Sheena Gayle, Freelance Writer

POSITIVE Parenting

WESTERN BUREAU:

Family Court judge Rosalie Toby is urging parents to get help in raising their children as she is concerned about an increase in violence-related cases, involving children, that are appearing before her court.

"Jamaican parents are in crisis because they feel that they don't know what to do to help their children," Toby revealed during a parenting seminar at the Hopewell High School in Hanover on Saturday.

Frustrated

Toby, who presides over family courts in Westmoreland, Hanover and St James, said parents become frustrated by the time they leave work and with their ability to provide for their children and, as such, that frustration is taken out on the child.

She noted that most of the cases that appear before her court that involve juveniles include cruelty to children, violence in schools and sexual abuse.

"Some of the children that come before the courts cannot read and are dyslexic, which poses a problem for them to learn at school ... and, as such, they become rebellious," Toby stressed.

Help with financing

In an effort to mitigate these circumstances, she recommended that parents make an effort to spend time with their children and take an interest in their social and educational development. Parents, she added, can seek the assistance of the government programmes in order to help with financing their children.

The parenting seminar was organised by the members of the Kiwanis Club of Hopewell in an effort to engage parents within the Hanover community on how to offer proper parenting to their children.