Bonnells Bay course building better dads
Bonnells Bay ‘Hey Dad’ facilitator, Peter Davy with course participant, Steve Rolfe. (Photo: Tim Gittins)
I want to be a better father. The course is teaching me more about myself and how I should be reacting.
– “Hey Dad” course participant at The Salvation Army’s Bonnells Bay Corps, Steve Rolfe.
A successful program designed to teach parenting skills specifically to fathers could soon be offered to corps throughout The Salvation Army Australia Eastern Territory.
The “Hey Dad” course, an initiative of Centrecare, has been offered by the Army’s Bonnells Bay Corps, on the NSW Central Coast, for the past 10 years. Facilitator, Peter Davy, says over the past 20 to 30 years society has changed dramatically, and many fathers are left in the dark about their parenting responsibilities.
“I don’t think there is that much material out there that is focused purely around dads and parenting,” he says. “So there is a need for a course like this and there seems to a strong desire for young dads now to be more involved in their children's lives and more fathers willing to take on the role of carer as stay-at-home dads.”
Hey Dad is open to members of the Bonnells Bay Corps, the community and the nearby Salvation Army Miracle Haven Recovery Services centre. Those involved are challenged about their role as a father and develop new skills about how being a dad today might be different to what they learned or experienced as a child. Topics covered include childhood development, dealing with emotions, discipline and self-esteem.
Father of two Steve Rolfe is currently doing the course and says it’s challenging, but in a constructive way.
“It’s a learning process but I can already see changes in the way that I interact with my kids,” he says. “When certain things happen and triggers happen I certainly recognise them more readily now and I’m able to deal with them differently than I was. So it’s been very, very good.”
Peter says it’s amazing to see how the attitudes and behaviours of the participants change as they go through the eight-week course. He is now in discussions with Centrecare to see if training can be organised to offer the course to other corps within the Australia Eastern Territory.
As for Steve, he’s looking forward to a fantastic Father’s Day with some extra parenting skills and strategies up his sleeve, which he hopes to be able to pass on to his kids. “It’s a life-changing experience,” he says.
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