Life is to be lived now, not in the past, and lived in the future only as a present challenge.
“In Re-ED, no one waits for a special therapeutic hour. We try, as best we can, to make all hours special. We strive for immediate and sustained involvement in purposive and consequential living.”
Trust between a child and adult is essential, the foundation on which all other principles rest, the glue that holds teaching and learning together, the beginning point for reeducation.
“The teacher-counselor, to nurture trust, must be a whole person, not a detached therapist.”
Competence makes a difference, and children and adolescents should be helped to be good at something, especially schoolwork.
“Acceptance without productivity is a beginning point in the process of reeducation, but an early goal is to help the young person become good at something.”
Time is an ally, working on the side of growth in a period of development when life has a tremendous forward thrust.
“We do not assume some mystical growth force as an explanatory principle but simply note descriptively that young people are still open to experience and change, and that they have surplus energy to support the operation.”
Self control can be taught and children and adolescents helped to manage their behavior without the development of psychodynamic insight; and symptoms can and should be controlled by direct address, not necessarily by an uncovering therapy.
“In Re-ED, we contend that symptoms are important in their own right and deserve direct attention. The assumption is that children and adolescents get rejected in large part because of identifiable behaviors that are regarded as unacceptable by family, friends, school, or community.”
The cognitive competence of children and adolescents can be considerably enhanced; they can be taught generic skills in the management of their lives as well as strategies for coping with the complex array of demands placed upon them by family, school, community, or job; in other words, intelligence can be taught.
“We regard as myth the idea, now deeply rooted in American thought, that intelligence is immutable. We assume, instead, that intelligence is a dynamic, evolving, and malleable capacity for making good choices in living.”
Feelings should be nurtured, shared spontaneously, controlled when necessary, expressed when too long repressed, and explored with trusted others.
“We are interested in the nurturance and expression of feelings, negative and positive, to help a child or an adolescent own all of herself without guilt.”
The group is very important to young people, and it can be a major source of instruction in growing up.
“The constant challenge in a Re-ED program is to help groups build cultures that sustain children and adolescents in their efforts to manage their lives in ways satisfying to themselves and satisfactory to others.”
Ceremony and ritual give order, stability, and confidence to troubled children and adolescents, whose lives are often in considerable disarray.
“Many Re-ED students have lived chaotic lives, even in their brief compass. They may come from homes where interpersonal disarray is endemic.”
The body is the armature of the self, the physical self around which the psychological self is constructed.
“A Re-ED school has a much more physically involving program than one will find in traditional treatment programs or in public schools.”
Communities are important for children and youth, but the uses and benefits of community must be experienced to be learned.
“Many children and adolescents who are referred to our schools come from families that are alienated or detached from community life or are not sufficiently well organized or purposeful to help children develop a sense of identity with neighborhood, town, or city.”
In growing up, a child should know some joy in each day and look forward to some joyous event for the morrow.
“We believe that a joyous experience is immensely important, that it is immediately therapeutic…”
Nicholas Hobbs, 1915-1983
More about the principles and practices of Re-ED can be found in The Troubled and Troubling Child, the last book written by Dr. Hobbs. The book is available only through AREA, provided as a benefit for organization members. For information about becoming an organizational or individual member of AREA please visit our membership page.
