OMULO ERICK: School fires expose lack of parental care

Parents are missing in action in the upbringing of their children.

They have abdicated their roles of instilling values in their children, leading to wrong characters in a society that do not see anything bad with burning schools.

They do not care because they were never taught values in their early years.

What do we need to correct the ills we find ourselves in with the young people who are still being provided for by their parents if it is not the Competency-Based Curriculum?

CBC will equip a learner with the skills, knowledge, attitudes and values to thrive in the modern world, be confident about their pride and rich cultural heritage and contribute to making the world a better place. 

The curriculum seeks to ensure that the next and future generations shall be both patriotic and globally competitive.

Education should promote the acquisition of national values as enshrined in the Constitution.

It should also be geared towards a self-disciplined and ethical citizen with sound morals and religious values.

But learning starts at home. What is missing in the upbringing of a child at home is active and role model parent.

Discipline is necessary for the good upbringing of a child. 

If you are pampering your children to the extent that when they do something wrong they don’t get corrected, you are a failed parent.

Parents should not surrender their responsibilities to a servanthood status, running helter-skelter trying to satisfy children. Children should learn the realities in life.

What we are witnessing in the burning of school facilities is a replica of a failed family system.

If you have no rules in your house and pretend to love your children, that is not love but a misguided and unrealistic mindset for failure.

A house with no rules is not a home to mould young people.

Therefore, it is breathtaking to hear a parent say the new curriculum has made them go back to school, just because it demands of them to be present in their child’s education.

They go to an extent where they falsely lay claims of doing homework for their children. This is not justified because the CBC is learner-centred.

It has rendered the teacher as a facilitator-helping learners gain skills through peer and collaborative learning among others.

In CBC, learning is experiential and practical.

Learners gain skills related to real-life experiences through community service learning and parental involvement.

So when children go to their parents, requesting their participation in household chores let them be allowed to.

A good parent should allow a child to have experience in what was learned in class.

Your work as a parent is to guide your child through real-life learning experiences.

Guide your child and they do their homework, but don't do it on their behalf.

If we don’t embrace CBC, it might not augur well in correcting some of the societal ills we are finding ourselves in.

We need to have a future generation that is engaged, empowered and ethical.

Kenya and the rest of the world need a generation that is strong enough to weather the storms in life.

The young generation should among other things be self-reliant, critical thinkers, problem-solvers, imaginative and creative.

Otherwise, we are likely to see many cases of suicidal tendencies and functionless families.

Edited by Kiilu Damaris