GUIDANCE

SESSION 3

Philosophical and

Theoretical Perspectives

AGENDA

• Review from previous class

• Learning Outcomes

• Topic: Philosophies of and Theoretical

Approaches to Child Guidance

• Break

• Topic continues

• Group discussion and review

• Questions on Observation #1

Learning Outcomes

• Identify adult skills necessary for positive guidance techniques

(knowledge of - child development; metacognition; EFs;

trauma and implications for the guidance process).

• Demonstrate the ability to help the child recognize his/her

feelings and help him/her to deal with these feelings in

appropriate ways.

• Evaluate their child guidance techniques/strategies keeping in

mind the child’s family system.

• Discuss and evaluate child guidance theories and

philosophies and policies (i.e. ELF- ELECT) diverse methods

of child-rearing, and the implications of these.

UN Special Assembly Declaration

UN Special Assembly Declaration on the rights of the child:

• Put children first

• Eradicate poverty

• Invest in children

• Leave no child behind

• Care for every child

• Educate every child

• Protect children from harm and exploitation

• Protect children from war

• Combat HIV/AIDS

• Listen to children and ensure their participation

(Resolution adopted by the Special Assembly May 27, 2002)

Dewey – The Child Living in a Democracy

Dewey – Main themes

Experience is education, and education is experience

Education needs to be for every member of society

Experiential learning is the only true learning

Learning about real life is essential

Democracy lies in education

Traditional schooling can be counter-productive

Education must be free

Education is a cultivating process

The environment is the content and means for learning

Experience leads to making meaning

That children live in the present is advantageous

Involvement and the understanding of the purpose of an activity allows for concentration- and leads to inner-control rather than imposed discipline

Investigation and real-life problem-solving promote learning

There is no opposition between experience and true knowledge

Naturalism and humanism can co-exist

Implications of Dewey and Progressivism

Link between education and experience

Child-centeredness

Helping children refine observations of phenomena

Nature in the classroom

Routines, everyday experiences, domestic play

Inquiry and discovery

Activity based learning

Rejection of formal teaching

Values learned through social interaction

Implications of Dewey and Progressivism

Curriculum in every part of the day – planned

and spontaneous activity

Imagination as the child’s reality

Assuming no absolute truth (relativism)

Child-directed activity

Emphasis on problem solving

Responding to children’s interests

Avoidance of rote learning

Educator as facilitator

Elkind’s Behavioural Contracts

Elkind suggested the use of contracts for

helping older children take responsibility for

their actions:

Contract one: expected achievements are

balanced with supports that will be provided

Contract two: expected responsibilities are

balanced with freedoms that will be allowed

Contract three: expected loyalties can be

balanced with commitments that will be

provided

First Nations Code of Ethics

1. Seek for the things that will benefit everyone.

2. Showing respect is the basic law of life.

– Treat every person, from the tiniest child to the oldest elder with respect at all times.

– Special respect should be given to elders, parents, teachers and community leaders.

– Touch nothing that belongs to someone else (especially sacred objects) without permission, or an understanding between you.

– Respect the privacy of every person. Never intrude in a person’s quiet moments or personal space.

– Never walk between or interrupt people who are conversing.

– Speak in a soft voice, especially when to whom special respect is due.

– Do not speak unless invited to do where elders are present (except to ask what is expected of you).

First Nations Code of Ethics

– Never speak about others in a negative way, whether they are present or not.

– Treat the earth and all her aspects as your mother. Show deep respect to the mineral, plant, and the animal worlds. Do nothing to pollute the air or the soil. If others would destroy our mother, rise up with wisdom to defend her.

– Show deep respect for the beliefs and religions of others.

– Listen with courtesy to what others say, even if you feel what they are saying is worthless. Listen with your heart.

– Respect the wisdom of people in council. Once you give an idea to the council or a meeting, it no longer belongs to you. It belongs to the people

– The clash of the ideas brings forth the spark of truth.

First Nations Code of Ethics cont…

• Be truthful at all times and under all conditions.

• Always treat your guests with honour and consideration. Give your best food, your best blankets, the best part of your house, and your best service to your guests.

• The hurt of one is the hurt of all; the honour of one is the honour of all.

• Receive strangers and outsiders with a loving heart and as members of the human family.

• All the races and nations in the world are like the different coloured flowers of one meadow. All are beautiful; as children of the Creator they all must be respected.

Continue….

• To serve others, to be of some use to family, community, nation or the world, is one of the purposes for which human beings have been created. True happiness comes only to those who dedicate their lives to the service of others.

• Observe moderation and balance in all things.

• Know those things that lead to your well-being and those things that lead to your destruction.

• Listen to, and follow the guidance given to your heart. Expect guidance to come in many forms; in prayer, in dreams, in times of quiet solitude and the words and deeds of wise elders and friends.

(Manitobachiefs.com)

Intentional and Relationship-based Guidance

• Involves what we (parents and professionals) hope for children: our shared intentions

• Relies upon parent partnerships

• Uses relationships as the means to reach intentions

• Recognizes and respond s to the child’s irreducible needs

• Depends upon how we impact children’s lives

• Is the way that we show respect for each child

• Affects every interaction we have with every child

• Maximizes the possibilities for experiences

• Balances independence and interdependence

• Supports effective decision- making

• Is embedded in particular values and beliefs; – a philosophy

Continue…… • Uses practical strategies

• Boosts children’s sense of self

• Shows our values and beliefs in action

• Shapes who we are in relation to children

• Supports children to become who they are and who they want to be

• Determines our role in children’s play

• Requires understanding of how we facilitate learning

• Includes multiple attachments and the way we nurture children

• Demands that we choose particular materials, resources, and playthings

• Ensures the creation and maintenance of the child’s environments

• Is a part of transformational learning that has the potential for bringing about social justice

Intentional and Relationship-based Guidance

Requires… Clarification of what guidance means:

Acceptance, rejection, or re-formulation of views of children and childhood - based on personal experience, research, history, philosophy, current practice, best practices, intentions for children, adult roles, and an unpredictable future

An integrated model of “‘ideal’” guidance based on an articulated philosophy of guidance

Linkages between what we have previously understood as curriculum, play, the environment, behaviour management, teaching and learning, and the experience of the child

The specifics identified (e.g., exactly what values, beliefs, philosophy, relationships, means for arriving at shared meanings, contexts, strategies, adult roles, and so forth, are required)

Congruence between theory ,and philosophy, and practice, and practical adult roles

GUIDANCE PHILOSOPHIES

1.MATURATIONIST

2.BEHAVIOURIST

3.DEVELOPMENTAL-

INTERACTIONIST

MATURATIONIST

• Learning emerges from within (Internal)

• Natural unfolding of abilities and behaviours [Gesell]

Continue…

• Appropriate behaviour and its

acquisition is a child-directed

process

BEHAVIOURIST

[Mind is an empty slate]

• Learning is an External process

• Takes place in the child as a result of influences from the child’s environment

BEHAVIOURIST (cont’d)

[Mind is an empty slate]

• Guidance is seen as an adult-

directed process (Locke,

Watson, Skinner)

DEVELOPMENTAL-

INTERACTIONIST

• Inner and outer development

interact

• External & internal controls are

necessary …..

DEVELOPMENTAL-

INTERACTIONIST

• The child is free to express

but knows and respects

clearly defined limits

NATURE

NURTURE !

Visions of Childhood

This chart offers a general overview, and therefore represents a

simplistic framework. Learners need to research each

component part.

Visions of Childhood cont…

The individual

child

Locke 18thC.

individualism emanating

from a reduction of external

control,

UN declaration

personal belongings,

child-direction,

child’s voice to be heard,

child rights,

child makes choices

The socially

mediating

child

Vygotsky

socialism

scaffolding,

zone of proximal development,

cultural learning

The child

within a bio-

ecological

system

Bronfenbrenner nested environments,

living within complex interrelated social

systems, from micro to macro-environments

The child’s

self

Victorian Freud

Erikson

era:1970-current

(Western society)

Maslow

Move to non-church

spirituality

*May relate to increased

economy but decreased

sense of meaning&/or

external direction

personality theory

psycho-social theory

self, self-esteem, self-regulation etc.

meaning within self,

self-actualizing,

humanism,

God within,

secular spirituality,

The child with

a social

conscience

decades up to today,

religions

learned empathy

universalism

ecological awareness

faith, spirituality

zakat, tithing etc.

altruism

organized charities

The child

saving the

world

era:1980s- 2000s

Rogers

Suzuki

child’s self-empowerment

Helping role

ecological awareness

The child

whose

behaviour is

shaped

Behaviourists

Bandura

* check out new brain research

into the influence on mirror

neurons

conditioning

imitating

observing

modeling

internalizing

The hurried

child

Rose

Suransky

Honore

Elkind

over-programmed,

pressured, high expectations,

stressed,

too-fast,

too-structured,

lacks play

The authentic

child

Gerber

Pikler

Reggio Emilia

Fraser

Aldort

respect,

Educaring,

authenticity,

post-modernism,

community,

adults learning from children,

negotiating experience,

demonstrated learning,

documentation,

emergent curriculum,

‘attachment parenting’

The digital child era: 1980s and gathering

momentum

technological child

skilled

un-protected from the internet, TV, etc.

The material

child

era: 1960s and gathering

momentum

booming economy

wants rather than needs.

meaning through having, fashions,

commercialism,

peer-pressure,

lack of meaning,

compensating for lost human

interaction, advertising

* may involve over-eating and other

over-indulgences

The child at

play

Breugel

Pestalozzi

Freobel

Opie

Elkind

Alliance for children

Parten

Garvey

Children at play

theory of play

Child’s garden

children’s games

need of learning through play,

child-centred activity

social play

types of play and their purppose

The resilient

child

manages challenging situations

The child with

rights

UN declaration

CCCF

human rights

meeting basic requirements

rights in Canada

The child of

mother earth

First Nations and other

indigenous populations

belonging to the earth,

reverent, understanding their

belonging, cycle of life, respect

for elders in community

The

phenomen-

ological

child

Husserl

Satre

VanManen

the child’s “essence”

the individuality of experience,

personal perspective,

‘being there’ for the child

The competent

child

Gerber

Juul

born with potential,

infant is already competent,

the ‘democratic parenthesis’

Factors Shaping Visions of Childhood

• socio-economic status – difference between the rich and poor, your ‘station’ in life might set the parameters

• religious beliefs - dictates values, texts indicate the way to live, deal with consequences, need to belong keeps dissenting thoughts at bay

• tradition – inculcated values, absorbed beliefs, pattern of living, hard to think ‘outside the box’

• life-style and culture – expectations, status quo, future stability may limit view

• communication systems – opportunity to access information and be presented with different perspectives

Continue…. • familial patterns – reinforcement in every-day

living

• prevailing beliefs – difficult to ignore or live with views in opposition to those of the mainstream, indoctrination issues

• the degree of scientific discovery – belief in evidence rather than insight or belief

• the level of education – may provide facts, facilitates critical thought

• experience – may lead to innovative ideas

• the groups to which the individual belongs – may reinforce tradition, possibly creative ‘think tank’

• self-preservation – survival ensures obedience

Continue…

• technological levels – help to see things differently, questions the means or the message

• the degree of industrialization – may equate with supposed sophistication where people focus on improving production rather than improving life

• urban, suburban or rural contexts – immediate environments may dictate priorities

• hopes and intentions for the future – hopes may bring about change because it is necessary for implementation

• infant mortality – might lead to decreased valuing of baby (cannot afford to become attached)

• order

Continue…..

• personal values/beliefs – although shaped by others personal potential might allow for new paradigm (e.g. belief in social inclusion)

• the era- and one’s place within it – it is hard to live outside the time in which we live (unless we are Huxley, Dawin etc.)

• perceived need for change – problem-solvers may see a need to change perspectives because a current paradigm is not working

• Academic freedom – ability to think broadly, research information, formulate theories, think philosophically, offer new paradigms

• Democratic/Autocratic context – freedom of press, freedom of expression, where power is situated, fear, freedom, intimidation, social policies, law and

Bio-ecological Systems - Bronfenbrenner

https://www.google.ca/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-

8#q=bronferebronner%20ecological%20model%20picture

Nested Environments

Reference

• Guidance Notes: A Compilation of Notes,

Articles and Readings by Mothercraft

College (2014)