Are we preparing our children for the real world?

EDITOR: Are the children these days prepared for the real world? Many of us who are older would recall our days of growing up where we had little to live on and were contented. Many of us had to go in the mountains before going to school and after school carry water from the standpipe, go to the shops and still do home chores. But today things have changed where our children these days are more privileged in so many ways in the sense that they don’t do what we had to do growing up.

Those days are what helped to make many of us able to survive and not giving in to crimes, suicide and ill disciplined. Unlike today where our kids have almost everything at their finger tips and are giving as it were choices. They chose what they want to eat, wear and seldom do any chores at home. This can be dangerous in that the children become the ones who rule and lack responsibility.

Many of our children do not know what it means to take responsibility. Many do not know how to deal with hard times and trying situations because they have not been exposed to these things, instead [they] are given, as it were, an easy life. While we consider this to be good and shows love it is not preparing our children for the real world where they would not have mom or dad with them but will be on their own.

So when they are on their own and they encounter the real world with its many challenges they have no clue how to survive. So for some they turn to crimes, some they become depressed and even commit suicide. No wonder in the work place many do not know how to interface with people and how to deal with difficult situations.

Some lack the survival skills to handle pressure and do not know how to take responsibilities.

Imagine some children don’t know how to do home chores and cook and even wash and iron clothes.

So when they go offer to university they spend lots of money on meals and clothes in terms of paying to wash and iron and even regularly purchasing clothes. This can lead to our children becoming broke and so put added pressures on the parents to find monies for them. This in turn leads the parents to overwork and become sick.

Also many of the kids feed on fast foods because they cannot cook for themselves as a result it can lead to health problems. More can be said on this subject, but suffice it to say that many parents are not preparing their children for the real world.

While giving them enough time to study, more attention should be paid to their overall development as a person. For not being able to deal with the real world challenges have lead many to become unfaithful because of needs in various ways and it has lead many down the path of crime.

We need to let our children grow up with a satisfied mind and be contented with whatever they have.

This will help the child to be stronger as an individual and so able to survive in this challenging world because they are prepared to face the real world

Kennard King