Sue Jennings and Andy Hickson Use Their Own Histories As a Background to Their Philosophies Regarding Work with Children and Adoles- Cents
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Communicating with Children and Adolescents of related interest Dramatherapy with Families, Groups and Individuals Waiting in the Wings Sue Jennings ISBN 1 85302 144 X pb ISBN 1 85302 014 1 hb Listening to Young People in School, Youth Work and Counselling Nick Luxmoore ISBN 1 85302 909 2 Making a Leap – Theatre of Empowerment A Practical Handbook for Creative Drama Work with Young People Sara Clifford and Anna Herrmann Foreword by Alec Davison ISBN 1 85302 632 8 The Child’s World Assessing Children in Need Edited by Jan Horwath ISBN 1 85302 957 2 Introduction to Dramatherapy Theatre and Healing – Ariadne’s Ball of Thread Sue Jennings ISBN 1 85302 115 6 Helping Children to Build Self-Esteem A Photocopiable Activities Book Deborah Plummer ISBN 1 85302 927 0 Active Analytic Group Therapy for Adolescents John Evans Foreword by Peter Wilson ISBN 1 85302 616 6 Creating a Safe Place Helping Children and Families Recover from Child Sexual Abuse NCH Children and Families Project Foreword by Mooli Lahad ISBN 1 84310 0096 Communicating with Children and Adolescents Action for Change Edited by Anne Bannister and Annie Huntington Jessica Kingsley Publishers London and Philadelphia First published in the United Kingdom in 2002 by Jessica Kingsley Publishers 116 Pentonville Road London N1 9JB, UK and 400 Market Street, Suite 400 Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA www.jkp.com Copyright © Jessica Kingsley Publishers 2002 The right of the contributors to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 or under the terms of a licence issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd, Saffron House, 6-10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Applications for the copyright owner’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the publisher. Warning: The doing of an unauthorised act in relation to a copyright work may result in both a civil claim for damages and criminal prosecution. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Communicating with children and adolescents : action for change / edited by Anne Bannister and Annie Huntington p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-84310-025-8 (pbk. : Alk.paper) 1. Interpersonal communication in children. 2. Interpersonal communication in adolescence. 3. Children and adults. 4. Parent and teenager. I. Bannister, Anne. II. Huntington, Annie, 1962- BF723.C57 C64 2002 362.7--dc21 2002016136 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN-10: 1 84310 025 8 ISBN-13: 978 1 84310 025 6 ISBN pdf eBook: 978 1 84642 333 8 Printed and Bound in Great Britain by Athenaeum Press, Gateshead, Tyne and Wear Contents SPECIAL NOTE: CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT 8 PartI–TheCurtain Rises 1. Warming up: Introducing Action Methods 11 and Work with Young People Anne Bannister, University of Huddersfield and Annie Huntington, University of Salford 2. Setting the Scene: Child Development 19 and the Use of Action Methods Anne Bannister 3. Pause for Thought: Action or Stillness 33 with Young People Sue Jennings, Actor and Author and Andy Hickson, Writer and Director Part II – Action Across Organisational Divides: Health, Education and the Juvenile Justice System 4. Freeing the Self: Using Psychodrama Techniques 55 with Children and Adolescents who Stammer Gail Smith, Speech and Language Therapist 5. Where there is Drama there can also be Art: 71 Using Creative Media with Children Living with Life-Threatening Illness Kate Kirk, Isle of Man Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service 6. Can We Do Something? Young People Using Action 86 Methods to Support Each Other in School Nick Luxmoore, East Oxford Schools Inclusion Project 7. Let’s Make A Bridge! Working in Action 101 with Autistic Children Ioanna Gagani, Psychodramatist, and Sandra Grieve, Director of Matrix Therapeutic Services 8. Providing Dance Movement Therapy within 114 a Mainstream School Sue Curtis, Goldsmiths University of London 9. Psychodramas with ‘At Risk’ Youth: A Means 128 of Active Engagement Erica Hollander, Hollander Institute for Human Development and Family Growth 10. DRAGO-DRAMA™: Archetypal Sociodrama 139 with Adolescents Mario Cossa, Director of ACTINGOUT Part III – Action Methods and Child Maltreatment 11. The Use of Action Methods in the Treatment 155 of the Attachment Difficulties of Long-Term Fostered and Adopted Children Paul Holmes, Attachment Project, Brighton and Hove 12. The Yellow Brick Road: Helping Children 175 and Adolescents to Recover a Coherent Story following Abusive Family Experiences. Facilitated Contact with Birth Parents using the Therapeutic Spiral Model™ Chip Chimera, Psychotherapist and Teacher 13. Touch Me – No! Creative Therapies with Young 191 Sexually Abused Children Christina Citron, Vasa Clinic, Stockholm Part IV – The Curtain falls 14. Resisting Change: What Stops Us Acting for 209 Young People Annie Huntington ENDNOTES 225 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS 229 SUBJECT INDEX 232 AUTHOR INDEX 239 Special note: confidentiality statement In order to protect the identities of children and young people mentioned in this book their real names have not been used, except in the chapter by Nick Luxmoore where the young people wished their own names to appear. In addition the names of professional colleagues have been changed, where necessary, to protect children. Occasionally, also, personal and family details about some children have been altered, where these could lead to identification. Part I The Curtain Rises chapter 1 Warming up Introducing Action Methods and Work with Young People Anne Bannister and Annie Huntington Action methods and child-centred practice Attitudes to children and young people change over space and time. This is unsurprising when we consider the extent to which childhood can be said to be ‘socially constructed’, culturally defined and re-defined by actors on the stage of life (Aries 1962). Despite criticisms of the characterisation of childhood as a distinct and separate state from adulthood, and questions about the extent to which continuity or change has defined adult/child relationships, there is some consensus as to the importance of exploring the way we think about childhood and children (Cunningham 1995): not least as competing discourses shape the social spaces within which we engage in our everyday interactions as adults and children. For example, is there a disjuncture between the romantic ideal of childhood and the lived reality of childhood for many children? Are childhood and adulthood distinct and separate, or fused, states? (Cunningham 1995). However childhood is defined, and whether we can pinpoint a ‘cut off ’ point that signals the end of childhood, there is a period of life that can seen as ‘quali- tatively different from adulthood’(Butler and Williamson 1994, p.1). Further, the ‘early years’ have been cogently demonstrated to be an important period in the development of any nation’s citizens (Brandon, Schofield and Trinder 1998), as has the transition period into adulthood (see Cossa, this volume). Thinking about and taking children and young people into account is important at many levels – for example, the strategic as well as the local. At the political level we could agree that ‘child impact assessment is built into the process of government’ (Newell 2000, p.47). Those nation states that have created children’s rights commissioners, or are considering doing so, under- 11 12 COMMUNICATING WITH CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS stand the importance of independent representation to protect the interests of children in ‘all matters of public policy and administration that affect their lives’ (Newell 2000, p.7). This might be viewed as an expression of adults ‘speaking out for’ rather than ‘speaking for’ children (Reinharz 1992). At the local organisational level staff working within child welfare services, as well as other sectors like health or education, need to ensure they actively engage their young ‘consumers’ as services are planned, delivered and evaluated if the rhetoric of ‘participation’ is ever to become a reality for this group (e.g. Cloke and Davies 1995; Freeman et al. 1996). Finally, at the interpersonal level we need to consider how we communicate with children and young people, as many of the authors in this volume clearly have. As we do so we need to ensure that we do not ignore the history of prior adult attempts to engage with children and young people in non-hierarchical, child-centred and empowering ways (e.g. Axline 1947; Axline 1964; Crompton 1980; Hostler 1953). Many committed and courageous people have attempted to work in child-centred ways whilst occupying a range of professional roles. One example may highlight this point. Francoise Dolto,1 who died in 1988, was a French child psychoanalyst, doctor and paediatrician. Unusually, for a woman of her time, she regarded children as persons to be listened to in their own right. She discussed family situations directly with children instead of talking over them, or about them, to parents. When listening to and observing a child she would say that she used