The usual Monday morning staff meeting.
"Last evening, at about 5.pm, Pilane ( a young person of about 17years) had one of his tantrums. He broke a window in the dormitory. It was about pocket-money. He wanted it then and there. I said " I'll give it to you on Monday morning."
Me, "What did you do?"
"Aagh. We've learnt t live with it... that's what he does."
Me. "But you are a child and youth care worker. That's not what we do. We don't learn to "live with". He needs to be helped. He needs to know how to use more appropriate behaviour. We use that moment to help the young person. He needs to know how to, what we call, hold-off. Many of the young people we work with characteristically want immediate gratification. Let's talk about phased. gradual learning to hold- off."
"Aagh, We just live with it. We've got used to it".
Me. "My concern is what happens if he isn't helped to have another way, a more coping way, of waiting for his needs to be met? What will it mean in his marriage? For his children?"
The question was What's the difference between life-space and life- span work?
Pilane was in his dorm next to a window. It was 5.00pm on Sunday. He wanted his pocket-money. Guess was he would bully a junior to go to the local Roadhouse to buy him a hamburger and Coke. He couldn't hold off until Monday when the pocket money was due to be routinely paid So, he used a power tantrum and a window break to intimidate, to scare the child care worker into breaking the rules. That's the moment. That's the environment in which he reacted. That's when and where the child and youth care worker seizes the opportunity to start a holding off Intervention plan . Its the life- space moment for life-span benefit.
At St Goodenough, I could never understand that there were boys in the residential programme who were sons of fathers previously placed there. In at least one instance ...three generations. "My father and my grandfather were here - now I'm here". All three were proud of their St Goodenough history. Even staff, I heard said, 'I looked after his father, and now I'm looking after him".
Me. "We just don't seem to get it. The purpose of our work is to put a sign on the gate .. Out of Business."
It was the Pilane, "We have learnt to live with it" syndrome. It was the "we look after syndrome Left unassisted Pilani was sure to demonstrate disfunctional relationships of intimacy, Pilane's children were predictably destined to be locked into the system.
St Goodenough again. One of the group homes was allocated to be, what we called, a bridging house. We took in street children from a neighbouring Street Children's Shelter when they were considered ready to be bridged into what we called the mainstream. We observed that the boys had inappropriate attitudes and behaviour toward girls. Projected into mainstreaming their whole approach to the opposite gender, shouted out messages of longer term developmental, life-span, disasters. The boys saw girls as sexual objects, lessor beings, fetchers, carriers and cleaners. But there were only boys in the house. No girls in the life-space. It took very careful planning. We had to create, to design life- space moments in which a few, or a group would mix socially with girls. For child and youth care workers, it was a structured activity.
Designed life- space work for life-span development... how very challenging yet professionally satisfying for us as child and youth care workers. But then again, that's what we do.
The coffee- bar was useful. At one time, in terms of the 1983 Child Care Act, the Children's Homes had the responsibility to provide follow-up with young people transitioning out of the programme. That changed. So we started a coffee-bar. There was an Old boy's Club as a fee-paying membership and the nature of it's members tended to be something of a Club for those who had made it. Proper longitudinal studies were lacking and are today. In any case their constitution didn't accommodate girls and they were reluctant to include the new generation of black children.
So, we started the coffee-bar. It was held once a month at the Bridging House. The idea was that, on leaving, young people and now young adults, or who-ever, having been in the programme could always come to the coffee club and talk. It was designed to give support into life-span situations.
In child and youth care work, it happens now, where the children and young people are. In that time and space, we are preparing them for their whole life-span. We are preparing their children and their children's children
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