A Fundamentals Class for Parents of Young Children
We just completed an online RC fundamentals class for parents of young children. I taught the class. Two parents of young children attended. Also attending were an assistant teacher and additional (rotating) assistants. We met for one hour each week, for seventeen weeks.
Everyone in the class was fluent in Mandarin Chinese except for one of the rotating assistants, who is Vietnamese, and me. We used the Chat for interpreting in both directions—Chinese to English, and English to Chinese.
I live on the east coast of the United States. One of the students also lives here, and the other lives on the west coast. My assistant lives in Europe, and the other assistants live in Europe, Canada, and the United States.
Both of the parents are overseas Chinese (Chinese heritage) and immigrants to the United States. Each of them has three young children. The woman’s children are ages six, four, and two. The man’s children are ages two (twins) and six months. The man is the wage earner in his family. He works partly online and partly in person. He and his wife do all the childcare. The woman works part-time online from her home. She has a little more flexibility, because two of her children are in public school or pre-school during part of the day. Often, one of the parents’ children would peek in the Zoom window.
Prior to each class, I sent the participants the main theory points for the class, a class schedule, homework for that week (with links to audio files and free relevant Present Time articles on the RC website), and a reminder to set up at least two ten-minute-each-way mini-sessions that week. I also included answers to questions that I could anticipate or that had been raised in class and we hadn’t had time to answer.
We recorded each class and made the audio file available. One of the students told us that the audio files—from our class and also from the RC website—were particularly useful, as they could be listened to while doing a household task.
The students periodically sent me reports about their counseling progress.
My assistant and I each did one mini-session (sometimes more) with each student almost every week. The students also counseled with each other and with the rotating assistants. By the end of the seventeen weeks, they were accustomed to doing ten to thirty-five minutes each in two-way sessions.
We started each class with “news and goods.” Then there was a mini-session and a short theory presentation. We also did demonstrations—first with my assistant or me as the client and later with one of the students or rotating assistants being the client.
At first I would pause a demonstration after five minutes and ask permission to discuss the session for teaching purposes. Then we would have another mini-session. Following that, I would ask, “What discharge (if any) did you observe, and when did it occur?” “What is one distress pattern you observed?” “What is one contradiction to the distress you observed?” Each person in the class answered at least one of the questions.
The client then chose one of the contradictions, and the person who had suggested it counseled them. Clients could see that class members were trying hard to think about them. And everyone could see the variety of observations and suggestions offered, reinforcing that several distresses can be observed and many contradictions are possible. People also got confidence that their own thinking might be useful and “correct” and saw that one can try something and see how it works.
If we still had time, there were questions and answers. Then we did appreciations and farewells.
The class worked well. Everyone was enthusiastic and committed, and leading it was fun and satisfying for me.
Somerville, Massachusetts, USA
Reprinted from the e-mail discussion list for RC Community members
(Present Time 209, October 2022)