Why children should not be denied their childhood

Humans need to grow in every aspect of life and the beginning stage is with kids, who come into the world being oblivious of the hustle, bustle and battles of life and also have the opportunity to run around. They should be carefree and have fun to make them psychologically ready to take on life’s […]

Humans need to grow in every aspect of life and the beginning stage is with kids, who come into the world being oblivious of the hustle, bustle and battles of life and also have the opportunity to run around. They should be carefree and have fun to make them psychologically ready to take on life’s battles when they become adults.
There has been a lot of cases of children becoming adults overnight, given no chance to be kids or even being carefree with no worries whatsoever. Therefore they find themselves missing the childhood they never had the chance to experience, and this leads to all kinds of situations; including full grown adults behaving like children and having childish dispositions because in their time, they didn’t have the chance to be kids.
Nowadays, we see a lot of parents consciously or unconsciously, denying their children of a chance to be kids, this is sad because most of the time, these parents went through life without the aid of these technological devices and video games. Most kids now have become so used to mobile devices and the art of conversation through social media that they never really learn the ways of playground games, face to face conversations, the joys of being carefree and playful without the aid of technology.
Life will never go back to the way it used to be we all know that but is it possible for parents to at least allow their kids to experience life the way they did in their own time? Is the life of old days so inferior that parents are quick to neglect it and embrace a whole new and “improved” way?
What about allowing children develop and hone the necessary skills needed to be an active part of the society, not just as automatic “adults” who spend all their time being more technology oriented than human-contact oriented. Another dimension to this, is that most times, these kids’ activities on the internet are not monitored by their parents/guardians so they pick some things they are not supposed to be exposed to.
Mairo Suleiman, an Accountant, is of the opinion that such children are an advantage to society in terms of being very smart and capable of handling adult issues even in their young age. She believes such kids end up as the pacesetters in society, with stronger cognitive abilities as opposed to those who were not really exposed like they were.
Jones Bawa, a writer, believes that kids these days are free to adopt the virtual way of doing things and should be in tune with the way the world works now but at the same time, they should be monitored and also given some “break” from the virtual world and allowed to play just like kids did in the old days. He also suggests that parents should never allow the current trend of the computer age to stop them from inculcating the values of true communication, respect and life stages in their children.
While being smart is encouraged in children, they must be allowed to experience the joys associated with being a child, so they are able to develop properly into well-coordinated adults.
Eremonkale contributes this piece from Abuja