Role Of Family In A Child’s Learning

 Family is the first teacher for a child. Who introduces you with behavior patterns, values, attitude, good manners, good habits, respect to the society and more? Home is the place where a child comes into the world and learns to walk, speak, eat, behave, and often the alphabets, words, sentences, and much more. This is where he or she can learn how to solve problems that they will face in life in a positive way.

Education is definitely not only going to school to study, though a very important component of how we learn in the present day. Therefore, as a family, as grandparents, as parents and as siblings, we should give more time to our young members. Showing our child how much we love them and care for them helps them become mentally and emotionally strong. This feeling and confidence is irreplaceable. Next, getting them involved in cultural, spiritual, greater family, society, and taking them to important places is something today’s school cannot do.

How do I know? Well, since I was a little more than ten years old, I have been contributing to the learning of my siblings Vidheha and Zoya. Also, I was educated in such a way that I had to be involved in the learning of younger students at my school and older students would contribute to my learning. This was such a powerful way of becoming educated and I really appreciate what I went through.

In the traditional school, there are many students and no teacher can focus on the growth of a single child, though many of them try. With big classes, they need to work with the group and after one or two attempts, they do need to move on hoping the family will pick up where they cannot. So, if we work with our children at home, that can help not only the children, but the teachers and the school. Actually, let us take the example of Vidheha. She was just three years old when she started her online math class at Khanacademy.org at home. She used to work two hours a day and enjoyed what she was doing. She finished her third grade when she was six years old. Now these things are helping her a lot at her international school. Now she can solve math problems on her own, initiate math related research, and actually enjoys the subject which many people fail to do.

During the COVID-19 everybody stayed home and did nothing, but we were working on our international online classes. We were also providing free online classes and education packages to students from all over Nepal and from other countries such as the US and Australia. We were able to work with 4,000 young people. So, our education was totally different because our guardians were educated, and they gave more time to us. 

During our classes some parents also stayed on the side, and they also tried to understand what was going on and how their children were doing. The students were quite happy because these activities were new to them and their presence made a difference. I was a coordinator for half of the participants and if they were unable to join the class for some reason they just called and I would help them. 

Hands of education is special. Beside online learning we also worked to rear chicken, planted vegetables, and bake. We are told that we contributed more than Rs. 50,000 through our learning and saved money during difficult one and half years while enjoying very healthy lifestyle and nutrition. Only families can get their children to get engaged like this, not traditional schools!

If we stay home and give some time to our children then they learn easily and they feel safer as well. Lots of people never realise that they are not spending enough time with their children until it’s too late. They just send them to school. Parents think they are studying well but they never actually study with them. By studying with them, there is no point in getting angry or frustrated with your child. If your child does not understand, laugh and try again. Also, make sure, the problem is not something else. If they do not know their multiplication or addition they will probably not do well with fractions! So, this is why teaching children is different. Review, understand, share, enjoy. Parents who spend more time with their children are the best of all. We should try to make our children happy so we also get joy from them. 

I started teaching my little sister Zoya when she was just a baby. I used to spend a lot of time with her. By the way, when she started to talk, the first word she uttered was my name, Anita. I felt so happy to have her in my life. We used to do lots of activities together. We do puzzles, gardening, cooking, planting, baking and much more. She couldn’t talk properly at that time but those were the best moments of my life. I still miss those days. Now she is four and half years old and I am still working with her. She is just gorgeous. She is in the US and I am in Nepal, so we video call every day and spend two hours together. We start our class by laughing and having fun conversations. We do book reading, vocabulary, sentences, and art. She reads several books including “Ten Apples Up on Top” by Dr. Seuss on her own. She makes creative sentences. I cannot believe that she is only four!

Again, I would like to say that it is the family that can really make a difference in a child’s life. Children are such sources of joy and doing this will help everyone mentally, psychologically, socially, and even financially. Therefore, let’s make best use of family influence.

(Anita is a part of the Spiny Babbler Education Network. She is supporting its unlimited children project. She loves writing and working with young people.)