The Holding Environments of Schools
As we discuss future(s) I want to share this story from a doctoral student - as a way of sending out the human aspect as a reminder of the heart of what we do. These children need to be served by our scenarios - or at least this is the standard by which I have always judged education.
I don't know if I will have time to spin a diagram from this - but the community wrapped with schools option of the OECD seems to me to be closest to what we would need in areas where stories like the one below occur. And although my voice is often on the side of knocking down the education system, becoming less institutionalized, I cannot completely support system meltdown because it would be these children who would suffer- for some the institution of schools offer hope, for others too tight a fence.
What follows is from Carolyn Kohn - a doctoral student
As a first year teacher, I started out at an urban middle class elementary school in the South where most children were dropped off by parents. Believe it or not, we definitely received our share of children that were abused on a constant basis. Although some of the abuse was physical, the majority of it was verbal. Sometimes the abuse was so verbally bad, you spent anywhere from thirty to forty-five minutes in front of the school, in the hall way, or right outside your door beyond 7:45 trying to convince those abused children to come inside the building or the classroom. With frequent bouts of parents puffing on cigars or cigarettes and screaming obscenities before car doors were opened by a staff member for children to enter school, anyone can see and understand why some of the children were frozen in their tracks or arrived in the classroom with such lack luster minds for learning, and oftentimes used the same sort of treatment against the staff and their peers with the exception of the contrabands. This sort of behavior can wreck havoc on any school or classroom where the ultimate goal should be learning and to learn. Teachers were usually at their wits end by lunch. To add insult to injury, administration constantly performed frequent informal observations in classrooms where these children were with the end result always being that
classroom management is lacking. Such critical observations turned the school into a revolving door. After the teaching staff and other staff members decided to take a stand, eventually,
administration came to the realization that there needs to be some measure to help remedy such a complex and perplexing issue without alienating the staffs, students, and parents.
The staff collaborated with the counselor, janitors, and helpful parents and took matters into their own hands by establishing a morning routine of gathering these children for a few minutes in the morning in the conference area and providing them with art paper, crayons, markers, tape, glue, and yarn to write words or create pictures that expressed how they felt that morning. On the next day, the art work would be presented to their parents. Once these parents began to receive these works of art, many pulled off with a since of shame, others pulled off and threw the art on the ground, some took it without making eye contact, and that small percentage that received the art with some level of dignity went on by their business. After a while, those little heartfelt tokens of
art put a lid on the sound of cursing, but the skid marks becoming louder. The children began to slowly come alive because they knew that they would be taken to the conference room to have breakfast and supplies would be waiting for them to create art expressing their feelings. It was discovered that many of the children had real talent, and others just needed that extra attention. Teachers were no longer stressed and valuable time was saved. After a while, administration expanded the idea by soliciting and receiving grants and more involvement from the Ask for
More Arts Foundation. The art program was extended to the entire student body.
Dougherty (1983) maintained that parents that abused their children often came from homes without a holding surrounding filled with plenty of nurturing and security. Nurturing parents treat children as humans by teaching and setting rules that will assist in becoming an independent
being. A state agency and a church-related organization located in Georgia used the holding environment theory to establish a Family Services Program. When mothers and their children arrived, a few minutes of play was used for staff to observe the interactions of the families. Later, parents participated in group conversations about individual and childrearing problems while children were in the nursery. Many of the mothers were active had low self esteem, could not adequately convey their needs, and had hostile relationships with their families. The group discussions provided socializing and personal developmental skills. The establishment of the groups was based upon the fact that many were ignorant of appropriate behavior and used discipline as a control measure instead of a teaching method. The groups were structured in an environment that fostered security. Twelve of the eighteen families that participated significantly improved their relationship with their children. Plus, the verbal skills and the children’s desire to share became more evident.
Heller (2000) maintained that family and school is the bridge that children cross the most in the formative years. While deemed learning institutions, schools are also places where children are watched for social and emotional issues that may interfere with learning so the issues can be address. Because emotional and social aspects of children are private, many actions may be misleading that will repel more than attract much needed assistance. The goals are to make the environment feel as save as possible where children can express their needs in a way where they can be noticed. Wennicott used the phrase holding environment to express how the “good enough” mother (Winnicott 1960 p145) does not have to be perfect at managing the care of her children. Mother is assisted by her surroundings. A holding environment where the needs of mother
are almost complete is a facilitating drive for the child to become less dependent on mother, but through them interpret signals that exposes them to the realities of imperfections of others.
Dougherty, N. (1983). Holding environment – breaking the cycle of abuse. Social Casework (64)5 283-290.
Heller, F. (2000). Creating a holding environment in an inner city school: Clinical counseling in schools (pp.22-36). Philadelphia, PA: Taylor & Francis Inc.
