• Experts give tips on how to give school children rewarding holiday experience
By Olakunle Olafioye
The holiday is here again, but the usual breather and excitement that once hallmarked the long vacations after months of rigorous and hectic schoolwork in the past are fast giving way to new routines.
Many adults who had the opportunity of enjoying their holiday vacations as children will reminisce, perhaps with nostalgia, what the long vacations used to be and mean to them in their childhood.
For many adults like Mrs Ibironke Adenekan, a school teacher, the approach of the long vacations was usually heralded with high expectations.
“Usually, it was more of a time for reunion with members of the extended families and this often came with thrilling experiences. To us, in my family, that was the time of the year when we often travelled to the village to have fun with our grandparents.
“Our cousins, nephews, nieces also were always around and their presence at the period would always add colour and excitement to the memories of the time. It was usually a time for new experience, especially as it relates to farming and rural life.
“That was the only time we were allowed to visit the river and learn how to swim; we would follow my grandfather to the farm and most importantly it was usually the time of the year when one had a change of menu and savoured fresh meals and fruits freshly plucked from the trees,” she recalled.
For Dr Fidelis Okudu, the long vacations were usually the periods of time when he and his sibling had the opportunity of change of environment and the freedom from the clutches of his father whom he described as a disciplinarian and no-nonsense man.
“Holiday periods were really fun in our days. It is regrettable that most children of school age of this generation no longer enjoy their long vacations the way we did in our days owing to a number of reasons; this is definitely not good for their overall development,” Dr0. Okudu said.
Indeed, there is a consensus on the reasons behind the declining holiday culture in Nigeria.
Many parents are quick to point out that allowing their children to embark on holiday trips could be financially draining, especially at a time like this. Added to this is the concern over the safety of their children while on holiday away from home.
A parent, Mrs Afolake Jayeola, noted that one of the best ways of giving school children quality holiday treats was to allow them to spend it in a different environment other than the one they are used to.
She, however, identified financial constraint as a major challenge.
“In our days, travelling during holidays was the order of the day and we cherished and enjoyed it. But nowadays, you have to consider your pocket and the pocket of the family you are planning to send your children to for their holiday. You should not just assume that the person you are planning to send your kids to for holiday is buoyant enough to feed and care for your children for the duration of the holidays. You, as a person, should be able to put yourself in the person’s shoes so that if someone brings his two or three children to you for holiday, you will be able to take care of them,” she noted.
Mrs Jayeola also identified the precarious security situation in the country as another reason many parents are reluctant to allow their children the freedom to enjoy their vacation away from their homes.
“Things have changed from what they used to be. There is hardly any part of this country that does not have its own security challenge. Kidnapping, robbery, ritual killing are now the order of the day. Besides these, many parents are not even sure of the safety of their children, particularly their female children, with those family members they are visiting for holidays. A good number of cases of child molestation and sexual violations have been traced to people who are closely related to the victims. So, there are always concerns about the safety and security of the children when considering the issue of holidaying away from home,” she observed.
In addition to allowing school children to relax their brains after weeks of hectic and rigorous academic work ahead of a new term, experts in the field of education believe that holiday serves benefits too numerous to overlook.
These benefits, they noted, are however, being eroded by the new trend of organising what schools now tag summer coaching when children are expected to be on vacation.
An educationist, Mrs Ijeoma Odikpo, said that depriving school children the opportunity to enjoy the long vacation affects them in many ways.
“First, holiday breaks provide the opportunity for families to get together and enjoy one another’s company. It also creates an avenue for students to shift their focus from school and complete other tasks they are not allowed to attend to when schools are in session. More importantly, holiday breaks have proven to be highly beneficial for students’ mental health and wellness since they allow for spare time for relaxing and doing other activities of personal choice, which undoubtedly is beneficial to physical health. It is, however, sad to know that our children are being deprived of these benefits because parents nowadays no longer see holiday periods as needing the desired attention in the face of other competing needs of the day,” she noted.
Odikpo accused school owners of cashing in on parents’ inability to give their children rewarding holiday treats as it was the trend in the past.
“Private school owners, upon noticing that most parents can no longer finance their children’s holiday expenses, resorted to organizing extension classes and subjecting the students to several weeks of repetitive school work and demanding extra money from the parents. This simply means that the students will be further stretched mentally with little or no time to relax their brains before the commencement of a new academic session. This contributes to the mental stress and fatigue that is often noticed among students when new terms begin,” she noted.
Odikpo, however, believes that school owners can still make the holiday period more exciting and rewarding for their students without forcing parents to break the bank.
“During the holidays, school owners should de-emphasise academic work and focus more on extra-curricular activities and programmes that will add value to the life of their students and give them more rewarding holiday experience. School could organize sports clinics, musical training, crafts, seminars and workshops on interesting topics and in areas of human endeavour, cultural programmes, talent and film shows, among others. All these will go a long way in making the holiday period exciting and fulfilling. This can be done for reasonable charges affordable to the parents,” she suggested.
In his opinion, Dr Okudu said that parents can make the holiday period more exciting and rewarding for their children by making themselves available during the holidays, particularly during the long vacations.
“Parents have a big role to play in giving their children a fascinating holiday experience. Everything is not about money. Parents can make themselves available to their children when they are on holiday. This can be done by scheduling their annual leave to coincide with their children’s holiday. Their presence around their children during the holidays can make a whole lot of difference. This will enable them to bond and have a good time together as members of a family,” he said.
There is also a suggestion of what Mrs Adenekan termed as cooperative or rotational holiday arrangement.
This, according to her, requires collaboration between two or more like-minded persons.
She explained that parents who share a similar philosophy in parenting may bring their children together on a rotational basis to spend their holidays.
This, she noted, will afford their children the opportunity of spending their holidays in different environments and with different sets of people.
“When my children were young they didn’t have the opportunity of travelling to spend their holidays with either their paternal or maternal parents like we did in our days because they were all late before my children were old enough to go on vacation.
“But there was this rotational or cooperative holiday arrangement I and my husband had with one of my sisters and my sister-in-law. Their children would spend some days or weeks in our house and would later go to either of their aunties’ place for some days or weeks.
“It was easy for us, not because we were related, but because our parenting styles and philosophies are similar. Parents who share a common parenting philosophy can come together and experiment with this idea in order to give their children a memorable holiday experience,” she suggested.