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Lessons of the heart
Nalini Naidoo. 28 March 2003.The Natal Witness. Republished with kind permission.
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For many children, school is not a happy place. It is where beatings, slaps and insults can be the order of the day. KZN newspapers have reported that despite the ban on corporal punishment, pupils are still subject to cruel treatment by teachers.
There's the recent Bulwer case where teacher Rosemary Gasela has been charged with the murder of Grade 2 puppil S'Khumbuzo Memela (8), who died days after she allegedly banged his head against the heads of three of his classmates as punishment for making a noise. A recent post-mortem showed that S'Khumbuzo died of meningitis, although a court must still decide on the charges against Gasela.
One group that's operating in schools to make a difference to the lives of children affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic is the Valley Trust Personal Development School Programme, which operates in the Valley of a Thousand Hills. Its members have been asking and exploring certain questions: how do we preserve the innocence of youth? With family structures crumbling, where do children learn about love and respect, warmth and acceptance? Where will they find the loving support that will help them cope with their emotional pain?
Programme Manager Beryl Lourens and Personal Development Facilitator Jabulani Mthetwa are working with teachers on the basis that if teachers cannot cope with their own emotional baggage, the pupils suffer. Lourens explained the way the project works: "We invite all the teachers and the principal in a school to become involved, so that everyone can work together to create an emotionally safe and nurturing climate throughout the school."
The programme runs for a minimum of two years and a key focus is on personal development. "Educators are dealing with huge issues in their own lives. They too have family members dying, financial burdens or relationship problems. In addition, they have to cope with enormous changes in their professional lives, many are demotivated and as a result have a poor work ethic," Lourens said.
"We encourage teachers to focus on a vision for their own lives, starting with the fact that we all have the power to choose to take responsibility for our own lives. We aim at building self-awareness and self-worth.
In the second year, we work with the teachers on how they can do the same with the children. We focus on emotional nurturing. We find that through the programme, teachers become sensitised to the distress of the children and how important it is for them to have a trusting place where they can express their emotions and speak about their feelings. Together, we work on strategies for how to develop democratic procedures in the classroom and the kind of values and principles we would like to develop in our classrooms, and would like the children to take with them."
Lourens, who was principal of Epworth Primary School in Pietermaritzburg, now works as a consultant. She started the project when she was working on a science programme for the Valley Trust. During her visits to schools, she saw that many teachers lacked confidence and that the classroom climate was authoritarian and not conducive to learning. She proposed a pilot project, received the support of Valley Trust Director, Dr Keith Wimble, and got funding from Germany.
The project was successfully carried out in two schools, and with the support of the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education, was rolled out to other schools in the area. She said the aim is to show teachers that their work is not only about cognitive learning but emotional literacy as well. "Research has shown that emotions play a huge part in cognitive learning and higher-order thinking. A child who feels secure and emotionally strong is more open to learning. Children do not blossom under authoritarian teachers."
The project is being documented by researchers from the University of Durban-Westville to see whether the training is having an effect and what improvements need to be made. Lourens and Mthetwa's goal is to develop emotionally safe schools, and their vision is for the project to be adopted by all schools in the province, perhaps throughout the country.
"Schools in the community can be assets. Children go to school for five hours in a day, 196 days a year, and these children desperately need their classrooms to be places that are emotionally safe. They need a climate that is warm and accepting and where they can build trusting relationships with adults.
Due to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, many are not experiencing this in their lives. They need a place where they can express their emotions and learn how to express love, and where they are encouraged and motivated to become the unique and wonderful people they were designed to be," said Lourens.
In the programme's brochure, above a picture of schoolchildren, is the heading: Educators - their only hope?. Printed in the brochure is a message from pupils to their teachers. It reads: "How can I feel wanted unless you want me? How can I learn to love unless you accept me? How can I feel liked unless you like me? How can I feel like a person with dignity and integrity unless you treat me as one? How can I feel I am capable unless I have some success? How can I learn and grow unless you help me express what I feel? How can I have a future unless you give me hope?"
For more information on Valley Trust, please click on the link on the righthand side of this page |
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