TALKING TALK.....CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

There is always something to talk about in child and youth care. This week something in last weeks blog sparked another Brian  Gannon flash back. The memory was of him telling me, " I can tell a good child and youth care worker from the way they say "Hi" to a young person....within 5 minutes I've learnt a lot more." 

Got me thinking.

I used to say that within 10 minutes I could tell the quality of verbal interaction. I was only an initial impression needing to be substantiated. But first impressions go a long way. Children and young people have, seemingly, an unerring intuition on whether a person is, or can be trusted within those early verbal signals. It can colour relationship building, preparedness to connect and respond positively.

 Three was an interesting confirmation of the effect of words theory a  research report on what was called speech signalling.            (2017 Torres Green, Monica. Ladders.com) 
A few quotes say it all:
"You can can be judged rapidly, frequently and accurately based on your words alone creating barriers for relationship foundation.........the first 7 words you say".

It is obvious to child and youth care workers that ours is, in its biggest part, a talking developmental therapy. Little surprise that in some countries, what we do is called "Applied Psychology".

Yes we need to model,we design therapeutic environments, provide good holistic developmental experiences. WE harness bits of the other therapies, Art, Music, especially Play, Sport, Relaxation, story telling. But in the everyday events and life-space, we largely, TALK.  WE largely, talk.... with individual children and young people, or with groups.

Can't help wondering what Brian Gannon heard in the first words and first five minutes which then gave him such a powerful impression.

There are 4 classic personal personal characteristics of the therapeutic personality: BEING warm, empathetic, genuine             (congruent) , and non-judgemental. I add another three.......BEING self aware, a good listener and goal orientated.

It's all of these, PLUS, I think, children and young people intuitively assess when we talk, our tone, body language, culture and our ability to read feelings.

The good news is that all these important child and youth care qualities can be learnt. It all has to do with practice, skill, knowledge and BEING. That's the HOW of what we say.

The when of what we say we say has to do do with timing. Is this a good and the best moment?

We as child and youth care workers have our own unique.....what must I say?......STYLE ?....A particular way. We have a communication style different from a psychologist, social worker, teacher, child minder, parent, pastor, manager. That's one reason I think, Brian Gannon was cued ( and me for that matter) to tell a good child and youth are worker from any other. There are any number of examples. Think about the way a doctor talks to a patient. Compare that to the way a nurse talks to the patient. Think about the way a teacher talks to a pupil. Compare that to the way we as child an youth care workers talk to children and young people. It has in a large part to do with our different training and education. A doctor has a bed-side manner. We have a developmental relationship based manner.

A caution. We must be wary of getting our roles mixed up. In our style of talk, suspicion appears to be raised when child and youth care workers use the reasoning that they must be "friends"with the children and young persons, or popular, or liked, even loved. I've seen instances when relationship confusion tempts child and youth care workers to use teen slang, township talk, the language of the streets. We may think that it builds connections but my experience has been that it may often come across as not genuine ( congruent) by young people. It's not our professional style.

We may have touched on something of the HOW of our talk . Now the WHAT? 
In our education and training we are usually given some very useful formulas/models as to what to say when. Models of what to say and what not to say in certain circumstances. These i found to be helpful. Typically in problem solving,life-space counselling , the escalation of behavior from calm to crisis both with individuals and with groups. There are many other such useful models.

Somehow they help us to find hooks on which to hang our talk as professionals in the more unpredictable, spontaneous moments of life-space work.

Reflection and proper supervision is essential and really very helpful in being able to talk developmentally and helpfully in practice. We have to ask ourselves "What happened? What did I say? What. The "What did I say? How did I say it? reflection", sharpens our talk as child and youth care professionals.

Lastly, reflectively, when we speak our response - LISTEN TO OURSELVES WITH THE EARS, HEART AND EYES OF THE OTHER.  




  
 what did I do?