Young children education can be decisive in determining their personality later in life.
Some educators believe that
taking care of an animal can benefit children’s development to a large extent.
Sure, it sounds like a good idea, but to look at this issue more closely,
there can be some serious problems associated with pets.
First off, pets can be a real distraction. We’ve all been through childhood.
In those formative years, children grow intellectually and emotionally.
Learning is a breeze for them
because they are at the best years of their lives when memory is in full swing.
When a cute puppy is now given to the hands of an eight-year boy,
there’s no doubt he’ll be thrilled.
And then before you know it, the pet is following his young master around,
not leaving his side for one minute.
And the boy is now either playing frisbee with his buddy on the lawn
or walking him in the park. Sure, it looks quite all right,
but he could have spent that time learning to play an instrument,
working on a science project or joining a readers’ club.
Since raising pets can be rather time-consuming,
it’d be a shame to see them taking care of pets at the cost of their own personal growth.
Besides, I think keeping a pet is too much of a responsibility for someone young,
let alone gain benefits from it.
Children are at this particular stage of life
where they have little self-control and cannot behave without supervision from their parents.
I once heard it on the radio that a teenager accidentally set a house on fire
while his parents were away.
I’m not saying children cannot be trusted, but as you can imagine,
it’ll be asking too much to expect a child
who can barely fend for himself to attend to another living creature.
Feeding, bathing and going to a vet takes more than just affection.
Instead, proper nursing knowledge and enduring patience are needed.
That’s something children might just fall short of.
If anything bad happens because of negligence on children’s part,
such bad experience would definitely have a negative impact on their future lives.
Admittedly, there are some children
who have become somewhat tolerant and responsible by taking care of a pet.
Especially for the only child in a family, to keep a pet teaches them to have compassion.
But the thing is, we cannot expect such positive effects to last long.
As an old Chinese saying goes, children are like the weather in summer,
rainy a while ago and then sunny a moment later.
How can we expect them to keep it that way?
Pets don’t get to live a second time,
so let’s not risk it for a sense of responsibility children can develop
otherwise, like doing laundry, preparing for dinner or taking out the garbage.
In a word, I’m not against raising pets 
but I just don’t think it can do much good to children
 because they could be distracted and unfit for such job.