airiefairie

In order to be mentally healthy, one must have the ability to express themselves properly, and without fear and shame of revealing their feelings and thoughts. And the conventional wisdom goes that the better one expresses themselves, the better they will be understood by others, and the more success they will have in society. But of course the development of decent communication skills should start from a very, very early age.

A couple of schools in the southern suburbs of Cape Town (one of them the school of the three boys [8, 8, and 9] that my family has been taking care of for two years already, under a program that we lovingly call "semi-adoption") are about to introduce classes in "Emotional Culture" as part of a project to prevent aggression and behavioural problems at school. The project is funded by the Ministry of Basic Education (because there's also a separate Ministry of Higher Education). Some good specialists in psychology and pedagogics from three universities across the province (my friend

nairiporter among them - thank you Nairi!) have been invited to take part in the classes. They will present a series of lectures and practical exercises to the kids throughout the next two quarters of the school year, and if this works, from next year onwards as well.

Researches show that kids in primary and secondary school in this country and many others have some serious gaps in their emotional/psychological education and they are in urgent need to improve their abilities of expressing themselves and communicating, if they are to become integral members of society.

Last year over 50 students from various universities worked on a similar project in four schools in the area (Cape Flats), the purpose of the project being to teach the kids how to express their emotions and thoughts, how to be tolerant, how to control aggression, and how to nurture a feeling of empathy for their fellows. The project turned out to be very useful and it showed some good results, many conflict situations were avoided or resolved... And this is why this year the program will be extended further, now to include the psychology specialists as well - most of them are specialised in working with groups of people rather than individuals. Thankfully, there are already enough such specialists trained in the country, thanks to a number of high education initiatives that started 4-5 years ago in Gauteng, and then here.

All this is aiming to create a better quality of communication between young people. But of course the main factor for developing an adequate individual is the family. The parents remain the most important element. But when there are no parents, as is the case with many of those kids (many of them are orphans or semi-orphans, or abandoned, and live in institutions spread across the area), deliberate programs like this can be of crucial significance.

To relate this to you folks, my question is this: Are you aware of similar programs and initiatives where you live, and how useful do you think they are? If you think they are necessary, in what form exactly would it be most appropriate that they should be carried out? And from what age? What about home-schooling? Can it substitute the social environment in class, particularly as far as the development of adequate social and communication skills is concerned? Or, after all, is this a worthwhile issue at all, or people are getting too carried away about it and the kids should learn these things naturally, from the family and their peers alone? Your thoughts are very welcome.

Cross-posted to