Ai FM: Integrating COVID-19 Pandemic into Life Education of Teens and Family

Dear parents and friends, it is a pleasure to have you listening to our consulting psychologist, Ms. Lee Li Li's public sharing on the topic "Integrating COVID-19 Pandemic into Life Education of Teens and Family", on 5th May 2020, Tuesday, 10:00 am, on Ai FM 89.3/106.7 Ai Ceria session.

Life education shapes our life concept through three correlations:

1. Myself and I: In relation to the relationship between the body and the mind, mainly to build up self-concept.

1. Other people and I: In relation to the relationship between an individual and other people (e.g. Family members, friends, peers, or community) mainly to build up the outlook on life.

1. Surroundings and I: In relation to the relationship between an individual and the surroundings (e.g. objects and environment), mainly to establish worldview.

Life education mainly helps children in dealing with the relationship with themselves, others, and the natural environment to allow them to learn and master related life concepts. Combining the three correlations mentioned above, life education also helps develop the children’s living and survival skills.

It is still common that most families emphasize on children’s academic education during this pandemic. However, life education is too crucial to be neglected, and the pandemic is a good topic to be used in life education. Parents are encouraged to integrate the pandemic into life education based on the following 5 recommended topics :

1. Life education and health To instil the children with health knowledge, such as maintaining self-cleanliness, often hand-washing, eating balanced diet with sufficient nutrition.

1. Life education and safety To develop the children with life safety knowledge by wearing mask to effectively inhibit the spread of pandemic and helps protect ourselves and others.

1. Life education and growth It refers to the growth in the aspects of mentality and cognition. For example, what can the children learn during this pandemic other than spending time on the internet, online classes and television show? How should they respond towards the pandemic situation?

1. Life education and values During this pandemic, each action by the parents deeply impacts the children’s development of values. For example, how would parents deal with the problems caused by this pandemic? If the parents solve the problem by quarreling, this will directly influence the children by leading them to adopt negative ways to solve problems.

1. Life education and care We are still able to observe the act of caring for each other during this pandemic. Perhaps the children will ask, “Why should we still help others when we are still in a miserable situation?” Parents play an important role to instill children with the right concept, which is, true care should not be limited to the amount of the resources, but to offer help whenever others are in needs.

Before the happening of the pandemic, most of the children were experiencing stress in learning and peer pressure. When these problems are not solved and to be extended to the stage of youth, they may have suicidal thoughts or the act of self-harming. Most of these youths are feeling miserable towards their life. Hence, life education needs to begin from a young age to lead children to grow healthily in terms of both the body and mind. Although children may not be able to experience an adult’s life experiences, yet, they are able to experience, develop positive self-concepts, the outlook on life, and worldview by involving in variety of life education activities.

Besides, the length, width, and height of life decides the quality of an individual’s life and it is depends on how much life education a person is instilled with. The length of life refers to the lifespan of a person. Meanwhile, the width of life meanwhile indicates the knowledge or cultivation of the society and culture of the person. Lastly, the height of life is referring to how much a person promotes spirituality.

Other than adopting the current pandemic as a theme for life education, parents may discuss and explore topics such as health, safety, growth, values and care through life education movies, current news, real life stories and so forth. For an instance, if we are facing financial problem or happened to be both parents are unemployed, will we complain throughout our life or finding ways to get through the hard times positively? Parents may lead the child to know more on the efforts done by the front lines to learn about the value of responsibility and their responsibilities as a student and as a child.

Please click this link to find out more, and to watch or listen to the full sharing.

Note: The above content is adopted from Ai FM 89.3/106.7 (Ai Ceria) program - "Integrating COVID-19 Pandemic into Life Education of Teens and Family" on 5th May 2020. For more information, please kindly contact our office. It is our pleasure to request our consulting psychologist to assist you. Thank you.