LZ/A/17-1

Meaning-making and intervention in child and youth care practice

Thom Garfat

 

In the past few years the subject of how one makes meaning of one’s experiences, or meaning-making, has been a subject of frequent focus in the Child and Youth Care literature in North America (See, for example, Garfat, 1998; Krueger, 1994, 1998; Vanderven, 1992). We do not really know, however, whether meaning is pre-existent, or whether each of us is ultimately the ‘author of his or her own life design’ (Yalom, 1989, p. 8), creating meaning individually as we move through life. It has generally been accepted in the helping professions, however, that meaning is created as we encounter our experiences (Peterson, 1988; White & Epson, 1990; Watzlawick, 1990) creating for each of us a unique and individualised experience of an event. We also do not know, specifically, how meaning is created by the individual. It appears, however, that culture, personal history, sequencing, and specific circumstance play an important role in determining how one uses one’s personal interpretive frame to make meaning of his or her encounters (Bruner, 1990 ; Fulcher, 1991; Goffman, 1974; Guttman, 1991). Each of us, then, brings to the making of meaning our individual experiences.

When a young person and a Child and Youth Care Worker encounter one another in the process of intervention, both go through a process of making meaning of that encounter. Each creates both the specific context and the meaning they experience in that encounter (Schon, 1983). Thus the process of intervention is, to a great extent, the process of making meaning.

In a sense, Child and Youth Care, like all helping professions, involves the encounter of cultures, each with its own way of assigning meaning to particular events. The culture of the young person and family, the culture of the dominant society, the culture of the program in the organization, and the culture of the worker all impinge on the intervention process. It is only when the worker attends to how meaning is construed in all of these that she can begin to understand the young person and his or her behaviour.

This is not to suggest that attending to meaning-making is simply a process of assessment to be conducted at the beginning of our engagement with a young person, for meaning-making affects all aspects of the helping process. By attending to meaning-making throughout the process of intervention, the Child and Youth Care worker enters an `expanded world of therapeutic opportunity’ (Polster, 1987, p. 97) as she encounters the young person according to how the young person has constructed the experience. It is only then that the worker can meet the young person in ‘direct perception’ (Austin & Halpin, 1987, p. 38) and co-create with the young person the opportunity to ‘re-establish in the child’s being the possibility of relationship’ (Austin & Halpin, 1987, p. 37). Perhaps in Child and Youth Care there is nothing more important than this process of meaning-making for, as Bruner has argued, ‘... the lives and the Selves that we construct are the outcome of this process of meaning construction’ (Bruner, 1990, p. 138).

References

Austin, D. & Halpin, W (1987). Seeing “I” to “I”: A phenomenological analysis of the caring relationship. Journal of Child Care, 3(3), 37-42.

Bruner, J. (1990). Acts of meaning. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.

Fulcher, L. (1991). Teamwork in residential care. In J. Beker & Z. Eisikovits (Eds.), Knowledge utilization in residential child and youth care practice (pp. 215-235). Washington, D.C.: Child Welfare League of America.

Garfat, T (1998). The effective Child and Youth Care intervention. Journal of Child and Youth Care, 12 (1-2).

Goffman, E. (1974). Frame analysis. New York: Harper.

Guttman, E. (1991). Immediacy in residential child and youth care work: The fusion of experience, self-consciousness, and action. In J. Beker & Z. Eisikovits (Eds.), Knowledge utilization in residential child and youth care practice (pp. 65-84). Washington, DC: Child Welfare League of America.

Krueger, M. (1994). Rhythm and presence: Connecting with children on the edge. Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Problems, 3(1), 49-51.

Krueger, M. (1998). Interactive youth work practice. Washington, DC: CWLA.

Peterson, R. (1988). The collaborative metaphor technique. Journal of Child Care, 3(4), 11-28.

Polster, E. (1987). Every person’s life is worth a novel. New York: W W Norton.

Schon, D. A. (1983). The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books.

VanderVen, K. (1992). From the side of the swimming pool and the evolving story of child and youth care work. Journal of Child and Youth Care Work, 8, 5-6.

Watzlawick, P Weakland, J.H. & Fisch, R. (1974). Change: Principles of problem formation and problem resolution. New York: W W Norton.

White, M. & Epston, D. (1990). Narrative means to therapeutic ends. New York: Doubleday.

Yalom, LD. (1989). Love’s executioner and other tales of psychotherapy. New York: Harper Collins.