“Prevention is better than cure!” This is a saying that is often blurted without giving it the deserved value. However the Foundation for Social Welfare Services adheres to this saying and puts it into practice through different initiatives, targeting young and adults alike. Agenzija sedqa has a dynamic prevention team which uses experience and research to identify alternative ways to promote prevention of substance abuse and addiction as well as other challenges to children and teenagers, such as safe use of the internet, through talks with parents, exhibitions, sessions in schools and at the workplace, and alternative leisure activities in the community.

Why are prevention measures important from an early age?

The prevention team works within primary, secondary and post-secondary schools to deliver interactive sessions to the students about various topics. These topics aim to promote a healthy personality within the child or young person and hope to identify difficulties that they may be going through, thus to offer the support and help required.

These sessions are important to help the child and the adolescent to begin to develop skills that will help him/her deal with future life events in a positive manner. From an early age, the child is helped to identify ways how to develop a stronger character, how to make choices after considering alternative consequences, how to express emotions and how to deal with stressful life situations. These sessions in primary schools are animated through the use of puppets and through other illustrations that help the child understand the message conveyed.

Following these sessions, the parents are invited for informative talks that deal with parenting in general and the importance of giving a good example to their children. Some parents find these talks very reflective and find that they understand better how their son or daughter internalises and learns from every word and action of the parent. Other sessions are also offered to the general public, tailor-made for each particular target audience.

The prevention team also offers parenting skills courses Inrabbu ‘l Uliedna Ahjar which involve six sessions of two hours each, including video clips, detailed information and encouraging discussions and participation from the parents.

Parallel to this, programmes also target educators so as to enable them to adopt preventive measures in the classroom when dealing with behavioural difficulties of the students.

By encouraging a healthy personality in children and young people, one increases the chances that when they grow up, they will have the ability to resist the pull of addiction by asserting themselves on the values that they are receiving. Educators, professionals and parents alike need to work together for the same aim, for a better future for our children free from abuse, addiction and whatever harms them.

What can the parent do?

Needless to say, preparing a base of good communication with one’s child is essential. The child or young person needs to feel secure to be able to approach the parent and discuss any difficulties that are being encountered. The response of the parents to their children’s approach is very important as it may encourage or discourage further attempts from the child or young person in the future to communicate with an adult. Would you share something personal or sensitive again with someone whose reaction shows lack of understanding? Would you share again with someone who shows to be overwhelmed or extremely preoccupied by what you said? It is very important to move at one’s child’s pace and although it is very important to discipline the child in an appropriate manner, it is also very important not to disrupt the parent-child relationship.

The parents’ example is also very important as the child identifies and learns a lot from the home environment. Children and young persons learn from the way parents react out of anger, how the parents deals with stressful situations and also from the way the parents spend their leisure time.

If the child or young person observes that the parent immediately reverts to smoking a cigarette or to drinking alcohol as a source of refuge, or becomes aggressive towards other family members when dealing with an upset moment, s/he will learn that substance abuse, violence, emotional abuse, etc are a means of escape from problems.

If children go out with their parents and notice the latter drinking excessively in order to enjoy themselves, such children will interpret having a good time as amounting to drinking a lot of alcohol. If, on the other hand, the child or young person lives in a violent environment where the slightest difficulty erupts into a violent assault, the child or young person learns to deal with situations in an aggressive way.

It is very important that the parent carries full responsibility for the messages that are being internalised by their children through their own behaviour. This would decrease the possibility that their children will get engulfed into substance abuse and other abusive situations further on in life.

A new initiative from the prevention team

The prevention team identified the need to be more flexible and to deliver sessions which are relevant to children in different life situations. Such situations include those of children in residential homes, among others, who have particular needs because their surrounding environment is different from that of the majority of other children and their needs differ accordingly. Some of these children are particularly resilient but they also need to be offered the opportunity to become more aware of what may hinder their life in the future. They need to be prepared, like all other children, to be able to make the right choices in life and to see the harmful effects of addiction before they find themselves entangled in it.

The prevention team structured sessions to be offered in the residential homes to children of different ages which will be delivered in the following months, covering topics about how to deal with stress, decision-making skills, positive character formation and positive self-esteem. Sessions to train the carers in the residential homes are also being offered: such sessions are similar to the ones given to parents.

Together for our children’s future

This initiative was launched on Wednesday 31 January during a seminar, “Together for our children’s future”. The carers of residential homes and of the High Support Service within Appogg, along with other professionals within the child care sector, were invited for training during the seminar and to participate in three alternative workshops to discuss the perception of children about substance-abuse parents, the behaviour of children in residential homes and children of substance abusers within the community.

The general outcome of the seminar showed the need for carers to be supported and acknowledged for the dedicated work that they do. They expressed that they have been feeling the need for further training, especially when dealing with challenging behaviour of children and adolescents. The participants exchanged ideas and thoughts about everyday challenges in residential care and reinforced the need for prevention work within the residential setting. The carers working in residential homes felt more trained and empowered through this seminar to identify particular needs of children and to provide creative ways for children to develop relevant skills to deal with specific situations.

Joe Gerada, chief executive officer of the Foundation for Social Welfare Services, and Jean-Claude Cardona, operations director of Agenzija sedqa, addressed this seminar. Mr Gerada stressed the importance of networking between professionals to promote more opportunities for today’s children and young people. He emphasised that together, the professionals can help each other to make the best use of available resources by ongoing communication and enhancing good working relationships not only within the foundation, but also with other organisations in the helping professions. Mr Gerada said that children and young people had to be dealt with in a holistic manner and therefore, professionals and organisations had to work together to provide support in an integrated fashion.

Topping the list are the social welfare agencies and the Education Division.

Mr Cardona thanked the participants for their positive response to this initiative and assured them that this seminar was only the beginning of further initiatives with residential homes.

The seminar was also an opportunity to encourage the residential homes to use the T.F.A.L. interactive CD launched by sedqa last November.

This tool is an electronic means for children between four and six years of age to learn basic values and skills together with an adult, a teacher or a parent. The CD involves six educational topics:

• how children should react to those around them and the importance of validating friendships, the children and their family;

• bullying;

• basic self-care;

• healthy eating;

• personal hygiene;

• taking care of the environment.

Anyone wishing to receive a copy of the CD may send a stamped self-addressed envelope to sedqa Primary Prevention, 2, Braille Street, Sta Venera SVR1690 or phone on tel.: 2124-4226 for further details. More information on www.sedqa.gov.mt.

First a child needs roots to grow... then wings to fly

Nurturing a child, communicating and really listening to his/her words and emotions is very important.

Through empowering self-confidence, and showing a good example as an adult and through involving the child in healthy creative activities, one can make a difference in the outcome of the child’s life!

Through understanding the adolescent and identifying how they can feel part of society, one may provide opportunities to help the adolescent feel integrated within the community.

By being a means of leverage for young people to feel supported, one may promote a future free from abuse and addictions.

We are all agents of change who may contribute to have the society we all want.

If we want something, we may contribute in a concrete way to achieve our aims. You and I are included.

Margaret Abela is prevention executive, sedqa, Foundation for Social Welfare Services