Family Home: Very Essential in Raising a Child

LETTER TO FAMILIES”

The Oxford Dictionary defines “Environment” as “the conditions that affect the behaviour or development of an individual”.

It is also defined as “the particular political or social arena or conditions”. I believe no further explanation or clarification is needed here.

And then comes the very next question, “What is a home?” Now we all know what a home is, but have we ever actually reflected on what it means? The Oxford Dictionary defines the “Home” as “a place in which you live together with your family”.

With that said and done, let us now embark on this journey into the home environment of the family and how individuals in the family influence it. But before we go far, let me bring to mind the popular saying “Charity begins at home” which means that the good anyone does should begin from his/her own backyard. This is a case of the effect of the home environment on the individual. This slogan is usually directed towards children because they are the product of the home and I am sure that it is a unanimous agreement that in actual sense, the home revolves around them.

In Pope John Paul II’s famous book; “LETTER TO FAMILIES”, he wrote (under section 17, sub-headed FAMILY AND SOCIETY) and I quote “The family is a community of persons and the smallest social unit. As such it is an institution fundamental to the life of every society”. What has been written here is a truth too dire to be ignored.

It brings to mind another famous saying; “As you make your bed so you lie on it.” like it or not, the home is actually whatever the family members make of it

and whatever decision they take not only affects the home but by love, the entire community and society they live in as well! In continents like Africa and Asia, the family is usually considered the model for the entire society. And as such this responsibility is tasking on Father, Mother (or guardians), Uncle, Aunty, children and whoever else, and as such, this article is an awakening.

The early years of a growing child are the most crucial, and a child’s education or educational responses boost of the home the child comes from because matter-of-factly, the home has a deeply profound impact on a child’s learning. In short, a child’s education during his/her early years is proven to be the most critical phase of the child’s existence. Look for example at a child whose parents have a sincere interest in his or her education. This child is privileged to numerous books in the home which means he or she reads more than most less privileged kids and their parents would have read aloud for them a lot when they were younger. The child’s parents also take his/her school work very seriously, by revising their homework with them, helping them prepare adequately for tests and exams, and even taking the time to assess their grades. This child is also privileged to enjoy certain indoor activities like playing board games (like Chess, Scrabble, Monopoly, Ludo, etc.), watching kiddie cartoons and educative shows, listening and singing along to nursery rhymes played all the time on a cassette or sung by their parents, and so on. Outdoor activities are not excluded in home education, such a child may be taken out to the zoo, a fun park, and even a field to play a lot of sports and games or picnics (I know we don’t usually do picnics in Nigeria, but I’m sure you could improvise something). Children who are privileged to these sorts of intense training are found to have higher and better cognitive outcomes and can do many things that most of their mates may not be able to do. Research has even shown that such children are farther than their mates by twelve to twenty weeks (that is three to five months) of primary learning. In the same vein, families living in disadvantaged neighborhoods plus parents that use bad language in the home, or parents who do not take the time to properly teach their children or even care how they are faring in school, all this tends to affect the mentality of the children raised in such homes such that the child has lower cognitive outcomes.

Early Years

This does not mean that the privileged child is more brilliant than the non-privileged child. It’s just that the former has been given the upper hand and a better head start in the race of life.

Poverty is one of the factors that deprive families of a good home environment and the environment needed for a child’s conducive home learning. And I mean real poverty, not an average living. Because poverty means that a child may not go to a good school, the child may never even go to school at all! Poverty means that the child may never eat well, they never have good clothes. Poverty means that the child will get sick a lot due to unsanitary conditions and poverty also means that they have no money for good health care. Poverty means that children have a lot of dreams and desires but barely have any hope of having them fulfilled. Poverty means despair, frustration and dissatisfaction oozing out of every family member. Poverty can lead to abuse by family members. The saddest thing is that this burden of poverty is placed on the children; from an early age they have to struggle to support the family to make ends meet. They are sent out to hawk or beg, they have to struggle every day for their daily bread and they are often abused or sexually harassed this way.

They are more often than not introduced to a life of crime, they become the street urchins, the vagabonds, the prostitutes, the drug dealers, the pick-pockets, the thieves, the neighborhood nuisance, a plague to society and the list goes on. These children have been robbed of the critical stage of ‘childhood’. They grow up too quickly, and because of the life they live, they are always depressed, cynical, bitter, frustrated, resentful, or in the worst case uncaring of the world that has given them nothing but hardships and suffering. Many very often go on to lead miserable lives. Only a few ever escape such fates.

The Joy of a Happy Home

This doesn’t necessarily mean that wealth guarantees a good and conducive home environment as many people tend to believe. Many homes of wealthy people are equally as devastating to a child’s mental growth as in many poor people’s homes. Many rich people and families believe that money is the basis on which a happy family thrives (partly true – who wants to have a family fending off the gutters?) but there is more to a happy family than just financial stability. Sometimes due to a lack of love and affection in the family, members are sentenced to a kind of ironical isolation, in the sense that you are alone whilst you are surrounded by people. Looks like the kind of life less privileged people are living on the streets doesn’t it?

And when family members find no comfort in the home, parents turn to work for solace and distraction, or worse, begin to have extra-marital affairs! And children turn to their peers; gangs for affection, advice and commendation and we all know how dangerous this can be.

Unhealthy home environments can be incurred when computers and televisions are allowed in a child’s room without supervision and restrictions. This usually isolates them from family interaction not to mention that they can pick up bad habits. When members of a family often spend so much time on phones and other gadgets; when they are always working and never really present- inconspicuously, without anyone noticing it slowly ebbs away quality family time. This manifests in the lack of attention shown to one another by parents and children. On a physical level, unrestricted and unsupervised use of gadgets by children like constant video games instead of outings, exercise and homework, especially when such gadgets confine

them to their rooms may lead to childhood obesity, which inadvertently leads to low self-esteem as their mates may constantly mock them for their size.

This may further lead to depression, emotional instability, and even substance abuse.

Good Parenting

Families that do not spend quality time together tread on unsteady grounds and when there is no sense of love, affection, trust and unity between family members, it can sow seeds of distrust, secrecy and tension.

Healthier home environments can be inculcated when family members spend more time together often doing creative and productive things like watching movies, playing different games, as well as eating out. Even more exciting though non-etiquette things can be allowed for example cracking jokes and discussing around the dining table. I am a living testimony of the good this seemingly bad table manners can do! A home should be comfy, warm and loving not stiff! This doesn’t mean that there should be no discipline though.

Ultimately, parents should be role models in their homes because children learn mostly by imitation and parents’ behaviour in the home plays an important role in shaping children’s characters and thereby in an implicit way their future. We all know nobody is perfect, and adults are not all-knowing simply because they are adults but that is still no excuse!

Parenthood is a role to play and as such anyone who assumes that role should strive for perfection. It is very much like getting a job in a company. You have to deliver your best and if you are not good enough you’re out! The job of parenting should not be shirked or done badly simply because there is no supervisor or

because parents are not getting paid for it! Children should also strive to be better, even in the worst of circumstances. I know this doesn’t sound easy, and things are easier said than done. But there are many stories of children who were brave and willing enough to affect the world around them despite their terrible family conditions. You do not need to have superpowers first.

And if the child cannot find the ideal role model he/she seeks in their homes, they can find it elsewhere; like a really good teacher or a fellow student with sound character. They can even turn to the Bible; Samuel, Isaac and especially Our Lord Jesus Christ were cherubic when they were children. It is overwhelmingly sad that many people have lost sight of the essence of the family these days (seriously I’m crying a river here!). In most families now it is the case of “Me, Myself and I”, or “To your tents oh Israel!” and so I would recommend that families should always strive towards the right path. They should acknowledge every situation that comes their way and make do with what life has to offer. The central theme is Love. Love is all that matters. If folks can heed these recommendations, nothing less than an ideal home environment would be established.