Parenting in this app & smartphone age is difficult. Parents have numerous challenges to deal with on a daily basis. Parental apps, controls & easy access online information on parental advice do not make things any simpler for new age parents.
Lead teacher at Safari Kid International Preschool – says, “I interact with toddler’s parents on a daily basis & sometimes I wonder why things are so difficult for them compared to our previous generations?”
Gauri says, “Sometimes I wonder after interacting with the parents that why I never had issues with my children? Was I a super mom or did I do everything so carelessly that I never faced such obstacles.”
Introspectively she says that she finds this difference confusing and mind boggling too. After giving it a thought, I realized that a lot has changed over a period of time, gone are the days of community parenting. In that approach of parenting, emphasis was on natural learning in a friendly way through experiences. Parents and children were not under a microscope, thus there was no such thing as parent or parenting failure. Failure was treated as a part of life and not performance appraisal, hence there was never a pressure attached to parenting.
Today with society changing, both parents working, time constraint, loads of guilt and a nuclear family has brought in professionalism to all aspects of life. I have realized that parenting is now considered as a profession were there are a number of checklists, targets, rules, deadlines, perks, bonus and etc. The approach to parenting has become more focused and target oriented. So the joy is fading away in the background and giving rise to stress and frustration.
Earlier parents took parenting as an integral part of their life with no long term plans or benefits. So the stress factor was less while freedom and fun was more. Failure was not an option but in reality key to learning. There was no parent child rating system or targets involved. Today, it’s seems that many parents feel that the cost of any kind of failure is very high. This leads to higher stress in addition to the other stresses that parents have to deal at work and elsewhere.
There are definitely number of positive developments happening because of professional approach but let’s take them as pointers and not make parenting a profession.
Parenting is pure joy with loads of trial and error but at the end of the day, it’s all about heart. Happiness is the key to strong bond. There is no right or wrong approach, it’s a very dynamic & natural process. Each parent understands and knows their child the best. Parenting is life long process with ups and downs, so let’s enjoy as much as we can.
Gauri Shardul Kshirsagar is passionate teacher with qualification of M.com + MBA with 15 year Experience in corporate, hospitals and schools at different management teaching positions. She is also also Montessori and Waldorf trained teacher with experience of dealing with specially abled children. She has worked in many regions of India and thus has experience in working in multi-culture environment. She firmly believes that good education during first 5 years of life leads to strong foundation of the child in order to build good character.
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