I’m Mr. Dele Agbogun, a leadership/ management and Family Life Consultant, committed to solving family problems and helping couples achieve a stable and healthy home. This I do through a blend of pragmatic, experiential, and therapeutic approaches, building a global network of individuals equipped with credible leadership skills to enable them thrive and yield positive change in the world today.
As a Leadership, Management, and Family Life Consultant, Akinropo Akinola’s article tingled excitement in me because it’s admirable to see family coaches explore the art world with edifying literature like this. It’s commendable. Akinola cleverly took on a very important topic affecting families and an overall development of children: early childhood education. Apart from insights shared from educational perspectives by educationists and academic scholars, I was pleased to see the topic addressed from a family perspective—detailing the impact and roles parents play in shaping the educational landscape of their wards at their formative stage.
He kicked off with a strong argument by acknowledging the importance of the early years in a child’s life and how habits and characteristics formed at that stage determine the outcome of the latter stages of their lives. This argument vitally resonates with family-based research and educational psychology, giving the article a strong theoretical starting point. He further highlighted the challenges modern parents are faced with in attempting to form good early childhood educational patterns for their kids, hence the reason why family coaches, particularly in Nigeria, are needed to step up in tackling the lingering challenge.
Akinola pointed out a list of intelligent interventions family coaches should implement when taking up coaching roles for families regarding early childhood education. He proposed that parents should be encouraged to involve themselves in Parent Education Workshops. He cited it as a comprehensive step to practically learn the tips for early childhood education. Having a background in Engineering, I understand and appreciate the power of empowerment; teaching people with practical tools helps drive better knowledge impact. It’s more interesting that Akinola suggested that in these workshops, hands-on and experiential training is assured for parents, allowing them to not just have theories in their mind but practicalize these theories and make them confident while applying these strategies at home.
He moved on to suggesting sub-parent support, which I find very insightful because I have had the privilege to experience this firsthand and the benefits are overwhelming. Having a group of parents forming a network that encourages open conversations of their family struggles and overall experience without the fear of being judged is beautiful. This is a type of peer learning which serves as an effective way to learn, relearn and unlearn. However, I’ll add that to give vehemence to this approach, mainstream mental health professionals should be included in these groups, such that when parents unburden, these professionals would masterfully control their emotions and suggest ways to regulate their minds, easing stress, anxiety and trauma. The expertise of these professionals would help parents to overcome mental stress that may impede parents’ ability to be fully present and engaged in their child’s early education.
The Idea of mother-tongue linguistics adoption as a primary communication method for families is fundamental. I find this idea to be brilliant, and I’ll have to applaud Akinola for his insistence on integrating mother-tongue linguistics into early childhood education, especially in rural areas. Mother-tongue linguistics not only makes education easy for kids, as they understand the language they are groomed with rather than a second language, but it also serves as a strong way to preserve cultures. The world is moving at a fast, modern pace and most parents struggle to strike a balance between modern education and traditional values. This approach would reduce the dangers of cultural imperialism and also breed quality early educational standards for kids. In addition to this, I’ll suggest that this approach shouldn’t only be intensely channeled to families in rural areas but also to urban-based families, ensuring that kids are well-rounded in both modern and cultural knowledge.
Showing the article’s innovativeness, Akinola highlighted family needs as an intervention technique for family coaches. These needs range from health screenings, nutritional counseling, and financial planning. I consider this intervention innovative because of the extent to which it reveals some of the constraints parents face in transmitting good early childhood education. Coaches must take cognizance of the fact that education cannot be executed alone; therefore a grounded socio-economic state for parents becomes essential. When coaching families, it’s important to make sure that social and economic barriers are addressed; without acknowledgement of these barriers, early childhood education might not be effective.
Highlighting behavioural management strategies, Akinola recommends that parents should have consistent behavioural management patterns as it is needed for good parenting practices. In this aspect, I’ll, however, add that it shouldn’t be on any kind of behavioural pattern but specifically trained on conflict resolution and emotional intelligence. Learning these skills are imperative to help parents manage both the behaviours of themselves and their children.
Akinola outlined that these interventions if properly utilized by family coaches would yield results such as developed intellectual level for children, developed language acquisition for children, and gaining all-round emotional resilience for both the children and parents. I love that he outlined the benefits in a way that humanizes facts pointed out, as parents are encouraged to not feeling left out or at a losing end in early childhood education, stating that it’s never too late for these approaches to be practiced.
The article is rich. I love the well-researched factors and how they are vividly expressed. It’s easy to understand and very practical. Contributing in regards to improvement, I’ll suggest that the article could have done more explanation on how the success of these approaches can be measured. Even if parents see positive results, metrics should be designed to measure the level it could get and how it can be controlled. These metrics would enable coaches to have a set framework to assess if their proposed interventions had an effective result. Some indicators in this regard could include academic progress, improved social skills, and parental satisfaction, among other indicators.
Overall, Akinola did a great job. The article was comprehensive and spot-on. He carefully explored the topic from a family perspective and highlighted how family coaches can assist parents with effective early childhood education, which has fast become one of the greatest problems for poor academic backgrounds in children. With the experience garnered in family consultancy, I appreciate and support these interventions, Akinola suggested. Should coaches utilize these interventions, the impact on both families and society as a whole would be immense. Akinola’s submissions are relevant and feasible, as I proudly attest to being inspired by this level of creative thinking to support the knowledge bank in the family coaching industry.
Dele Agbogun is a Leadership/Management and Family Life Consultant. With an initial background in Engineering, he holds an MBA from a Business School in the Netherlands. His expertise is further enriched by diverse training and certifications in management, leadership, and family life. He is a certified Family Systems Engineering Practitioner (FSEC) and a professional family life practitioner.
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