suggesting measures like denial and time out to help straighten a child, Omoegun spoke of the need for parents to begin early to teach the children sexuality education so as to enable them know and report when they are being violated.
She however added that children cannot approach their parents to discuss issues bothering them unless the parents create time for them and make them their best friends and confidants.
On her part, a public affairs analyst, Francesca Ogulade, lamented that the value system in recent times has shifted from hard work and integrity to inordinate pursuit of money, adding it is high time parents returned to teaching their children values such as dignity and integrity, and showing them the difference between right from wrong.
The discussants, while agreeing that parenting in the digital age is different and more difficult, urged parents to monitor what their children watch and limit their level of access to video and online contents.
