Self Identity Description of graphical content is included between Description Start and Description End. Transcript Start [ Slide start: ] Read by speaker Audio Description: A slide reads Self-Identity. At the bottom are logos for Penrickton Center for Blind Children, Texas School for the Blind & Visually Impaired, and Perkins School for the Blind. Patty Obrzut: If a child is at school or in a residential setting, they're going to meet many, many individuals. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: In many settings... Content: • child must interact with many adults • can be difficult to achieve close relationships and promote self identity Description End: It's going to be very difficult for that child to achieve close relationships with those individuals, and also it's going to be difficult to promote self-identity. So how do you do that? [ Slide end: ] Well, the first thing is that the staff at any agency have to decide to use the same approach. It's extremely difficult for a child to think that they can play a certain way with one person, and then the very next day here's another adult who says, "No, no, no. Don't play that way." So, the staff need to talk ahead of time about what kind of approach they're going to use, and try to use that approach consistently with every child. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Staff must agree to Content: • Use the same approach • Inform each other about the child's reactions • Share ideas for activities • Organize the day so every child can spend 1:1 time with an adult Description End: The staff need to inform each other about a child's reactions to activities. It's also so important that we help children learn to have a self-identity. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: What is Self-Identity? Content: • The child's ability to perceive him/herself as distinguished from the outside world. Description End: Self-identity is a child's ability to perceive him or herself and distinguish himself from the outside world. [ Slide end: ] The development of self-identity is a process of imitation. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Self-Identity and Imitation Content: • The development of self-identity is the process of imitation. • From an early age, children learn to initiate self activity, imitate and interact with the world • A child cannot imitate if there is nothing to imitate. Description End: From an early age, children learn to initiate self activity, to imitate and interact with their world. But a child cannot imitate if there is nothing to imitate. [ Slide start: ] Read by speaker It is important that the people around a child demonstrate their own sense of self-identity. [ Slide end: ] For example, sometimes I'm spending time with a child and I need to use the restroom. So it's important that you identify to a child that I need to go to the bathroom. And I'm getting up, going to the bathroom, and I will come right back. How else do you expect the child to be able to tell you that they need to stop their activity, go to the bathroom, and come back? You want to try to use words like "I," "you," and "we" so that a child can establish their own self-identity. "I'm cold." "I want a glass of milk." "Do you want a glass of milk?" It's not that "we" do everything together. There is a child, and there is an adult. And it's a "you," and a "me." And in that way, in using those kinds of terms, a child is going to learn their own self-identity. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Mine and Yours Content: • Children need to develop a sense of "this is mine" & "that is yours" • In school or residential setting everything is shared; child does not "own" anything Description End: So in a residential center, remember everything tends to be shared. All of the toys belong to all of the children. So, how can a child identify with it being their own item, if it's not theirs? So you might want to suggest that a child be given two or three toys that belong to that child. Is it their stuffed animal? Is it their blanket? And if other children want to play with those toys, those children have to ask permission of that child to borrow that item. This will help to create a sense of self-identity in every child. [ Slide start: ] Read by speaker Audio Description: A slide reads active learning space. www.activelearningspace.org. May 2017. At the bottom are logos for Penrickton Center for Blind Children, Texas School for the Blind & Visually Impaired, and Perkins School for the Blind.