Parenting and how to discipline a child.

Hi friends… 

Hope we are all having a nice time on the platform. Life is a bed of roses and thorns like we all know. We have our different battles to fight with life itself. Most times we find it a bit difficult to engage with things we are used to doing before, at times we struggle to get things in order or even make time for ourselves, family, and friends. 

I have been working on a project with my supervisor for more than a year now. It looked easy at first but in the long run, I realized it wasn’t as easy as I thought. She gave tough time to the extent that making time for myself became something so uneasy, I became weak and even fell ill again and again. 

But by the grace of God, I was through with her some days ago, so I took some days to rest and relax my brain. (All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy). I slept as much as I could. And from my leisure, I would get my phone and type some articles as drafts. Maybe someday when I get the ability I will publish them. 

Thanks for the encouragement

I got into a conversation with a friend of mine two days ago. So I made a statement that I wouldn't marry a woman that is not well educated. Then my friend disagreed and asked me for the reason behind my ideology of marrying a well-educated woman. 

I told him there is a huge difference between the term literate and illiterate. I wouldn't have mind marrying a woman who is illiterate only if I am one. That might just be a perfect match 😜. 

Then he asked me about those who get married to the non-educated, won't they also live a better life?. 

“They would for sure”, I responded.

Then I added, saying that the prior reason for me to marry a literate is for my kids. Giving them a mother that can train them to become someone in life, a mother that can spare her knowledge and impact them, a mother that can ask them to bring their books and teach them the basics, not requesting for a tutorial class. 

He said I haven't answered his question. Lol 😆

He then narrated a story to me about a family whose parents are both illiterate, but when their children return from school the father would get a newspaper and act like he was reading it, then he would tell the children to get their books and start going through their classwork and he would give them an assignment on what he saw similar to what they did in the textbook.

After doing their assignments, he would tell them to submit to him, then he packed everything and hide it on one side of his room without even checking on them.

The children did this for years till they were accustomed to it. They knew it to be their daily activities. 

As the narrator concluded, he said when the elderly child was about to finish high school was when he realized that his dad was an illiterate who would always read one newspaper simultaneously 😆😆. Without even checking the submissions they made to him. But he testified that his dad had impacted a lot on his academic performance. Thereby he was able to outshine his classmates in his studies and was used to reading. 

What do you think?. 

He then added that the answer he wanted from me was "discipline" from parents matters most. Not the fact that they are educated or not. It doesn't mean that the non-educated parents won't have time for their children to teach them. But when there is discipline then it's enough for the child to perform better. 

Even nowadays educated women are not ready to come up with those motherly roles anymore. They leave it all to their maids, then take the babies to daycare. They would always prefer to go to their workplace and earn than to give their children full attention. If this could fall to both sides (father and mother) on a child. Only God can help. 

We all believe that the first school and teacher of a child is their mothers. Mothers play a lot of roles in the life of a child. I might say 70%of a child's lifetime is spent with their mothers and this would indeed have an impact on them physically, morally, spiritually, academically, and even mentally. 

There is a woman who was once our neighbor when I was still in my third year in the university. She had some grown-up children. A male and three females. The eldest among them, the son, doesn't live with them. But the 3 daughters are living with their mum. But every day when they wake to get their house chores done and they make any form of mistake, instead of their mum correcting them and guiding them to what's right, she would rather lay curses on them and utter foul statements to them. She looks like she is giving them some discipline, but she isn't. 

These children got adapted to the curses and abuse from their mum and grew used to it. And at some point in time, they would not give her the respect she deserves. They talk back to her harshly and most of the time when they even speak among themselves they use abusive language and curses most of the time. 

I knew right from the time that the impact of their mother had shown on them. If it was an educated mother, such might have not happened. I narrated this to my friend in question. 

I agreed that one fact parents should never lack is the act of discipline. 

Discipline

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Discipline could mean a practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior. Using punishment to correct disobedience. 

Oxfords dictionary

There are also various types of discipline. 

It could be preventive, supportive, and corrective. 

Preventive discipline: This is about creating an avenue for rules and regulations to be followed, guidelines, or could be rules guiding the behavior to prevent distraction. This could be when we have given a reward for good behavior and prevented the bad ones by telling them the consequences that would erupt from doing so. 

Preventive discipline is better to be done when children are at a young age because they are still easy to curb and they would always love to listen at this stage. They pay rapt attention to the advice given to them and make sure to take heed to prevent themselves from getting punished. 

Supportive discipline: This type of discipline occurs mostly in the form of transgressions. The fact that they might have gone beyond the age to be given preventive discipline. We can’t teach a child everything at a tender age, they have to learn gradually. So possibly a grown-up child made a mistake and needs to be corrected, it is not necessary it comes in the form of punishment or even rewarding them. 

Verbal warnings, non-verbal warnings, reminders of the rules to be followed are the keys to a successful supportive discipline. Take an example that when a mother tries to correct a grown-up child, probably a teenager, in front of their mates, it is better to give them a supportive discipline, even sign language would be more appreciated. Because the child would have realized that before his/her parents could give such a sign then there must be consequences for such an action. Then further warning could later come up in verbal forms when they are alone. 

Corrective discipline: This is the last stage of discipline. It comes into play when a child has failed to change his or her behavior after repeated attempts of supportive discipline. It’s more like an advanced form of discipline. At this stage, strict action should be taken. Punishment might not work out, even verbal warnings are nowhere to be found. For example, this happened among students in a class then strict measures like removing the disruptive student from the classroom, reporting to the school principal, or even informing the parents then scheduling a meeting with the parents and the school principal. These steps might look more disappointing and disgraceful but they would go a long way in changing the child’s attitude and taking to corrections.

Discipline is so important in our society, right from our home, schools, and even our place of work. It brings peace and orderliness to society. In a congregation where there are no rules and regulations then there is no need for punishment, but when there are rules to be followed then there would surely be a consequence for intrusion. 

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Importance of discipline on a child

Discipline works better on children than adults because it is believed that adults are the ones to impose discipline on a child. 

1. 1. It keeps the child safe: when a child is well-disciplined either at home or school. They know the right from the wrong, thereby keeping them safe from environmental hazards. Safety precautions such as looking at both sides of the road before crossing. It could be addressing them on health risks and precautions to take before handling their meals while eating and after eating. A child should know what to eat and when to eat them. Even in the home, their safety should be important, when we see a child playing with sharp objects instead of saying “stop playing with knives” it is better to tell them why it’s a problem. Say “That could cut your hands. It’s not safe”. 

3. 2. It encourages good choices: a child who has been warned against the wrong things would surely know perfectly well what to do when such occurs again. They would have the preference to choose the right from the wrong, reminding themselves of the consequences and punishment that they had received for doing so in the first place. 
   

4. 3. It creates room for self-discipline: A well-disciplined child would learn how to control their emotions making them emotionally and socially mature adults. Knowing the right thing to be done at the right time. 
   

Conclusion. 

There is a difference between consequences and punishments. The two might sound similar but have a different impact on a child making it important to distinguish the difference between consequences and punishments. 

When children are disciplined with appropriate consequences they learn from their mistakes. Punishments, however, tend to mean that the children quickly learn how to prevent themselves from getting caught when they misbehave.

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