Give them a Childhood

Prime Minister urged parents to give our children their childhood at his national day rally speech. Well, childhood in Singapore is no longer like kumpong days. I grew up in HDB flats and outdoor was limited to playgrounds & occasional family excursions to haw paw villa & east coast park. So what should a proper childhood be, in today's context- fast paced, technologically-dependent, self-centered society?

Specifically, he was referring to giving children more free time, instead of sending them to 2 kindergartens & tuitions round the clock. Ok, that's manageable. Our children have been attending 4-hr kindergarten b4 starting primary school. Enrichment is restricted to their requested activity- music, art or ballet. They spent most of their free time drawing, playing, singing, watching tv, playing iPhone (oops!) etc. Homework is restricted to 2 pages of worksheets on Fridays for K1 and e-learning for P1. I'm trying to enforce more outdoor time per week, but it's constrained by our schedule, weather and pure laziness.

To encourage more babies, strategies like worklife balance, subsidies/ priority in housing and pre-school education are suggested, without details until the white paper is out. It has sparked off discussion online and forums on printed media. Everyone gave good and bad examples of sending children to pre-school enrichments, pri-sch preparations and whether homework should be given for pre-schools.

To me, all these are personal decisions that cannot be moderated at the ministry level. Didn't MOE enforce 5-day week? Why did I still see children in uniform regularly on Sundays at nearby popular primary school which was over-subscribed 3 times at phase 2b this year? It can only be encouraged but not endorsed. Maternity leave of 4 month was reviewed and considered "sufficient". If an employee needs more than 4 months, she can extend using her annual or even no pay leave if required. There is no one- size-fit-all model.

Among all the strategies discussed, giving them their well-deserved childhood is the minimum we can offer. And to do that, I can only afford to have 2 kids, with 24 hours to distribute between family, work and self. We will continue to implement our no-tuition policy and include more outdoor time in our schedule. Afterall, childhood is the memory that a child has when he grew up. I can only remember the silly games I played with my sister but has long forgotten what was taught in the classroom.