Safety and security of children has always been a major concern for parents. In times when every second day we read news that elaborates about a child being assaulted physically, sexually and mentally, the one question that always runs in our mind is “Are our children safe?”

Safety and security majorly comes from two things. One is the environment and the other is self awareness. When the environment we are in, is questionable the other best option is to educate our children to be self aware about the state of vulnerability that they possess and the reality of the people and world around them.

We consider a school as “Home away from Home” not only because they spend more time of the day here, but because they play, learn and grow at school. Today, all schools boast of a safe and secure environment but very few believe in imparting the right kind of knowledge to educate children towards living a secure life even in an unsafe environment. At Gaudium, our circle time talks primarily deal with topics like “Good touch and Bad touch” “Stranger Danger” etc. and most importantly we aim at making our children “communicators” in order that they learn to speak out and share everything.

A major advantage for the parents of this generation is that their children talk, and are very comfortable sharing many things because they are taught to be reflective. This is very unlike our generation, we were not as comfortable to share things with our parents perhaps out of respect, all in the name of “generation gap”.

But, conversely, a major set back that the parents are going through is lack of time. Bluntly said, they are too busy making money which of course, is for the children, but have no time to spend with them. In families where both parents are working, the child hardly has time to spend with them. Weekends are usually to unwind or fulfill a family chore which again does not involve the child. All this leads to children “getting bored” and parents finding a “hobby class” for the child, thereby distancing them further, and leading the children to confide into other “comfortable” company which could prove harmful to them.

It is very important for us as parents to know every detail of our child’s day and for that we need to habituate ourselves to “reserve” certain time of our day or night to consciously speak to them about their thoughts, feelings, people and things around them. It is only through creating this kind of regime will the parents be able to bridge this “invisible communication gap” between them and their children.