Yanique DaCosta, Contributor

Coral Hagley (right) presents Yanique DaCosta of Immaculate Conception High School with her prize in the 13-15-year-old category at the National Child Month Essay and Poster 2008 Award presentation luncheon at the Alhambra Inn Hotel on Friday, May 30. - Junior Dowie/Staff Photographer

Did you benefit from communal parenting? Do you have fond memories of virtually everyone in a village or district encouraging, praising or punishing you when you were growing up. Share your experiences with us. Email phyllis.thomas@gleanerjm.com or editor@gleanerjm.com.

Children, too, have their views on what constitutes positive parenting. Yanique DaCosta, a 15-year-old student of Immaculate Conception High School in St Andrew, is one of several persons who have responded to our invitation to readers to send us their views on positive parenting. Yanique, who has just won the 2008 National Child Month Committee Essay and Poster Competition, is the winner of several local and international essay and oratorical awards between 2005 and 2008.

Children's only chance of becoming good citizens and strong leaders comes through positive parenting.

Positive parenting is giving a child love, care, protection and exposure to positive values and attitudes. The responsibility of parenting is not confined to biological parents, but anyone who chooses to contribute to the growth and development of the child in order to develop a positive, productive and independent citizen.

Let's face the facts: Jamaica is overpopulated with single parents, as columnist Kevin O'Brien Chang implied in The Sunday Gleaner, March 6, 2008, Page G4: "Jamaica is a country with 85 per cent of children born out of wedlock and less than 40 per cent with registered fathers - perhaps the world's largest rates - and also leads the planet in per-capita homicide."

However, there are people who are products of single parenting who have shaped this country.

Globalisation

With the challenge of globalisation, increasing cost of living, and the gross domestic product decreasing, parental guidance has also decreased, which is why so many children have lost their values.

My mother, a single parent, faces these challenges by adhering to the mantra 'It takes a village to raise a child'. Through this method, I have gained early exposure to wholesome values and attitudes. Although I consider her my role model, she carefully chooses positive role models for me, who also provide parental guidance.

My mom is my best friend because she listens. Parents should be less judgmental and allow theirchildren the opportunity to exercise freedom of expression. Hence, the issues affecting young people would no longer be a mystery and this method can also serve to demolish low self-esteem, peer pressure and loss of identity.

I was taught to love, care, respect others and to take responsibility for my actions. My mother is very patriotic; therefore, I was made aware of Jamaica's rich culture and the civic duties of a citizen at an early stage in life. Now, I am a proud citizen who considers myself an ambassador to my country. Parents should encourage their children to enrol in service clubs, which will teach them good leadership qualities. This is the 21st century where children are more exposed and more intelligent. Hence, parenting has become more challenging.

Illiterate

The education system needs to be modernised and teachers need to enrol regularly in training programmes. Many children are not illiterate or learning disabled; they are just bored and need to be challenged. During my kindergarten age, I was bored and slept a lot but my mother, a positive parent, worked with my teachers and I am now considered a brilliant child. Parents need to ask for help so that their children won't be left behind.

'It takes a village to raise a child' is the solution to all the problems affecting the family and Jamaica, in general. Parenting is everyone's responsibility because any contribution to the growth and development of children is a contribution to the productivity and growth of Jamaica.