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117
that certain lines of behaviour or certain attitudes on their part can sever them from
the group and their main desire, therefore, is to learn those patterns which give
them freedom of expression and yet at the same time do not cut them off from the
other members. It is surprising how quickly this group sense can be achieved.
The admission of a new member is immediately recognised as a threat to the group
and it takes a week or two before he is fully accepted and integrated into the group.
Once a child has learnt how to become a useful member of the small therapeutic
group he is the more able to fit into a larger group such as the school and the
community.
Much of the analytical process depends upon the ability of the child to express his
fantasies outwardly and we have found the group to be a useful method by which
this can be done. Some children are able to do this almost from the start, but with
others, who are unconsciously aware of the aggressive and anti-social content of
their fantasies, it takes some months before they will make their first experiments.
Once this has been done, however, useful material is almost immediately discovered
and can be used both in the group and individual session. The therapist must keep
a close watch upon the changing character of such fantasies and must also prevent
those boys who have no difficulty in this from blocking the expression of the other
members.
Group Observations and Discussion.—Observation by the children of their own
behaviour or that of others is of very real value. It serves an educational purpose
which is barred to the therapist who cannot combine therapy with education since
this would have the undesirable result of slowing down analysis, the child seeking
only to please the therapist rather than take his own analysis deeper. The group is
able to exercise a strong educative pressure without, given the safeguards which we
have earlier mentioned, any untoward results.
The advantages which we have enumerated indicate that we place considerable
faith in the group method, particularly in a school of this nature. In this school there
is no marked line of demarcation between the educational and psychiatric approach,
and each member of the staff seeks to co-operate with those who approach the child's
problem from another angle. The therapist makes contact with the teachers and
cottage staff, sees the child in school, in the woodwork group, in the playground,
and tries to get an all round picture of the child. There is a free exchange of information
among the staff and the value placed upon the psychiatric approach is indicated
by the recent requests made to the headmaster by both the cottage staff and the
teachers that discussions with the psychiatric social workers and the therapist might
be initiated.
We are satisfied that the group method will repay further attention and
experiment."
Psychiatric
social
workers
During the year a psychiatric social worker was appointed to the Council's staff.
Most of her time was spent preparing the families of the boys at Bredinghurst for
their eventual return to their own homes. The social workers at the child guidance
units were already too busy to be able to undertake this extra work. The Council
agreed during the year to appoint a second psychiatric social worker for the two other
schools for maladjusted children.
Child
guidance
units
At the end of the year the Council was responsible for child guidance units as
under:—
(1) Earls Court Child Guidance Unit, 25, Stratford Road, Kensington, W.8,
which was opened in new premises on 4th September, 1950, to replace the unit
which had previously operated at Bishop Creighton House.
(2) Battersea Child Guidance Unit, 6, Cambridge Road, Battersea, S.W.ll,
which was opened on 3rd October, 1950, to replace the unit at Putney Health
Centre.