specific needs of children and elderly left behind as a ... - IOM Moldova

CHAPTER I
• The support provided to teachers during their school life: “to help the
class teacher to know more, not all class teachers know about these services”;
“that would calm the spirits, those conflicts with the teachers, even with
the pupils, a vacancy for a psychologist would be useful” (FG_EC_rural);
• Assistance provided to children left behind: “Children whose parents
are abroad generally go to a psychologist. They usually address us with
interpersonal issues, with conflict situations, when they are oppressed or
have misunderstandings. They want to talk and we try to work with them”
(FG_EC_urban); “I believe that there is a need for psychological services
for primary classes. Most of the problems arise when children attend primary
school. Do you know what a school psychologist should do? Take care
of groups of children at risk. What do I mean by “a group at risk”? A disorder
that is there for less than 6 months but if it is there for over 6 months
this is already a disorder. In high schools most of them have issues which
have lasted over 6 months and we have to work with them, but we are not
experts” (FG_EC_urban);
• Qualified specialists who would provide all types of psychological assistance:
“I believe that having a psychologist would be a good thing, but
one for every domain, for example one of them is correcting, the other is
working on prevention” (FG_EC_urban);
• Placing a psychologist’s room outside the school and providing anonymity:
“I think that every school should have a psychologist, but their rooms
should be outside school, so that the child would go there” (FG_EC_urban).
The role of the class teacher cannot be reduced to class education but also
implies interacting with children and their family. Thus, it is necessary to
assume more responsibility regarding behavioural and educational interventions.
Teachers’ continuous training becomes a challenge in this
context: “This process has to be determined by changes produced at school
levels but also by the new category of children who come to school. Teachers’
professional competences are extremely necessary in psychology and social
pedagogy. There should be some changes made regarding school management
and continuous training” (III_EC_6).
Modern educational tendencies encourage teachers to respond to children’s
particularities, to establish cooperation and partnerships with all involved
actors. Interviewed experts list the following solutions for working
with families with members abroad:
• Organizing parents meetings in order to raise awareness: “We organize
meetings where we talk and give parents the possibility to talk” (FG_EC_rural);
• Organizing educational measures for pupils: “We study their behaviour,
we try to find people who would talk to them such as a priest or someone
else” (FG_EC_rural);
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