In an apparent bid to stem the tide of growing moral decadence among Nigerian children, a group of experts have come up with solutions to halt the ugly trend.
The experts disclosed this in a virtual discussion on Raypower FM on Thursday, April 21, 2022 titled “Growing Moral Decadence In Classrooms and the Blame Game”.
TheFact Nigeria observed that the culture of respect and chastity was fast becoming unpopular among children and youth owing to lack of parental guidance.
Answering the question of “what went wrong?”, Fellow, Counseling Association Of Nigeria, Prof. Mopelola Omoegun noted that the reason for increased moral decadence in classrooms of today owed to the fact that parents did not train their children well.
She further added that, many of the parents did not have home training themselves and therefore could not give what they did not have.
Prof. Omoegun lamented that moral values were not taught to children at home, as parents had no time and thus did not monitor them.
Correspondingly, she stressed that parents should not relegate their duty to teachers: “teachers are to teach academics and not serve as surrogate parents”, she said.
The Counseling Guru further advised parents to be their children’s friends, that way, they would be comfortable to share whatever was bothering them.
She also said, where both parents have to work, there should be a balance, if one spouse was doing a demanding job, the other spouse should take a less demanding one.
On his part, Registrar, Teachers Registration Council Of Nigeria (TRCN), Prof. Segun Ajiboye, while speaking on the role of the teacher in instilling morals in children stated that: “There is no school equal to a decent home and no teacher equal to a virtuous parent”.
He said the parents and society at large have failed the children, noting that, children as young as one year old were left in school when they were supposed to be bonding with their parents and learning morals.
He also stated that, when parents do not spend quality time with the child, he/she will look elsewhere to fill that void and they turn to the internet, especially when left unsupervised.
The TRCN Boss also blamed the alarming rate of moral decadence on the quality of teachers employed especially in private schools.
He noted that about 83% of teachers in government schools were properly trained and could pass on good morals to their students. He however noted that this could not be said about private schools.
Citing the case of Hanifa Abubakar, who was murdered by her school teacher and Chrisland’s Mr. Adegboyega Adenekan who defiled his pupil, Prof. Ajiboye called on the government to flush out unworthy teachers from classrooms across the country.
Also lending her voice to the need for parents to wake up to their responsibility, beginning with their value system, Public Affairs Analyst, Francisca Ogunlade said: “Parents of nowadays do not focus on what is right, we have shifted from integrity, excellence, hardwork to money, fame so children think it is more important”, she explained.
