DAYS AND DATES...CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

"Today" she said, "At 3,00 o'clock I came into the Home. Uncle Benny said, "OK. now you're here, Sister Pat will show you where you sleep. Take your things upstairs".
"How did you feel?, asks I.
'Scared and relieved at the same time.

The surprise was that she remembered the exact date and time of her arrival. Later to find out that almost all of the young  people remembered the first contact, that moment, the date,the time and what was said. Like a birthday date..Amazing!

I don't remember the date of my graduation, wedding anniversary, ordination. It speaks loudly of the powerful impact of that moment in the life of a young person.

Friday afternoon, after school he was pushed into my office. "He took your son's track suit off the wash-line. He stashed it in the hedge next to the gate Huge expectation of an out-burst from me. The door closed.  "Oh, Oh, Looks like your in trouble. Looks like we have to talk.".

It was his sister's birthday that weekend. She would be three years old. "My mother don't have money to buy cold-drink and cake. I will sell the tracksuit and buy some Coke, cake and chips". 
'Why didn't you ask me?"
"You would have said "No". 
"I'll keep the tracksuit. Try now to ask me for Coke, cake and chips". 
Unused, unable to ask. "I want Coke, cake and chips I need it".
"I'll see what I can do".
 Consternation, general staff resistance bordering on outrage.

Too bad!

I gets to this. Dates and the events associated with dates matter to children and young people in programmes.

So what, we always do something for the young peoples birthdays".
Yep. Not good enough.

Same girl as the admission girl. "Today my father died in a car accident on the highway that goes to the Buffalo Bridge.  I know the exact place. I was in the Home. They 'photo tell me. I was sitting here in the foyer. I'll never forget. I just laughed and laughed. Is that what nervous laughter is?". 
"How do you feel now?"
"I couldn't help it. I laughed. I don't feel guilty" about that any more".
'Do you want me to take you to visit his grave today?". 

It got to me. The memorable moments, The red flag days, the days we, as child and youth care workers take as just another day are not just another day for the young people in the programme. Seems to me that our calendars should hold more than just the birth dates of the young people in care. Other than they, themselves, who else will remember, listen, respond, comfort.

We, in our programmes, can make days and dates that become  memorable moments in the lives of children and young people.

Something of an incomplete list.

Staff Birthdays. The young people, told when, planned and created a surprise special day for me. It was an event. A Coke, cake with candles and chips event. Treasured, hand-drawn birthday cards and letters, little speeches and birthday greetings. This was a memorable moment for me. But I know it was one of those "I remember" moments for them also."Mr Lodge, It's soon your birthday again" And so it should be for everyone. Birthdays are special.

So then, the facility/ programme's  birthday. To be part of history, to hear and make memorable moments has the effect of feeling part of something bigger than ourselves. Some kind of ritual is a memory maker. At the St Goodenough's 80th Birthday there were made and distributed memorabilia. Ties, scarves, lapel badges, t-shirts. A  moment memorably marked.

Spring Day. In South Africa there is a strange cultural happening with roots that have long been forgotten. As I remember it, in the early church on Spring Day maidens were sprinkled with perfume. What on Spring Day now, in the streets and so in the programmes, children and young people use buckets, bowls, whatever of water to slosh on the unwary. A kind of water battle develops, no harm. A memorable day, date. Can't wait for next year!

All our Public Holidays in South Africa are great opportunities for dates to be memorable days. Much and especially, Youth Day. And again, Heritage Day ... traditional dress, food, dance, poems in mother tongue. All planned and presented by the young people, often with explanatory narrative. Memorable day. Memorable date.

I enjoyed the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday (Shrove Tuesday). Didn't matter from where the children and
young people came in their faiths. Simply called Pancake Day. We had teams making pancakes. pancake tossing, running and tossing and of course eating with all kinds of fillings. The sweet ones were the most favourite 

Many dates and days.

Let's not forget the staff. Child and youth care worker's day and child and youth care worker's week  (coming up soon) 
Social Workers Day, Secretaries Day, Mothers Day, Mothering Sunday, Father's Day, and best of all Bosses Day!

The late Brian Gannon our South Africa child and youth care guru and pioneer, once instituted a year dedicated to making memorable moments and making memories with and for children and young people.

Days and dates, past and present, provide for us as child and  workers, huge opportunities to respect memories, to respond to them caringly, for stories to be told, feelings explored, but then, also, to create experiences that make memorable moments and memories for children and young people. 

BUILDING SELF ESTEEM...CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

A recent social media comment read ," Art is powerful". It got me wondering what else are "powerful" child and youth care tools for the development and reclaiming of young people and children. I thought that building self esteem was one the many. 

Numerous Individual Development Plans (IDPs) I have seen for children and young people, tell a child and youth care worker to "build self esteem" or "develop self value". End of story. Usually outside the Assessment Meeting, the child and youth care worker then asks "But what must I do?"  "What works?" The confusion usually, if not invariably, comes from confusing an aim with a goal. Goals are set as achievable, with specific tasks and and practice duration at which time the achievement of the goal is measured. Properly drafted, the child care worker contributes into the multi disciplinary team,who together devise a set of "What exactly to do".

In South Africa we use the Circle of Courage as an assessment format and a tool for establishing strengths and identifying development areas. The quadrants, Belonging, Mastery, Independence and Generosity, are a useful structure for us when we devise tasks for ourselves with the young person to achieve in the building of self esteem.

If young people don't or can't connect with others in developmentally appropriate ways, like for example, having friends, then follows the risk of a reduced self value. Possibly a sense of worthlessness. "Not good enough", "Not liked" can become neglect of self, for "What does it matter?"  

We have professional interventive work to do, goals to reach with this young person and practical carefully planned tasks to provide exposure to experiences that will grow the young person to goal achievement.

She was 13, going on 14 years of age. She was experienced  obviously as hanging around the neck of adults, the child and youth care worker and other child and youth care staff. shoulder to shoulder, minute by minute. In this closeness she was far too eager to please the child and youth care workers. Far too ready to serve. "I'll do it! Can I make you a cup of tea? Do you need cigarettes? I will go to the cafe for you." We talk about having friends her own age.....none. "At school"?...None. "I'm a homie, They don't want to be a friend of a homie" IDP typically said  Aim:  "Build self esteem". Goals were established. She should have 6 (six) friends her own age in 6 (six) months time. This was considered developmentally appropriate.

Now for the tasks. First came her somewhat neglected inappropriate age/stage physical appearance. Off unaccompanied to the hairdresser.  Off to the clothing store. Jeans and tackkies and Tshirts with a selected teen peer in the facility. The less adult dependency the better                   .(Independence). Looking good, looking teenish, less homie... the next task.

"Here's the task, do you remember? In 6 months time it is your birthday. Your father says he wants to come here and give you and your friends  a braai (barbercue) . Your first task, choose one of your girl classmates you think could be a friend. (Independence), We will help you to learn what to do and not to do, what to say to build up a friendship with her. Rehearse, Rehearse Rehearse. "Try it, give feedback (Mastery). Now invite her to come here. Let her see the group home is just another house in a street in her neighbourhood. You know how to bake . You can bake cake together. ( Mastery) (building on strengths). Maybe the friend you choose will have friends. If she has, we will help you find acceptance in the group (Belonging)". You will be able to invite them to your birthday lunch ( Generosity).

With a lot of support, It worked. There was the giving and receiving of gifts and dad made a great lunch. (Belonging).

This is just one example. Many tasks are planned/designed with and by individual child and youth care workers for individual children and young people to help them feel an improved sense of self worth.

There are some general, everyday basics when planning and carrying out tasks for building self esteem. Child and youth care workers, in the life-space and the daily life events recognise and acknowledge even the smallest acts of children and young people. Like the saying of "Thankyou" , helping another young person with something, like doing her hair, straightening his school tie.(Generosity). 

It has to do with encouragement rather than praise. It's not so much to do with recognising achievement ( which has value), but acknowledging moments of improved, more appropriate coping. Like schoolwork for example. Last result 38%. This assessment result 42%. "I always knew you could improve. Good job!" "Hair is looking good today".

Most often it involves keeping count. Minister Frazer Moleketsi, opening a National Association of Child and Youth care Workers (NACCW) Conference , those years ago in the movement toward professionalisation, said "I look forward to the time when child and youth care workers will report, in writing, the number of cigarettes a child smoked in a day. The number of times this child used a swearword or acted in anger"(not a direct quote"). She was right . Counting gives child and youth care workers a graph. "You did this on your own. You must surely be pleased with what you did today/week/month.

Irene was 12. A very small 12, The other young people in the facility treated her as a much younger child..."Ankle Biter". Ankle biters were regarded as something of a nuisance and then babied. It was time for her to be given experiences of responsibility more appropriate to her age. Time to experience a reversal of her perceived social infancy into which she was living in her faulty thinking.

Across the road from the facility was a hairdressing salon. There was a road to cross. No pedestrian crossing. The child and youth care worker was to teach her to safely cross the road. From co-dependence to independence. then she was given two younger children to accompany to the salon. Again, co-dependently to independently. The hairdresser was briefed, understood and co-operated. It became understood that it was Irene's responsibility to accompany three or four younger children to the hairdresser, sit with them  and accompany the back. The sense of Belonging, Mastery, Independence and Generosity boosted her self value. Over time she was seen by the older young people to perform no more as an ankle biter. 

For a shift in self-perception, building self esteem means for the child and youth care worker in the multi disciplinary team  ensures that there is a provision of life-space experiences designed to make children and young people feel better about themselves.

It may sound easy, but it's not. It takes very careful thought, planning, developmental knowledge, creativity, the design of life-space experiences which allow children and young people to feel..."You see! I'm alright! '.     


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LOCKDOWN IN A SHACK...CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUUTH AFRICA

The Covid-19 lock-down in South Africa has been extended until the end of April. No school, no sport, no work.

Extraordinary times demand extraordinary measures. These suggestions are an attempted response to a question directed to me and some others in social media. It was..Is it possible to keep any "explorers" (children) in a one roomed shack for ,altogether 35 days? It went with a pic of the tightly situated shacks of an informal settlement. In South Africa, typical of many densely populated settlements of one room shacks. 

It has been obvious from the start that lock-down favoured the rich and privileged. The informal settlements have to comply and have rough deal. My answer.. No, you can't keep children in a one roomed shack without essential services such as electricity, water, sanitation indoor stimulation, toys, internet and possibly no mobile phone 

Now is the time to employ child and youth care workers...and there are many presently unemployed in South Africa. Child and youth care workers, among their many other professional trained abilities, have knowledge and skill in the creation of designed environments to optimally meet the needs of children (explorers). Child and youth care workers work wherever children are. Child and youth care workers have, a wealthy vocabulary of stimulation programme activities for children and young people.

An essential basic...Testing and masks for children are an absolute priority if programmes for children are to be initiated.

Now for some of those extraordinary measures/suggestions. 

(1) Create clusters/sections of shacks as a boundaried home base. A largish "family" as it were. As far as possible with a small accessible open space. I've seen a small section of street used as an open space. 
(2) Create cluster committees to brainstorm needs and ideas as well as to monitor movement.
(3) A community-based child and youth care worker, as an essential service worker, to be allocated to a boundaried cluster of shacks and the children in that cluster. This is an extension of the present situation in which only child and youth care workers in Child and Youth Centres are regarded as essential service workers
(4) Supply to the cluster, portable toilets and portable wash stations within reach of the allocated small open space.
(5) The possibility should be seriously considered of having equipped mobile activity child stimulation centres. Like the mobile clinic, library or testing units.
(6) The provision of child centered activity packs. Food parcels, it is said, are provided, so let us add an activity pack for the children. Such a pack can include for example, craft supplies, small games, puzzles, some toys,educational materials, stationary.. you know the kind of things, I'm thinking of.       
(7) useful would be "towers", even car tyres to make towers, and what is needed to make a container vegetable garden.

There was, decades ago, research undertaken at the Frere Hospital in East London in the Eastern Province of South Africa. The outcome proved dramatically what, I guess, we  know. The children in the "Sunshine Ward", long term patients, were found to be unstimulated. Routines only. The children did not thrive as they should, physically. They did not follow the usual developmental mile-stones. They under-performed cognitively and in the use of language.
A simulation programme was introduced. The next batch of children received the full benefit from admission. They thrived holistically.

 I have always thought that parents, should not only be encouraged to provide stimulation, but to be shown how and where needed, given the resources to do this at home. Even with little to now resources. There are really useful stimulation activities for children and young people using scrap. Here is an opportunity for child and youth care workers in our work with children and young people in the family. Especially now in the Covid-19 lock-down.

The President of South Africa in his address to the Nation, said that we will find South African solutions to our present difficult time. We have a South African community-based professional child and youth care model in the Isibindi Project. It has much to teach us in meeting the needs of children locked-down in shacks, for many of the Isibindi programmes were established to serve such communities. One of the add-on programmes to Isibindi is the Safe Park. Some were fitted with a single container for storage and a planning/work station for a community-based child and youth care worker. Then came the Temporary Safe Park. No set space and no big equipment. Just a circle marked out with plastic traffic beacons. The circle is then equipped with games for children. All of this can be packed in and out of a car. Social distancing is possible with proper control.  

Safe Parks also taught us to enlist volunteers in the community and to stimulate community buy-in and support. I'm thinking in these times of need for children a carefully planning with child and youth care workers could be scheduled to reach given numbers of boundaried clusters of shacked homes and numbers of children.

To wrap up. There is an urgency to act and to think creatively..child centered; to think and act now, to keep high density, poor children with no resources, safe from the virus and at the same time to involve them in stimulation programmes that engage them. This is the task of child and youth care workers.... employ us!

Now is the time. for the sake of children, employ child and youth care workers. Provide them with the resources and don't pay them peanuts. The children, especially in informal settlements, need us NOW.

THE ARTS...CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

It happened in Kimberley in the Province of the Northern Cape. Dance and Drama rehearsals with youth in the streets. 

Exactly. 

The Arts has power to heal, develop, express and to communicate feeling, values and beliefs. It can bring about change in young people and in society.  It is a great tool for child and youth care workers in whatever settings.


Herbert Read in his book, Education Through  Art  Makes out a case for the Arts to be the very basis of learning. Everyone is and artist. Everything, he argues, can be experienced and learnt through creative activity. No need to list separate learning subjects - you know them. All - is his argument are integrated in the Arts.

I saw this this in Germany whilst on a study scholarship. In the best examples, whole classrooms were transformed into, for example, a medieval castle interior, painted, decorated, measured out, dramatised, historically researched. It was coupled with resource- based education.   

Does this have a message for child and youth care work? 

I think so... The National Association of Child and Youth Care  ( NACCW) in South Africa Biennial Youth Conferences speak of the Arts as a medium of expression. Not just of our historical past, but as an expression by young people of their immediate present. Banners, posters, dramatisation, socio-drama, costume, dance music, singing, choral singing, composed poetry,readings, all fused into a riveting presentation.  It is invariably an aha moment. A cry for personal and immediate social change, for social justice, a vehicle for a better world for all. I never fail as a child and youth care worker, but to be moved by the young people and the Arts.

It's called the emergent curriculum approach. In this approach the children and young people decide for themselves as a group ( democratically) what it is they want to say using the Arts as the medium.

"Everywhere in the world, it is accepted that students (children and young people), as a thinking and independent minded section of the population, has a right      
to freedom of thought and expression of opinion". ( Nelson Mandela. Statement made at the All-in Africa National Action Council. 3 September 1961.

 And again. 


"During the worst years repression, when all avenues of legitimate protest were closed by emergency legislation, it was the Arts that articulated the plight and democratic aspirations of our people. The affirmation was demonstrated, through drama, dance, literature, song, films, paintings and sculpture that defied the silence that apartheid sought to impose".   ( Nelson Mandela. Statement on the occasion of the opening of the Cultural Development Congress at the Civic Theatre, Johannesburg, South Africa. 25 April, 1993) 

The Arts can be a political act, a conscious effort for children and young people to facilitate and participate in social change and so, a change in the very conditions that brought them into care. For we believe that there are creative social solutions.  We believe that there are various forms of communication that children and young people can use to  touch society's consciousness. ( adapted from Rini Hartman   www. Art for Social Change.Net  undated )

Taken together, these thoughts provide a well considered rational for using the Arts in child and youth care work as a way of expressing the social situation facing the children and  young people in our programmes and allowing them a voice for social change. 

 But that is not all.

An admission of the source of my conviction that the Arts be integrated into child and youth care practice! ...13 years of being a registered practicing Art Therapist in a Child Guidance and Research Centre. I'm not I'm suggesting that child and youth are workers must be Art Therapists. I am saying that the Arts have a healthy, healing developmental potential for children and young people. This is whether they be unstructured, or structured as an activity and undertaken within the scope of practice of the child and youth care worker. Making the Arts available is not a high level intervention. To structure some Arts activities similarly ..no risk. Just opportunity for expression and skills development. 

Hugely useful, is puppetry and puppet making. Like the use of personal dolls, puppets allow for the acting out of scenarios with some level of personal distance - it's the puppet talking - not me. Making hand puppets is really very simple and very satisfying for children and young people.Finger puppets, even simpler - no puppet theatre needed.

Clay is a delight. You can pull it, pound it, pinch it, push it, pummel it, prick it, stroke it and smooth it, mess your hands - and do you know what? ..you finish up with something great!

Colour talks too. The "How I feel" colours. The "What I enjoy" colours, ... NIce! 

"If you can't say it, try drawing it. You can t draw it, try acting it without words, work out some little dramatisation in your group or on your own".

 We love to sing 

The possibilities of the Arts are endless. Creativity and expression has no limits.

Defying the silence, learning, education, expression, culture, communication saying it safely,letting it go, speak, say pain talk, speak for social change. 

Does this sound like child and youth care to you. It does to me.