Back to School!

Nico and I went back to school for a week!

And it was great.... we got our notebooks ready, tested our pens, filled our water bottles and off we went! It was a funny feeling to sit again at a desk, notebook and pen out, taking notes! It was a course called 'Claves'. All about sexual abuse. 

This topic is so real today and at the Rock House we are faced with this daily. At the course they defined abuse in many forms; physical, emotional, negligence and sexual. Anything that goes against the right of the child.

The aim of the course is Prevention against sexual abuse (including awareness of where there may be risk). This part of the course Claves was with the goal of teaching through play, the theme: "Playing we strengthen to face difficult situations."

The course breaks down this theme to teach in sections... starting with difficult situations, how to face them and who we are facing (including looking at reasons why people abuse), what to strengthen and how to do this through play.
It was a very interactive course with 21 students, two teachers and always a translator for those who do not yet speak portuguese. It included discussion groups, teaching, videos and playing!


The part that I found most interesting was when we learnt about the importance to build up 'resilience' in the child. This resilience becomes one of the barriers that stops an abuser abusing. We talked about 22 resilience blocks that would build up a wall of resilience in a child. Here are a few:

• Develop an attitude of self worth
• Know your rights, and be able to make them be respected and put limits to peers and adults
• Develop problem solving skills and strategies to navigate different risk situations
• Able to recognise in your environments people in whom you can trust, inside and outside the family
• Learn to know, value, care for, control and enjoy your body
• Count on adequate sexual education

We played! It was fun to play, it was a strategy for us to learn how to play with the material that could be bought to be used with groups of children and teens. For example, a game like dominoes but with emotion cards. The idea was to play the game but each time talking about one of the new emotions displayed. Asking questions like; how does she feel? why do you think she feels like this? what should she do? Very effective.

The course suggests a 10 til 12 week programme focused on specific age groups. Depending on the age group you choose will depend on the material and games etc to use. The programme with the kids or teens is divided into three blocks; me and my body, me and my intimate parts and me, my body and others. We received a book that gives much information and many ideas for how to plan each day of the programme. 

The last day of the course we were in groups and had to choose an age group, one of the blocks and plan a 15 minute presentation. This gave us a little idea of what it would be like! It was difficult but fun and informative!

As the Rock house Nico and I are already thinking about how beneficial this could be to do with the kids and teens we work with here. Please pray along with us as we plan for this to happen next year. We are so thankful for this opportunity to learn more that can be beneficial in the work we do here. With information comes responsibility.

Receiving our certificates at the end!