A cultural belief held that young children lack the ability to experience grief, based on
the assumption that children have not yet developed to understand, or to be
emotionally affected, by the concept of death. 'Disenfranchised grief', a term first
coined in 1989, refers to grief that escapes notice due to emotions not finding
expressive outlets. Disenfranchised grief afflicts young children in particular. The aim
of this study was to provide guidelines and identify support structures that teachers
can use to help a child that is experiencing grief in the Foundation Phase classroom
due to loss of a parent, sibling or grandparent.
Multiple case studies were utilised to investigate children's experiences with
disenfranchised grief within different contexts, and existing support systems for
children who suffered the loss of a loved family member. Three Grade 3 learners
experiencing grief were purposively selected from a state school to participate in
semi-structured individual interviews, drawings activities and verbal narratives. Three
themes emerged from the data: experiences of grief, emotional experience and
support. The findings indicate that children do experience grief, but need support in
giving expression to their emotions, and to process their losses. Recommendation is
made to teacher-training institutions to incorporate counselling as part of their
teacher-training curriculum. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Early Childhood Education / MEd / Unrestricted
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:up/oai:repository.up.ac.za:2263/60948 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Aboobaker, Fatima |
| Contributors | Steyn, Miemsie G., fatima606@hotmail.com |
| Publisher | University of Pretoria |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Dissertation |
| Rights | © 2017 University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. |
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