Lessons From The Garden

Are we depriving children of "time away" from their troubles?

As I was reading “The Secret Garden” with my students today, we came to the passage where Mary, “unsympathetically” questions Colin about his statement that he is going to die. When she asks him why he believes that, he states that he’s “heard it ever since I remember”. Every adult in his life has led him to believe that he is ill, fragile, and likely to die an early death. He is even told he will be a “hunchback” because his father is. As a result, he behaves as if he is ill, fragile, and likely to die soon. Later in the chapter, when Dr. Craven comes into the room and finds Mary and Colin smiling, laughing, and talking animatedly like typical 10-year-olds, he lists off all of the health issues and precautions he is supposed to remember. Colin states emphatically, “I want to forget it”. 

This child has been told nearly every day for ten years that something was wrong with him. He was led to believe that he was physically weak and incapable of doing anything but lay in bed. He knew his father had a condition that led to his “crooked back” so he assumed he would eventually have one as well. He assumed the older wiser people and “experts” in his life knew what they were talking about. No one ever told him, until Mary, that he might not be ill or fragile. No one, until Mary, made him smile, laugh, and feel like a typical boy.

It is a sad truth in our society that some children suffer trauma and experience mental health issues as a result. Those children need the help and guidance of trained medical professionals to work through their trauma. They likely do not need to be reminded of their trauma everyday as they walk through the doors of their elementary, middle, or high school. Like Colin, they might want to “forget it”, at least for a few hours. While we need to ensure those children requiring physical or mental health care get it, we must make sure we are not using Social Emotional Learning (SEL) in the classroom to “convince” children that they are ill, fragile, or otherwise in need of mental health care. 

Often, the questions asked on surveys given to students are intrusive, leading, and indicative of how a student feels at that moment. The data mined from these surveys is used to justify what are essentially group therapy sessions (Community Circles) led by unlicensed psychologists (classroom teachers). Like Colin, if students are told often enough that they are depressed, anxious, hyper, stressed, etc., they just might start behaving as if they are. 

I am not undermining childhood trauma or the need for certified therapists to address issues, I am simply questioning the practice of teaching healthy young people that they aren’t, as well as the practice of constantly focusing on the trauma of those who are truly suffering. I am a firm believer in learning from literature and if The Secret Garden has taught me anything, it is that focusing on something other than yourself and your problems can actually be healing and healthy, especially for children.