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From: knonesuch@TheHub.capcollege.bc.ca (Kate Nonesuch)
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov>
Subject: [NIFL-WOMENLIT:1013] Re: A personal experience
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I liked your story, Daphne.
In my experience, students will disclose no matter what the content of the
curriculum. You can be teaching the "coolest" subject imaginable,
fractions, for example, but If you treat them with respect, if you show
that you are willing to listen, if you pay attention to what they need,
many will respond by disclosing their experiences to you, and perhaps
asking for help in other areas.
I know I can't take on listening to every story and working in a
counselling mode for our students, so I try to get prepared to do
referrals. Here are some of the things that work for me.
The College I work for has a couple of counsellors/advisors, whose primary
function is academic advising. However, they will see students with
"personal" problems and refer them to local counsellors or programs. They
are a few blocks away, however, and usually a student in tears does not
choose to walk through town to the main College building to see a
counsellor. I make sure when we are on the main campus for other reasons
to introduce everyone to the secretary in Student Services, and
counsellors sometimes come to visit us to introduce themselves.
The First Nations Student Support worker from that department comes to our
Centre once a week and holds a friendship circle for any student who wants
to attend, and many First Nations and white students do attend. That is a
helpful contact for many students, and because it is on-going, they get
another chance the next week to disclose more, or hold back, depending on
their circomstances.
That same Student Services department has put together a terrific little
folder, that fits in a wallet, listng all the places to go for help in our
community. I hand it out and use it all the time.
I think this is one of the advantages of living in a small community--all
the possible referrals fit on a little card!
Seriously, most students in my program have lived in Duncan for a long
time, and most of them are connected with several programs--welfare,
social workers, drug and alcohol counselling, healthy baby programs, and
so on. So when a student discloses to me, I can listen, honour her
telling, and ask if she has someone to talk to. If she says yes, then I
know I'm not on the spot for being the main counsellor. If she says no,
then I pull out the little card, and because it is a small community, she
will usually have a connection at one or two of the programs listed there,
and be willing to go in to talk to someone.
This back-up makes it possible for me to refer to violence and abuse in
class, in the material we read, for example, or in the activities we do.
I give lots of warning before we read it--"the story we are going to read
tomorrow is hard to read emotionally. It is about a girl who was sexually
abused--" and students have the freedom to come to the reading class or
to work in the other room with the other teacher. I give the warning so
students who don't want to hear it can keep themselves safe. Other
students come and some will disclose.
I like it better when people disclose to a small reading group, rather
than in secret to me, even though they may tell me privately more details
than they reveal in group. The culture at our Centre is that abuse is
wrong, and that nobody deserves violence, no matter what they do. The
"provocation" excuse just doesn't wash here, at least in class. So when
someone discloses in group, they get a supportive response, although I
wouldn't like to give the impresstion that the response is deep or
well-thought out or results in any concrete help or action.
nifl-womenlit@nifl.gov writes:
>I wonder what it is like for instructors to receive information from
>learners, when they are not ready or have not made a conscious decision
>to bring it up in class.
>I will never forget an experience that I had when I was going from
>program to program testing and interviewing adult learners for my
>dissertation project. I was fairly new to the field and was very careful
>not to include any questions in my interviews that I would perceive as
>being intrusive. It amazed me how people opened up. I met with
>individuals reading below the fifth grade level and I was interested in
>their basic reading knowledge. The interviews were only demographic in
>nature and yet everyone shared with me information that I did not ask
>for, and many shared very personal information-such as drug use, drug
>selling, prostitution, incarceration history, etc., etc. The learners
>that I tested and interviewed spent an hour and a half with me, and they
>had never met me prior to this.
>I will never forget the one young man who had shared with me that he was
>nervous while doing the tasks I gave him and he kept blanking out. I
>asked him if he wanted to stop, and that it would be fine to do so, and
>he said no, he wanted to learn as much as he could about himself (I
>shared with the learners information about their underlying reading
>knowledge at the end of their time with me). I gave him time, space, and
>we took things at his pace. He told me that he was severely abused as a
>child. I asked him if he felt that this interfered with his ability to
>concentrate on the tasks and he said yes. I asked him if he had shared
>this with his adult literacy instructor and he said no-he was scared to.
>To make a long story short, I found out that he had never seen a
>therapist, and when I asked the adult literacy instrucor and
>administrator about referrals for one of the students I had tested (I
>didn't reveal which one), they told me that they did not have any. I
>went ho!
>me, did my homework, and went back to the program and gave him all of the
>information that I could. I was very shaken by this experience-the
>disclosure, the fact that the program had no referral information to give
>me, and the fact that he had decided to share with me this information.
>I did a lot of thinking about why he had shared-was I safer because he
>would not have to see me again; because of my own experiences, my
>unconscious "talked" to his unconscious and he "knew" that I would
>understand;was the time simply right for him;or something in the specific
>tasks that I gave him triggered stuff for him? Unfortunatly, I moved out
>of the state a few months after my contact with him, and have lost touch.
>Daphne
Kate Nonesuch, Instructor
Why Did It Happen to Me? by Carla Frenchy
Carla gets bad news from her doctor--something is wrong with the baby she
is carrying. She looks for support from family and friends, but keeps
asking," Why did it happen to me?" 16 pages, 11 photos. $7.00
Reading and Writing Centre
Malaspina University-College
Cowichan Campus
222 Cowichan Way
Duncan, BC
V9L 6P4
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