The Problem Child in the Hostel
- Author:
WOLLEN
Deputy Warden, Bourton Grange Hostel, 1940-1943 ; Warden, West Park Hostel, Yeovil, 1944.
Bourton Grange was opened in 1939 by a private committee, financially supported by the Ministry of Health, to assist with the problem of unbilletable children. This strange group produced considerable controversy among those responsible, and opened a new field of investigation and experiment. Time for preparation was short, and the staff” had little experience apart from general social work, except for the Warden who had done psychological work under clinic conditions. Premises were fairly convenient and the house furnished to accept thirty children. A large garden with open country behind was a great asset.
At first, approach was dominated by Child Guidance Clinic methods and a belief in the child’s ability to make his own adjustments, given a sympathetic understanding and freedom of expression. The first major problem was the conflict between the claims of the individual and the group. A considerable amount of destruction and general unrest was considered a necessary evil until confidence was established in the staff. Modification was so slow, while destruction threatened to make the hostel uninhabitable.
It was apparent that a strict framework of discipline could stop this disintegration, backed up by sanctions and eventually corporal punishment. We appeared to be forced to choose between a ” free hostel ” in which the comfort and interests of the community were subservient to the free expression and development of the individual, and a ” disciplinary hostel ” where external standards were forced prematurely and the personality robbed of opportunities for expansion. Eventually vve built on compromise and devised a reasonable system of group control allowing the individual t0 move freely in an atmosphere of order and securityThis treatment of problem children in a specially planned hostel appears to be a new type of therapy to be approached along the lines of ” experimental experience While planning the hostel we found the individual needs as conflicting and varied as the childrenThey could be roughly classified as:?
fa) Neurotics and pre-psychotics, suffering from severe anxiety.
(b) The behaviour problems, children lacking adequate social training and discipline.
The dull and backward child.
The hostel had to be the temporary home and Provide love and security expressed by affection and knowledgeable authority. We had also to present a simple community life with opportunity to build satisfactory human relationships, although social adaptation was difficult “for the problem child. The responsibilities of daily life appeared frightening and exacting to them all, the neurotic was unadaptable, the behaviour problem lacked the training to c?pe, the dull child was baffled by it all. They did not flourish in an atmosphere of anarchy and needed the interpretation of daily existence into a simple routine, allowing energy and time free for individual Play and expression. We wished to avoid dictatorial Methods, although these could give superficial results, but when withdrawn produced aggression or regression. It was always the crowd that got in the way; the neurotic excitable child found it far tQo stimulating, the dull and backward child, Enable to join in at the same level as brighter companions, sought attention by notoriety, while the untrained child became a thoroughly disrupting element. The secret was to get the child to feel the life of the hostel existed for him and his interests.
link was essential between the child and the c?mmunity. Normally this existed in life outside the hostel in the family, where the sympathy and experience of home life prepared the child for the Wider and more impersonal responsibilities of the community. Although ten or twelve years of age, the children proved emotionally infantile and only able to respond to demands and discipline linked With personal relationships. In the large group it Was impossible to prevent property, routine labour, etc., from becoming impersonal for many children. The hostel was a ” no man’s land ” and no longer a substitute for home, the property and concern of loved ones.
Both reason and experience forced us to find some substitute for the family, so children were divided into four small groups of seven or eight, with a Member of the staff in charge. The aim was to give security and a focus for affection; a group to which the child felt he belonged and which was peculiarly nis. The leader acted as a parent substitute.
Various considerations were borne in mind when arranging these families:? w) The child’s chronological and mental age. V>) The child’s problem. vc) Personality of the leader.
While not grouping strictly to age we found those troni five to seven best apart from older children who tended to bully. The few girls in the hostel ?r a time were included in this group, which was Under the charge of a woman. The dull and backWard appeared to progress better in one group Where they were not in competition with brighter children of their own age (with these children there appeared temperamental difficulties complicating relationships, and this selection would not necessarily be a wise pattern for grouping normal stable children). Certain excitable and hysterical children did well in this group as it was not unduly stimulating, the leader being a patient and rather passive type of man. A very aggressive child was better in a group able to protect themselves, and with a leader able to enter into aggressive and active occupations providing legitimate outlets. The child with artistic trends, finding great satisfaction from expression in handicrafts and constructive occupations, was placed in a fourth group whose leader had gifts in this direction. A certain amount of juggling and adaptation of premises was required to give the groups the necessary partitioning. Each group had a dormitory and common room. These were their own rooms which gave privacy, previously sadly lacking. Leaders were able to offer the little attentions meaning so much to the children?reading aloud, preparing little tea parties to celebrate birthdays, welcoming their children home from the village school, showing an interest in their occupations, tucking them into bed at night, helping them to write home and chatting about their families. All these gestures welded them into a family and gave a sense of ownership and security. Admittedly many of the children had come from bad homes and projected their family hates and grievances upon the parent substitute, but this proved a more hopeful situation than when the child had no focus for his confused fears and hate and just knocked his head against any resemblance of authority.
Total segregation was carefully avoided and the wider community life preserved by communal meals and playroom. Children invited each other to tea parties in their common rooms, and leaders exchanged visits. Getting up in the morning, making their beds, cleaning and maintaining their rooms, finding boots and shoes and getting to school early, was the private concern of the group, while other matters concerning the whole life of the hostel, such as raiding village orchards, anti-social behaviour in the dining room, larder raiding and destruction, were governed by the impersonal and impregnable laws of the house.
Children were flung into the hostel willynilly and newcomers felt no obligation to respect our organization and Authority. There were also cyclical waves of general problems affecting all, such as stealing and raiding, excessive ragging at night, window breaking, which threatened to disintegrate the hostel we were endeavouring to build. These decreased in time as tradition was built. It was this situation that forced us seriously to consider strengthening our organization and authority by punishment. There was many an argument over coercion and punishment in staff meetings. What is written now is from observation of our experience, rather than theoretical consideration. We were forced to use penalties and ultimately corporal punishment. Some children appeared to struggle until up against adult opposition, and to obtain reassurance from a knowledgeable discipline. All appeared to consider parent substitutes omnipotent and expected to find strong and active intervention. In some cases it appeared to relieve guilt and anxiety. We watched for the pathological antisocialist who was extremely rare. The hysterical child reacted favourably to the shock of punishment, feeling free to let himself go knowing he would not be allowed to be a danger to himself or others. Being emotionally young the children apparently accepted punishment as just and automatic and felt that this retribution was necessary.
Through varied occupations we aimed to divert the child from punishment by legitimate outlets for aggression, adventure, excessive restless energy, etc. We tried to see that offences were understood and that it was in the children’s power to correct them. An impersonal attitude was maintained to house laws; punishment quickly followed the crime and the penalty was short and sharp. Deferred long-drawn-out punishment, such as stopping pocket money or privileges over a period, always led to further trouble. The child’s memory being short, he had not the control to meet the recurrence of the sanction. We found our community spirit was not developed enough for the community to accept responsibility for the misdeeds of a few. Eventually we accepted the use of corporal punishment. It was only used as a last resort when every possible means of obtaining the child’s co-operation had failed. It was used as a deterrent for wilful destruction, larder raiding, general buccaneering and defiance, after repeated warning had been given. Although its effect seemed negative, the result appeared to justify the means. The anxious neurotic child did not appear to suffer harm when corporal punishment was administered for breaking one of these house rules, and it was certainly better than long-drawn-out punishment which brought uncertain reaction to the repeated stimulus. We were always on the look out for more constructive methods on the occupational side, and as we were doing this we used the cane confidently when driven to it. The way the punishment was carried out appeared important: firstly the children were of school age (under 14) and emotionally young; it was executed formally in the office and always in private, with no apologies; it was short, sharp, and never accompanied by a lecture. The attitude was one of ” silly little beggar, you have driven me to this ” or ” you have got yourself into this mess, you little fool, and you have got to see it through “, and the attitude of sorrow rather than anger was avoided as we realized the child reacted to atmosphere as well as to the stick. Undoubtedly this action met the problems of destruction and group buccaneering which forced the step and had threatened to destroy the constructive and positive organization of the hostel, and there appeared to be no bad feeling. It was noticeable that the occasions for resort to corporal punishment became less and less as the hostel became more established. It is important to stress that this negative side of our policy served the active programme designed to meet the needs of the children with, e.g. better play equipment, more toys (now not immediately destroyed), sets of woodwork tools, choppers, saws, etc., and a supply of logs for rough carpentry, drawing and painting, handicrafts, mud or water play, gardening, picnics and expeditions, rock and tree climbing, bonfires, organized team games, boxing and wrestling, sports meetings, music and percussion band, dramatics, etc. Punishment was not just designed to protect adult interests but to make the children’s programme possible. It prevented the staff being worn out and driven to nagging, piling up petty punishments and bringing despair and revolt. We were tempted to make exceptions of persons and occasions, but the children obviously thought this unjust and lost confidence in our organization if it appeared to make unfair discriminations.
Sexual misbehaviour was another problem in the hostel. We had many children referred for masturbation or sex play involving attempted sexual intercourse. These complaints were usually greatly exaggerated and the children often arrived over-excited and stimulated. There was also the quiet suppressed child who, freed from the bogey of guilty secrets, went in for excessive discussion. We recognized excessive masturbation as unfortunate, as a preoccupation preventing normal development of interests, although masturbation in some degree appeared almost universal. Direct condemnation was avoided and as little apparent notice was taken as possible. We tried to prevent the subject being regarded as a dirty secret by recognizing the general nature of the practice, and treating it as an infantile habit to be outgrown. Mutual sex play was also rather prevalent amongst some. We protected young children from exploitation, if necessary, by direct intervention.
Our approach to the problem was through sex instruction and education supported by an attractive programme of constructive occupations. The child not only received formal instruction from the Warden but was encouraged to discuss sex with the Group Leader in his own somewhat crude terms, in an endeavour to make the knowledge his own. We found some children suspected the adult story, as it appeared to be entirely different from knowledge gleaned from their own pals. Ultimately they became quite uninterested in sex talk and it lost its novelty. A new child coming into the group would march out a treasured bit of spicy gossip and would be met with the scorn of the fullyinformed, who would be more interested in some absorbing occupation?” We know all about that ! Be quick and lend me the mallet and chisel.”
We tried to prepare our children for the realities of life in a billet or home and sought a normal and sympathetic approach to all their problems. Some children needed the assistance of individual treatment in the near-by child guidance clinic, but the majority considerably modified their behaviour as the result of a period (average time twelve months) in the hostel. Life was designed to give assistance in making significant human relationships, and spreading these relationships over a wider society ?f children and adults; in developing powers of expression through varied activities; in accepting authority; in recognizing personal differences and limitations; and in coping with the everyday superficial demands of life without friction. Security and affection made this possible, and previous failure was overcome through the mediation of this planned life, and successful experience ultimately enabled the children to accept the more exacting and harsher demands of life outside.
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