One group of children continues to be very much in need. These are the orphans and children of broken homes who, because of some physical or mental handicap, have been placed in special residential schools.
Such schools are intended primarily for children who will receive letters and visits from their parents during the term and will return to their own homes during the school holidays. They are essentially Boarding Schools rather than Homes.
My first experience of special Residential Schools was in Northern Ireland immediately after the First World War. It catered for blind, deaf and dumb children and was known locally as “The Deaf and Dumb.”
The headmaster was a humane man genuinely interested in the welfare of his charges but neither he nor any of his staff were qualified teachers. When I expressed surprise I was told that naturally no qualified teacher would wish to work with such children if he could obtain a post in an ordinary school. (It seems possible also that the salary scales were lower than the usual scale, but of this I am not sure).
There has certainly been a spectacular change from such an attitude to that of the present day when many of our most able teachers accept the challenge of the blind, the deaf, the retarded, and the mentally defective. There has been enormous progress and the teaching in many of these schools is excellent. In the classroom the children are treated as individuals and are given the maximum amount of help in coping with their disabilities. It is on the ‘Home’ side that many of them are still so woefully lacking.
I once had as a student a woman with a small boy who was deaf. She was separated from her husband and had no home of her own. The boy was being educated at a residential school for the deaf and he came to us for holidays and occasional weekends. He was of good intelligence and in spite of his disability he was able to adapt himself to life in our large community. He was devoted to his mother but not over-dependant on her. His distress on returning to school was therefore disquieting. His mother told me that though the education at the school was excellent, the living conditions were unutterably bleak. The majority of the children went home at weekends, those who were left spent their time in a walled playground supervised by whichever member of staff happened to be on duty. No attempt was made to provide them with occupations and contact with the staff was entirely impersonal. Care was purely custodial. This was ten years ago1 and conditions in this particular school have probably improved but I have gained a somewhat similar impression of impersonal care at a school for the blind to which I have been, indirectly, connected for a period of several years.
The material conditions in this school are excellent and the boys have a considerable amount of freedom both in the grounds and in the school building. There are good recreational facilities, a swimming bath, gymnasium, library and plenty of indoor games, such as chess and draughts, specially designed for the use of blind people. Discipline is reasonable and parents are encouraged to have their children for weekends. There is, however, no substitute care for those without parents.
The boys are divided into age groups but they have no House Masters responsible for them. Supervision is done on a rota system by members of the teaching staff. The particular boy who I visit has been at the school for five years, under two different headmasters, but he does not appear to have formed a significant relationship with anyone apart from a teacher who left after one term. His parents are separated and, though he is able to return to his father for part of every holiday, much of his time is spent in a Children’s Home with a constantly changing staff. It s not surprising that, at the age of sixteen he lacks any sense of security or self confidence and that he is deficient in social skills. One of the women staff at the school told me that she thought he was ‘a horrid boy’. Perhaps if her own attitude had been more professional he might have appeared more likeable. Certainly if she had known his home conditions she might have viewed him with more sympathy.
Such conditions are not universal. Some schools for the blind have divided the children into smaller groups and appointed House Staff in addition to the Teachers. There is however a tendency for the teaching staff to have overall responsibility and for the house staff to be subordinate to them. The same problems arise in Approved Schools, schools for the mentally handicapped and schools for the maladjusted. It is probably most acute in schools for the deaf where specially trained teachers in special schools have greater ease in communicating with the children. It seems that house staff in these schools should have some special training in addition to what is required for normal residential care.
Special schools have the same staffing problems as other residential establishments and the same difficulty in recruiting trained staff. It is perhaps significant that there is a higher ratio of children to staff (9 to 1) in schools for the blind than in any comparable institutions.
It would be interesting to know what proportion of children in special schools could be classified as ‘Deprived’. There is certainly a sufficient number to make it imperative that better provision should be made, not only in the schools but also for holidays. Some Local Authorities try to provide permanent holiday foster homes for these children. Some try to ensure that they will always return to the same Children’s Home. More often they are subjected to constant change and are seldom wanted by House Parents who find school holidays sufficiently exhausting without the addition of extra children.
The answer may lie in having more Children’s Homes and Hostels within the reach of Special Day Schools and finding more Foster Parents nearby. This may mean moving some children a considerable distance from their homes but would nevertheless provide a better method of care.