In this twenty-first century, Singapore is undergoing a lot of changes because of the ever changing demands of the global economy. Parents these days, are working even harder to meet up with the political growth and the bustling economy of Singapore. This results in ignorance of their own flesh and blood. The idea of a father being a sole bread-winner and the mother a housewife has long ago been obliterated, now in most families, both parents works, leaving their child in care of a maid or an elderly. Are material needs what teenagers really want from their parents?
Teenagers in Singapore are faced with fierce competition in school. These days, school is no more a place where they get educated, it is more of a competitive arena whereby students pit themselves with individuals like themselves, striving to stick out and come out top among their peers. Teenagers are faced with immense pressure from both their peers and their teachers.
In order to overcome these pressures, teenagers will have to change their mindset of studying. Teenagers should learn that the reason we are studying is because it’s a way of learning new skills and essential techniques which would benefit us in the future. Teenagers actually do not study just to reach their parents expectations but it is actually for the benefit of them. Where education paves a path towards your future, feeding you with valuable information and life-skills. Learning and studying should be a smooth and natural process whereby stress and pressure are the things of the past.
Furthermore, as time passed, the need to find the next generation of leaders who in come will lead Singapore in the future increases. Therefore, the present government stresses the fact that one has to be all-rounded, meaning one has to excel academically and also in their co-curricular activities ( CCA). This high expectation of the government challenges teenagers to balance their time well, juggling their CCAs and work. Ultimately, studies are more important, hence teenagers haven to exercise self-discipline and self-control to know when to play and when not to play.
Not only facing the stress gained from school, teenagers too face a stressful family life. To meet the high living standards of Singapore, parents are always at work from dawn to dusk, ensuring a steady flow of income to support the family. Hence, teenagers do not really communicate much with their parents and blame them for not giving the seeds of nourishment in their growing years, and that is love and care. This results in a lot of misunderstandings and miscommunication between both parent and child, resulting in affecting the child psychologically and the child’s social well-being.
These add up the stress in the teenager’s family life, causing them to feel unloved and not cared for. To overcome this problem, both parents and teenagers should be willing to sacrifice their time in to understanding each other more. For teenagers, simple SMSes or daily calls to their parents is essential. For parents, they can come up with a time-table or a schedule to allocate time for their family, they should share a meal together at least once a week or they could go out to conduct recreational activities to decrease both parties stress level.
Due to the lack of communication between parent and child, the child is unable to voice out their feelings about the opposite sex. As they undergo puberty, so does the attraction in the opposite sex increases. Due to the influence of the Western culture, teenagers in Singapore engage in casual sex. A recent survey was conducted and one of their main reasons on why they do engage in casual sex is that they are not aware of the dangers about casual sex and that they have no one to talk to about relationships with the opposite sex.
To eradicate this casual sex culture in our young minds of Singapore, the dangers of sex should be infused into their minds and this starts from their very households. Parents should warn them about casual sex that it brings incurable diseases such as AIDs and gonorrhea. Teenagers too should force their parents to make some time for them to discuss sensitive issues about their relationships.
So does material need really satisfy a teenager wants? No, its love and concern from their parents. Families are very important and they should share strong bonds within one another. When you look at your life, the greatest happiness are family happiness. Quoted by Joyce Brothers.
