IT’S NOW time for parents to attend school and learn a thing or two about parenthood as schools in the city are now starting crash courses on parenthood. The workshops, sessions and crash courses help parents with kids in the age group of 0-5 years tide through the difficulties of parenthood. While Jumbo Kids, the playschool wing of Podar group of institutions, has been conducting workshops for parents for the past three years, it has recently started “Parents Cafe”. The ‘cafe’ is an informal session where they are told about how to work on the emotional and behavioural well-being of their little ones. “The cafe brings together parents who learn from each other’s experiences. There are lots of activities on how to interpret and handle what their children do,” said Swati Popat Vats, who heads the Podar Education Network. “A stand-up comedy on parenthood not only touches the right chords with parents, but can be quite informative,” added Vats. The cafe is sponsored by the group’s flagship parenthood programme, Born Smart, which is open to anybody interested in the programme. “Parents or to-be parents can visit the website or download the free app. From there, they can access short videos on parenthood,” said Vats. While the Born Smart programme is open to all, the Eurokids and Euroschool group also hold similar sensitisation programmes for the parents of their schools at regular intervals. Besides, the Institute for Psychological Health in Thane holds Palakshala or Parenting School — a two-hour session for parents during the weekends. Vats, who is also the president of Early Childhood Association (ECA), explained, “Parents usually need help with three things — handling the behaviour of the children, their food habits and their addiction to TV and mobile screens. These programmes help parents handle these issues.” Parents were divided over the advantages of such crash courses. Nidhi Sharma, who has a one-year-old daughter, said that the workshops are helpful for first-time parents. “In a metro city, away from the support of a joint family, sometimes we don’t know what to do. It helps to attend a session, understand and learn from the experiences of other parents,” said Sharma. However, Arundhati Chavan, the head of the Parent Teacher Association United Forum of Maharashtra, said that these courses were marketing gimmicks of schools that were tapping into the psychology of parents. “Parenthood is an experience. One learns every day. There is no need for such courses for parents. It’s a marketing trend that is catching on in metro cities,” said Chavan.
