INTERNATIONAL CHILD AND YOUTH CARE NETWORK

6 OCTOBER 2000
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An intriguing mixture of the old and the contemporary in a typical letter sent to intending housemothers when applying to work at Shotton Hall, a well-known program for troubled children in England

Applying for a post — four decades back

We notice that you have already some considerable experience of life, which is a great help to children who, through bad traumatic experiences, were injured in their ability to form relationships with other people, especially adults, and who need to re-build their emotional life with us. They must be able to go back to their early childhood with us, in an endeavour to grow up again, with the help of substitute mother and father figures.

This is work which requires a great deal of intelligence and skill. We notice that you have worked with children before, but to do what we do needs not only the application of what you know already, theoretically or practically, but a great deal of personal readjustment and the learning of certain techniques and methods to be able to fulfil this task on a psychologically sound basis.

In our outlook, we neither moralize nor reject a child for his misdeeds, but show the child that while disapproving of his action, we still like and love him. This means readjustment for many adults when they encounter our children ’in the flesh’, for when a child first comes to us we allow him to display his symptoms freely so that we may discover precisely their source and find ways of helping him.

A housemother’s stay with us is continuous learning, combined with practical work. For everyone who is willing to do this, Shotton Hall is a good place. But for every new member of staff the first period is not easy: you face problems which may be very close to your own feelings and you must come to terms with these feelings if you are to be of real help to the children.

To find one’s own footing in work like this and to become helpful to the school are both matters of time. To see a child developing through many different phases of readjustment requires patience, and without experiencing such development, the housemother would not find much benefit from her work. The children also need consistent handling, otherwise their readjustment is endangered. Frequent changes of staff are against all therapeutic principles.

So far, all our housemothers have stayed with us for eighteen working months and quite a number of them have decided to stay on, having seen how important it was to the children and themselves. We would like your views on this point.

The interesting side of this work is that it looks on the surface like an ordinary family home where the children form their outlook in work and play, doing things together with adults. The difference is that we always do things with a therapeutic reason in mind — our approach can be learned by all who come and work with us.

The work usually involves a considerable amount of thought about one’s own childhood.

One must learn to understand the child’s symptoms, fantasies and desires, to be extremely tolerant at the beginning and gradually to make developing demands according to the progressive adjustment of the child.

We give our housemothers a great deal of guidance in this task. They must, however, be prepared to lend a hand themselves where necessary, especially in the day-to-day running of the house, just as a mother would in a family living in the country, We distribute the work between adults and children, each according to his or her capability.

Housemothers do art, craft, pottery, gardening, animal care, music, games, etc, according to their ability and any of these skills which a housemother does not possess, she can acquire here. We would like to know in which, if any, of these fields you have skill or experience.

These out-of-school activities are used in a therapeutic way and you can learn this approach here, provided you are willing to do so. Of course, general supervision and hygiene both form part of the work of our housemothers.

It would be interesting to know your outlook towards education in our special field of work.

Lennhoff, F.G. (1960) Exceptional Children: Residential Treatment of Emotionally Disturbed Boys. London: George Allen & Unwin