Parental Guidance 2021: Meet the families with very different parenting styles

There’s a reason why people warn that you should never tell a parent how to raise their children.

It isn’t just obnoxious, but it can also cause a lot of tension and unfair judgment. After all, is there any one way to navigate the murky and turbulent waters of parenting?

Now, Channel Nine is throwing out the social rule book with its new show Parental Guidance that puts parenting styles to the test.

Today Show host and mum-of-two Allison Langdon will be joined by parenting expert Dr Justin Coulson as they work closely with 10 brave sets of parents with very different approaches to parenting.

From tiger parents to helicopter parents, routine, free-range, extreme and authoritarian, these parents will put their values and techniques to the test through a variety of challenges to uncover the best method.

Allison even revealed that the show’s helped her become more relaxed and less of a helicopter mum.

In conversation with the Sydney Morning Herald told the publication that she didn’t think she would learn from the other parents, but she’s grateful for the education.

“I undertook this experiment thinking I’m going to be drawn towards these parents or those parents. What I found really interesting was how much I took away from all of them,” she said.

Allison admits she’s learnt a lot about parenting her own kids from the show.

(Credit: Channel Nine)

Ally, who was raised on a farm, says she had more freedom than her city-bound kids Mack and Scout but since working on Parental Guidance has implemented some of those old school values through a modern lens.

“I’d love to raise them the way I was brought up, but it’s a bit tricky when you’ve got little kids and I constantly find myself saying, ‘Be careful, watch out, don’t do that’,” she shared.

“One of the things I’ve taken away from this show is that my husband and I try to do that a whole lot less. [Before] if we were at the park and the four-year-old was climbing a tree, we were like, ‘Careful, Mack!’ And as soon as you say that, the kid thinks, oh, this must be dangerous, so they’re not working out for themselves how far they can go, we’re just hovering a little too much.”

So, before you place your judgements (and for once you’re meant to), meet the parents of Parental Guidance.