How positive parenting steers families through crises
Community training sessions teach parents about positive approaches to discipline, good mental health and prevention of COVID-19
Siem Reap, 17 November 2020, one lesson 2020 has taught us all is that a pandemic can damage a society in many different ways. While children have not suffered the worst health consequences of COVID-19, they have been harmed by the economic and social havoc it has caused. After all, if parents go through economic turmoil or major life changes their children will also likely feel the impact.
Krovan is a 33-year-old mother of three daughters who went through many changes in 2020. She and her husband Samnang began the year living as migrant workers in Thailand, like tens of thousands of other Cambodians who struggle to earn enough in their home country. They worked in construction, and left their daughters in the care of grandparents, which is a common solution in Cambodia. The family situation was stable, although Krovan was very aware that she and Samnang were not providing as much parental love and care as she would have liked.
Then COVID-19 spread across the world, and Krovan and Samnang soon lost their jobs and were instructed to return to their home country. They had left their home province of Siem Reap because there weren’t enough employment opportunities and knew that there would be even less when they returned because of the pandemic. Their home province of Siem Reap was particularly badly affected, being the tourism capital of Cambodia, and having been hit hard by plummeting visitor numbers. Unsurprisingly, the return home was a stressful time for the two parents.
“It’s been very difficult since I came back from Thailand,” Krovan said. “I have been unemployed which has meant I couldn’t pay for my daughters’ clothes or education. It has been really stressful and I got a lot of headaches.”
Sometimes parents who are facing challenges like these can show their stress to their children by becoming impatient, harsh in disciplinary matters, or even violent. There have been reports in many parts of the world suggesting that children have been more likely to face violence in their homes during 2020, particularly in lockdown situations.
Fortunately, Krovan learnt a better way of parenting when her village leader invited her to attend some positive parenting training along with other parents. The training was organized by Sosor Sdom’s Commune Committee for Women and Children (CWCC), just one of the ways in which CWCCs work to protect the vulnerable in Cambodian communities across the country.
The training was conducted by a local NGO called Improving Cambodian Society Through Skillful Parenting (ICS-SP). It was funded and supported by UNICEF as part of the UN Joint Programme for COVID-19 Response and Recovery Multi-Partner Trust Fund. The training has now reached 35 communes across three Cambodian provinces. A total of 35,794 children, parents and caregivers have been reached with messages on positive parenting, good mental health and prevention of COVID-19. 20,202 parents or caregivers and 13,667 children were reached with community-based mobile campaigns, and 1,000 adults and 925 children reached with home-based counselling.
“The training was really good,” Krovan told us, “It’s good just to take a step back and really think about what my responsibilities are as a parent.” She found the sessions on Family Communication and Parental Well-Being particularly interesting and useful. As a result, she has learnt how to be more supportive when interacting with her children, while also learning useful techniques for managing her own stress or anger.
“I try as hard as I can to provide my children with warmth, while also listening to them properly and helping them with their homework,” she said. “I don’t think that being a good parent has anything to do with income, it’s about how you act. The better I can do, the better my children will do.”
Krovan says that she particularly values improved communication with her children. She can show her care for them by asking them if they are hungry and by paying close attention to their behaviour. If they appear unhappy she has learnt to ask them about it gently. “I say something like “I am feeling you are not happy, can you tell me what’s happened with you?”, Krovan explained. She is grateful to the local community for organizing the training and for helping her to become a better parent to her children. She can now feel optimistic about their future as a family, despite the difficulties they have been through.
