On the Subject of Coaching Children

I feel like I should over-emphasize the point made on my previous article "Yay or Nay to Mentoring Children?" I thought about it, and reached the conclusion of Yay. And here's why. Growing up in Cameroon, I watched hens mothering their children in a manner that indicates the mentoring technique I intend to capture. To mentor a child, in its simplest form, is to teach them how to fend for themselves. Even though I see education as the direct route through which many have tended to provide for themselves and families, I also think there exist several other indirect paths. Unfortunately in Cameroon, many of these paths are thought of as low-income jobs, meant for those with little intellectual capacity. Contrary to the view, I have observed that it is the means through which many in the West sustain their lives. Examples such as sewing, hair-braiding, driving, and crocheting are usually perceived as a no go area for many parents in Cameroon. But in Britain, it is a life skill to know all of the above mentioned trades. People become millionaires as seamstresses taking the fashion industry by storm and designing the outfits we run to the super-markets to buy at exorbitant costs. It is about time that we engage in similar productions. Even though many women in Cameroon dominate the fashion industry, it still hasn't evolve to a large scale industry. Hmmmm got me thinking there. There's a business woman in me that is forceful to emerge. Gross diversion there, but it is demonstrates that we should engage our children in extra-curricular activities for as the future is unbeknownst, we can never tell what path our kids would take. So if it is sports they love, encourage them by being their coach or taking them to learn the sports they love. If it is dancing the love at tender age, nurture that skill and don't call them derogatory names like, "this pikin go turn na some akwara soon". In whatever your child chooses, regardless, encourage them all the time. If you cannot teach them, employ someone's services to do so. You'd be satisfied you did, and I want to think they would, too. Do not forget to draw up a time-table for every activity and when you expect them to have learned. Like mother hen who has a few months to teach her young chicks how to dig the earth and find worms for food, so too, must you who is brainier than mother hen, must do so for your child. You have 18 years to teach your children to become. Strive to teach them something new everyday, or make attempts to perfect what they already know. Register them to partake in competitions to see the extent of their growth process. What else would you have done if by 18 they choose to go astray? 

This hand work sold for a whopping £170,100, and the buyer would also have to pay a £7 delivery fee...Now, that's some hand work!