By Renee Woodburn
Aspiring doctors take a lot of science classes. If you want to become a historian, you take many history classes. There are many different forms of art classes for future artists.
But what if you just like kids and want to be a mother or father someday? Biology certainly won’t teach you how to change a diaper. You won’t learn about teething in history, and all the English classes in the world couldn’t help you understand how to communicate with your baby. Now, there is a class that will– parenting.
Mrs. Rebbeka Blitz started the parenting program at Chamblee last year. “It’s hard for kids to get the full picture, but for them to actually get experience… they learn so much more,” she comments about why she started the class. The students work from textbook and take tests as they would in a regular class, but two days out of the week they volunteer at a daycare.
By doing this, the students get a more hands-on view of the stages of child development. Topics of study include parenting skills, stages of development, neglect, abuse, learning disabilities, etc.
Another major theme within the class is the responsibility of being a parent. Not only do students read and study parental responsibilities from the textbook, but they also put their skills into practice.
You may have seen many people walking around with “flour babies.” This is an activity the parenting and psychology classes do together. The parents/students are to take care of their baby for a few days.
They must keep it safe, provide for it, and use their imagination and what they have learned to make a time schedule of when the baby eats, sleeps, etc… At the end of each day, the students are required to write in a daily diary and describe their experiences as a pseudo-parent.
The psychology and parenting classes also collaborated to host a Daycare Day on Wednesday, September 18. Students and teachers brought in children ranging from ages three weeks to four years. This activity is designed for naturalistic observation. The students observe the children and take notes on developmental psychology.
Though this seems like fun and games, the students learn a lot. Senior Ashley Rabon, a second-year parenting student, says, “I don’t want one (a child) now. I’m not mentally mature enough,” but has admitted to learning lots about childcare, such as how to speak to a child and how to deal with each child’s special needs.
Senior Corinth Hunter, a first-year psychology student, comments, “I have learned that children are a huge responsibility that I don’t think anyone can handle at seventeen.” Thus, the point of the project was reached: children are a big responsibility. Make sure you’re ready before you have them.
Still thinking about having children? Maybe you should think about taking parenting.