IF YOU BEAT THIS CHILD, YOU JUST MIGHT...

I woke up yesterday morning and saw a post from a Facebook friend. Folake Afolabi’s son Pelumi Praise Afolabi who’s a student of Command Secondary School Ojo Lagos Nigeria in Jss 1 Diamond was flogged because his parents didn’t come for the school’s open day. 

The mark of the cane is seen on his eye lid and beneath his eyes. This means that it narrowly missed his eye because it was closed at that moment when she used the cane on him.

Now this isn’t the first time I’m seeing this. 

Last week, I saw the picture of a 3 year old that was flogged mercilessly. Black and blue doesn’t depict this for a boy of that age.  It’s brutal and wicked. 

Why did the teacher flog him? He urinated and defecated on his body without informing the teacher he wanted to go to the loo.

This is hilarious because we are talking about a 3 year old not a teenager.

Nigeria is an interesting country. A particular yellow network service provider barred people’s lines because it wasn’t registered. 

They expected midwives to leave the delivery room, teachers to leave their students, doctors to leave their patients and people to leave their jobs no matter how sensitive just for them  to gain access to their lines. The NCC and other appropriate bodies didn’t even complain. I guess it finally dawned on them to go to various companies in order to reach the people there even though it was late.

If Pelumi’s parents have white collar jobs and a paid employment, how are they supposed to attend the open day? Why can’t the school fix the open day on a weekend or a convenient day for each parent to come around and check their child? Why punish the students for what the parents did?

For the 3 year old boy, I feel really sad. This can cause trauma for him and affect his own mental health. Do you know the boy may hate school and hate anything that concerns learning just because of this particular act? 

Each child is different from another child and her training should also be different too.

Many teachers these days aren’t trained; they find themselves teaching just to make ends meet and you’ll see this in their approach to teaching. Many of these teachers don’t care for these kids. They don’t even know there is anything or a book on Child Psychology and this is really sad. 

A teacher is one who affects destines and lives. Sadly, many people don’t understand this fact.

I think there should be a psychologist for teachers in schools. Imagine a teacher who’s facing difficult times at home: landlord is asking for his dues, the spouse is misbehaving, sick parents, trouble from the in-laws, etc. On this particular day, she just wants to break down but she has to go to school so that her salary will be complete but a student annoys her. How do you think she will beat this child? She would pour all her sorrow, anger and pain into flogging this child.

I’ve always wondered, is flogging a child always the way out? It can never be! 

Sometimes all you need to do is ask the child why she did something wrong, why he isn’t talking or what the problem is. Just be friendly with kids and they will tell you their secrets. There may be something troubling the child that you may be able to help her deal with.

This is the work of a guidance counsellor for schools.

If you help the destiny of one child, do you know how many more destinies you’ve saved or empowered?

Think about this!

P.S Please share this with people as it can help a lot of people.

 

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