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MALADJUSTED CHILDREN. These are children who show evidence of emotional instability
or psychological disturbance, and require special educational treatment in order to effect
their personal, social or educational readjustment. Some children of normal intelligence
find difficulty in making good relationships with adults or other children either at home
or at school. They are often retarded in school subjects and sometimes delinquent. Such
children are first investigated at the Child Guidance Clinic and the diagnosis established.
The special educational treatment required is advised by the clinic and often wholly or
partly carried out there.
A few acutely maladjusted children need a period away from home and in these cases
the Authority make arrangements with voluntary organisations managing special schools or
with independent boarding schools. The School Health Service has established itself
firmly as an essential and unique service in the field of preventive medicine. Towards the
end of 1955 the Report of the Committee on Maladjusted Children was published. The report
emphasised the fundamental importance of the prevention of maladjustment in children, not
only by its early detection, but also by guiding aright all children in their emotional
development and so preventing maladjustment from arising or developing. The School Health
Service with its teachers, educational psychologist and other skilled workers, has an
important part to play in the implementation of the CommitteeJs recommendations. Great
importance is attached to the promotion of good mental health and to the prevention of
maladjustment. Health visitors and school nurses held positions of great possibility in
the sphere of prevention by virtue of their work with the school doctors, their visits to
the schools, and most important, to the home.
The Committee recognised their value, and recommended an extension of their functions
and an adaptation of their training, so as to make them more effective in this field. It is
interesting to note that the Committee of Inquiry on Health Visiting, set up jointly by the
Minister of Health, the Minister of Education and the Secretary of State for Scotland,
supported their valuable use in this way. Stress was laid on the "early years" as they are of
such great importance. Joint appointments have obvious advantages and provide opportunities
for the prevention of maladjustment during the formative early years of childhood. Intimate
co-operation between the School Health Service, the Maternity and Child Welfare Service and
other health services of the local authority is most valuable and joint appointments such as
school nurse/health visitor, and school medical officer/maternity and child welfare officer
should be encouraged.
The number of children "ascertained" as maladjusted during the year was 2; they were
both recommended for admission to a residential school.
PUPILS SUFFERING FROM SPEECH DEFECTS. These are pupils who, on account of defect or
iack of speech not due to deafness require special educational treatment. Children suffering
disturbances of speech need only be formally ascertained as handicapped pupils if the
disability is so great that they need special educational treatment, i.e.,some modification
of the educational regime as distinct from.medical treatment. No children were ascertained
under this category during the year. Children who stammer or who have other defects of speech
are given special treatment at the speech clinics to which they go while attending ordinary
schools. The day special schools for physically.handicapped and educationally sub-normal
Pupils are also visited by the speech therapists so that any children needing the specialised
treatment may have it. An account of the work at the speech clinics appears on pages 117 to 119.
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