CP time!

 

Today a CP group was scheduled for us to run! We chose the activity of making ‘instrumental’ toys with recycable material such as toilet rolls and paper in order to show the mothers that they can make their own toys at home (with what is lying around) in order to stimulate their children. We were a little bit nervous when the first three mothers came to the clinic together with their children because we had never before seen the children nor did we know their levels of functioning. Another goal of the group was to establish a support network amongst the mothers. I was given the role of running the group which caught me a little off guard but I did it and enjoyed it nonetheless J Sometimes having to do something ‘unexpected’ is more fun than having had the time to ‘over’ thinking and preparing it....I know!!...there is not such a thing as being over prepared in OT J What immediately struck me was the meaningful engagement that could be seen between the mothers and their children! We were working with ladies that were much older than what we were which was the moment I realized the importance of the different general principles that we learnt in class and that we need to take into consideration when working with adults.  

·         Adults autonomy

·         Adults accumulated foundation

·         Adults are goal directed

·         Adults relevancy orientated

·         Adults are practical

·         Adults want to be shown respect

(Christopher, C. 2014)

It was such a pleasure running the group as the mothers were all willing to learn and most willingly involved their children in everything that they did.  The critical levels of learning are motivation, reinforcement, retention and transference. All the ladies that came were motivated by their accountability toward to their children. We reinforced and assessed their level of retention of their knowledge of the crucial passive stretches by asking them to demonstrate these on their children.  In order for transference to take place we asked the mothers that knew the passive stretches well to teach the ones that did not know.  One mother knew exactly what kind of passive stretches she needed to do with her child whereas another came for the first time which is when we asked the ‘knowing’ mother if she didn’t want to brief the ‘new’ mother about the different warm up techniques. (Christopher, C. 2014) This resulted in a sense of altruism which is very important when it comes to support groups!

"One person caring about another, represents life's greatest value."     - Jim Rohn 

 Referencing

 Christopher, C. (2014) Principles of adult learning. OCTH413W0. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban. Unpublished lecture notes