Always on the sunny side?
Further to yesterdays's posting on Conductive World, Susie Mallett writes
Most people who work in the conductive world know that centres offer all kinds of different forms of what is referred to as many things: "Conductive Education", "Petö therapy", just "Petö", or an array of other names.
The customers know this too.
Rarely is it offered with the name Conductive "Nevélés", sometimes perhaps it is offered as upbringing but with a different name. In many places I know that "it" is a centre where some parents think they can happily drop off children for a few hours, with the "knowledge" that something will be done to them, or even with them. These parents are happy to have some time to themselves: they do not wish to know more, usually because they have no idea that there is more to know.
Instead of complaining about how the conductive world is in such a sorry state, surely it is better for readers to hear about good examples of practice so that they know what they should be getting for their money, or even demanding for their money. We must never forget that they are our customers.
As Vikki says it is no fault of the parents what they think "CE", "Petö", "Conductive Upbringing" is.
They only know what they have been told or have read.
Just negative tones will not change anything, but perhaps if the customers out there could read about how it is done at NICE or other centres, read about now Vikki, Tunde and others have done this in the beginnings, when CE first came out of Hungary to prevent misunderstandings, then just maybe changes could take place.
How for example, have the parents been taught and guided on their chosen path through a conductive life at NICE, or at other centres. How did/do parents continue to learn when their children are older and no longer accompanied in the groups by parents? How have you stopped the rot, how did you inform and guide families?
This is the stuff that parents need to hear, especially after being told that something is wrong out there.
How for example are student-conductors taught about house visits?
Who funds house visits? Are these offered as a part of a course for children, as they often have been in groups that I have worked in?
How often are the visits built into the programme. Are the house visits a few hours or overnight?
How else do parents learn the next steps in their conductive family lives? Please tell these sorts of stories not the despair.
These are things that parents need to read about. How it works, why it isn't therapy, why it isn't about rewiring brains. They need to read about it in order to know what to ask for. That's what customers do, they ask for a service, but first they need to know what they could be asking for. They won't be asking for anything if they only hear that the conductive world is criticising its own practice.
As we saw on Andrew's recent posting about the parent's blogs that he discovered, those parents immediately asked what is it they should know. What is it that they should be doing and receiving? What it is that has not be told to them and what is wrong with what has?
Andrew did try to inform them later but not before the worries had set in. We could prevent those extra worries, parents of disabled children have enough of them.
Perhaps it would be easier for the customers to read the answer along side the criticisms, or even better would be to leave the criticism and just get on with telling how it is.
It is all very well to say that the conductive world is not in order but the customers need to read about how it should be done too and how it is being done very well in many places all over the world. It is this examples that should be held up for them.
They need to be informed and have the resources available to them to learn what a conductive upbringing is and not only read that the world of CE thinks it is in dire straights. That is sure to put many a customer off.
In my small part of the world it actually isn't in such dire straights. I believe we are moving with very small steps further and further towards our goal of conductive living.
Yes Vikki, it is a very small drop in the ocean, but it is all I can manage with one pair of hands on a practical level. But I write about it and hope that a few more drops in the ocean are generated from my words.
Just think how many more drops in that ocean there would be if more people wrote about Conductive Upbringing. If more was written to describe how it is a life-style, with examples given of snippets of life where the Conductive Education is so apparently doing a spontaneous and wonderful job.
How else can the would be customers understand, how else can we begin filling with joy the big hole that some people havedug, how better than by describing what we do and how it works?
How else than by describing how a seven-year-old severely athetoid child controlled her moving limbs for a long time yesterday. Oh yes, we had learnt together over the years in many situations how she could do this, dressing, eating, playing, puzzling, walking, talking.
You name it, we practised it, but yesterday she used this skill in "real spontaneous life", to stroke the hand and a cheek of a three-week-old baby. The joy on that child's face to be doing what the baby's brothers were also doing, that is what customers need to read about conductive upbringing. To be able to sit alone on a stool and be given the baby in her arms to stroke, that experience in that moment was what conductive upbringing meant for that little girl.
I think it is just as damaging to the conductive world to be always reading about the deep hole that CE is in as it is to not tell the parents more about what they can expect when embarking on a hard but wonderfully rewarding conductive life.
Please let’s start looking on the bright side of life.
The above response was too long to fit intothe Comments . I am always pleased to post up readers' contibutions that for some reason they cannot get on line.
As for the substance, above and yesterday, I would crave a little time to think about it.
References
Sorry, soundtrack only. I can't find a video, can anyone oblige?
Yesterday's posting and comments
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