Education Should Start From Home, Says Dr. Onukwugha

By   Ikechi Elenwoke

The president and founder of Pearlville School Avu, Owerri, Imo State has advised parents not to abandon their basic responsibilities of mentoring and general upbringing of their children to schools and teachers alone.

She pointed out that the gap created at the early phase of a child’s upbringing affects his future development and progress generally.

Onukwugha, a consultant curriculum expert, and school administrator also stated that parents are the first teachers and mentors to their children, and therefore are saddled with the basic foundation that kick-starts the general learning process.

But the reverse is the case these days, the entire responsibility is left for school teachers to do and according to her, such comes with a lot of challenges in the school environment.

The adjunct professor stated this in a media chat that preceded their sports week which took place recently in their Owerrihead office. She further stated that sports are a very vital part of the child’s development. “Sporting activities refresh the brain. When you keep bombarding the child’s cognitive domain with so many materials, you will rather get a counter result. Remember the saying, ‘All works and no play, makes Jack a dull boy.

I have thought that sports be made part and parcel of the school curriculum. It helps the brain and the body to be in a very healthy state to learn. Here in our school, there is time for everything, sports inclusive.

We try not to bombard the students with academic activities so as not to overburden the brain. But that is not the case in some other places.

Some kids go to school very early in the morning, come back at 5 pm and from there, head for another long learning session of extra mural classes. No time to sleep and relax the brain.

This is killing and very unhealthy for the child’s general development”

“Here in our school, we take every segment of our daily routine seriously; the sports, the entrepreneurship programs and more. We try to provide holistic learning for the all-round development of the child” she concluded.