On August 25 the 3rd season of the “Take Away Children from Streets” project came to the end. This year children of temporarily displaced persons from the anti-terrorist operation zone became its participants. Specialists repeatedly spoke about the need of extension of the project on this category of children who appeared in “a risk zone” as a result of the conflict in the eastern part of Ukraine.
“These children endured heartrending experiences, had a severe stress. They were forced to completely change their current way of life. They had a certain change of values and the motivational sphere was strongly touched. The result is psychological discomfort and problems in communication with peers and adults. It can push them to deviant behavior which, as a rule, leads to offenses, – the Chief Inspector of Juvenile Prevention Department of National police in the Kharkov Region Konstantin Sheremet considers. – To save them from this way, to give an alternative and to help to make a right choice -this is a task which we set for ourselves within this project realized jointly with the ICF “Alexander Feldman’s Fund”.
Within nearly two months the specialists of the Center of Psychosocial Rehabilitation Feldman Ecopark practiced with the children living in the modular town for displaced persons. In the work they used the techniques which are conditionally united by the general name “ecotherapy”. Its underlying feature is a principle of psycho correction of behavior of children and teenagers by means of creativity and communication with the nature.
“We aim to use as much as possible unique opportunities Feldman Ecopark, the best domestic and foreign practices, and also own practices. This summer the bibliotherapy in combination with other work forms, which already become traditional in our Center – landscape therapy, animal therapy, art therapy, work therapy, collective psycho training were actively applied, – the Chair Holder of Psychotherapy Department of the Kharkiv Medical Academy, the Chief Specialist of Ministry of Health in “Psychotherapy”, the curator of the Center of Psychosocial Rehabilitation Feldman Ecopark, the Doctor of Medical Science Boris Mikhaylov told. – All of them complement each other and allow solving an objective in a complex – removing psychological barriers, expanding a circle of contacts, stimulating interest in cognitive activity. In simple words, we try to return the childhood to children”.
Young participants of the “Take Away Children from Streets” project also told about the effectiveness of such methods summing up the results of a season of 2016. This year there were 15 of them- the backdrop of the knowledge and insights of everyone was considerably replenished. They learned soft training of various animals, seized skills of riding, worked over the abilities in drawing and calligraphy, got acquainted and made friends with the world of books, tried their hand at the journalist and the writer.
And the most important, according to children is that occupations in Feldman Ecopark gave them self-confidence, ability to be friends and to settle the conflict through peaceful means. For this reason they chose a horse and a pigeon as the main symbols of the “Take Away Children from Streets” project which emblem they drew on their own.
We will note that “Take away children from streets” — the ICF “Alexander Feldman’s Fund” author’s project which is implemented together with the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine in the Kharkiv region since 2014.
