Home
>
Parenting
>
What Values Are We Giving Our Children?

What Values Are We Giving Our Children?

On a bright Sunday morning, a couple of weeks ago, I went to South London to receive a message sent from Nigeria. As I entered the lift, I saw a couple, apparently in their early 20s, smoking marijuana while their young son sat comfortably in his push-chair. As I was going down through the staircase, I saw another three children in their teens smoking marijuana and drinking beer.

The above situation depicts the state of our children abroad. What values are we giving our children in foreign lands? Is it the environment or our work that forbids us from giving our children good values, home training, love and care? Or did we dump the values we were brought up with at the airport as we boarded the aircraft to England?

Agreed, many parents work hard to provide for their children, but parents also have to find the balance between work and family. American researchers have confirmed from empirical studies that when both parents give long hours to a career, it is often their children's self esteem that suffers. 'They don't have the self-assurance that comes from knowing that your parents are really interested in you and behind you', says Ronald Levant, a Harvard Psychologist. Another author, Patricia Morgan says, 'children who spend long hours in day care from early age tend to develop anti-social and aggressive behaviour.

A recent survey by 'Parents at Work', which advises employers on childcare indicated that 15% of fathers see their children only at weekends and more than 50% spend less than five minutes a day with their children, one to one. In this kind of scenario, by the time the child goes into drugs, sex and crime, the parents, especially the father, won't be aware. As is typical of most Nigerian men, when the bubble busts, all the blame of the child's wrong doings will be heaped on the woman.

Especially in this environment, men need to support their wives in child rearing and nurturing. Being taught good values by parents will determine whether our children succeed and overcome their surrounding.

Teaching them how to come out good in life, expressing and demonstrating love, rebuking them when they err and letting them know that they are rebuked not because they are not loved, but because what they did was bad.

'A child learns whether or not he is lovable or worthwhile or intelligent or talented by the way he is treated by his parents. Children need a constant, continuous flow of love in order to develop healthy personalities. Children who do not receive high quality love in the first three years of their lives will develop deficiency needs. For the rest of their lives, they will try to compensate for their deficiencies rather than realise their potential. In the formative years, children learn in two ways. The first way is by imitation, usually of one or both parents. Many of our adult habit patterns and characteristics come from straight imitation of one of our parents in our formative years. The other way children learn in the formative years is by moving from discomfort towards comfort. Of all the discomforts a child can suffer, the most traumatic is the withdrawal or threat of the withdrawal of love and approval by parent', wrote Brian Tracy in his best-selling book, the Psychology of Achievement.

Maybe many of us still need to go for training on parenting because what you don't have you can't give. The values given to children will invariably determine how they see life and what they will do with their lives.

When I was a child, my mother nurtured my frail body as a testimony of her love. Now, we are best of friends rather than fall into the stereotypic notion of a 'mummy's boy'. Till today, whenever she writes me, she never fails to tell me to remember the son of whom I am because a good name is better than gold and silver. These are the values I am passing on to my own children.

"Children must be reared with strong moral character, confidence, high self-esteem, and who would feel that they could accomplish whatever goals they set. To give those values to your children does not cost you a dime. Those are characteristics and gifts that money cannot buy", says Mrs. Jordan, the mother of the basketball legend, Michael Jordan, in her book, Family First: Winning The Parenting Game.

A child's mind is like a blank sheet of paper. I believe parents share in the authorship of a child's experience. We help write some of the chapters. They learn the letters and languages, and then self-expression emerges. The values you give children today form the foundation on which they will build their lives tomorrow. So don't waffle! Robbers started out by stealing pencils at school. Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Dayo Olomu is a UK-based Motivational Speaker, Writer, Business/Life Coach, Trainer, Media Entrepreneur and Competent Toastmaster. His core belief is that we are all endowed with seeds of greatness, and his mission is to help individuals and organisations achieve their full potentials. He is the author of best selling "4 Indispensable Strategies for Success" and the President of Croydon Communicators Toastmasters. Get his FREE monthly Rise to the Top ezine by sending a blank email to subscribe@dayoolomu.com or visit his website at: subscribe@dayoolomu.com

cleaning help near Mundelein ..

In The News:

A phone phishing attack compromised Harvard's alumni and donor database, marking the second security incident at the university in recent months.

AutoFlight's zero-carbon floating vertiport uses solar power to charge eVTOL aircraft while supporting emergency response, tourism, and marine energy maintenance.

A new phone return scam targets recent buyers with fake carrier calls. Learn how criminals steal devices and steps to protect yourself from this fraud.

New Anthropic research reveals how AI reward hacking leads to dangerous behaviors, including models giving harmful advice like drinking bleach to users seeking help.

The Fox News AI Newsletter gives readers the latest AI technology advancements, covering the challenges and opportunities AI presents.

Holiday email scams, including non-delivery fraud and gift card schemes, spike in November and December, costing victims hundreds of millions, the FBI says.

Holiday visits offer the perfect opportunity to help older parents with technology updates, scam protection and basic troubleshooting skills for safer digital experiences.

Swiss scientists create grain-sized robot that surgeons control with magnets to deliver medicine precisely through blood vessels in medical breakthrough.

Researchers exploited WhatsApp's API vulnerability to scrape 3.5 billion phone numbers. Learn how this massive data breach happened and protect yourself.

Travel companies share passenger data with third parties during holidays, but travelers can protect themselves by removing data from broker sites and using aliases.

Xpeng's humanoid robot moves so realistically that crowds believed it was fake, marking a major advancement in robotics technology ahead of 2026 commercial launch.

Researchers discover phishing scam using invisible characters to evade email security, with protection tips including password managers and two-factor authentication.

iPhone and Android users can reduce battery drain and data usage by restricting Background App Refresh to Wi-Fi connections instead of mobile networks.

Scammers nearly stole an Apple account by exploiting the support system with authentic-looking tickets and phone calls, users can protect themselves with safety steps.

FoloToy restored sales of its AI teddy bear Kumma after a weeklong suspension following safety group findings of risky and inappropriate responses to children.

Threat intelligence firm Synthient uncovers one of the largest password exposures ever, prompting immediate security recommendations.

Viral video shared by Elon Musk shows Tesla's Optimus humanoid robots performing tasks from cooking to construction, garnering over 58.5 million views on social media.

Chinese hackers used Anthropic's Claude AI to launch autonomous cyberattacks on 30 organizations worldwide, marking a major shift in cybersecurity threats.

Apple's new Sleep Score feature gives you a rating for your nightly rest quality. Learn how to set it up on your Apple Watch and iPhone today.

Essential phone settings to enable before losing your device, including Find My network, location services and security features for iPhone and Android.

The Fox News AI Newsletter gives readers the latest AI technology advancements, covering the challenges and opportunities AI presents.

Cybersecurity research shows weak passwords remain a major threat, with simple patterns and number sequences putting millions of accounts at risk.

New Android malware BankBot YNRK silences phones, steals banking data and drains crypto wallets automatically. Learn how this advanced threat works.

FDA approves first human trial for Paradromics' brain-computer interface that could restore speech for paralyzed patients through neural technology.

New phishing platform QRR targets Microsoft 365 users across 1,000 domains in 90 countries. Learn how to spot fake login pages and protect your accounts.