SIX (6) TO (13) YEARS OLD CHILDREN’S ENGAGEMENT IN ERRANDS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF SENSE OF INITIATIVE
Abstract
Despite the high demand for persons with creative skills in every sector of society, the need to nurture such skills in African children is still underemphasized. Advancement in technology and globalization has kept children in our modern world more occupied with electronic gadgets. Most of them thus hardly have time to engage in house chores or run errands for their parents and seniors. Also, the rapid involvement of Women who are considered primary child caregivers in white collar jobs and businesses keeps them very busy with limited time to engage the children in chores or errands. The tendency has been to higher maids or other caregivers who perform every chore at home living the children with very little or no opportunity to partake in task. The relevance of the skills that children develop in the course of running errands has been overlooked. This paper thus aims to highlight the degree to which children develop initiative as they engage in running errands. Secondly, it aims to compare the degree to which children in rural and urban areas develop initiative as they engage in running errands. A cross-sectional survey research design was adopted to obtain questionnaire data from a sample of 40 6-13 years old rural and urban Meta children and 120 members of their social setting. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. It was realised that; Meta children exhibit creative dispositions (71%) in running errands and rural children tend to exhibit more creative dispositions (X2 cal (18.549) > X2 crit value (9.488) in errands than the urban ones. It is thus necessary for parents and care givers to engage children in running errands.
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