18 • MODULE FOUR: RELATIONSHIPS
- Discuss what a child could do if abused physically, emotionally or socially. Some of the points to
be covered are:- Leave the scene immediately;
- Say no assertively;
- Seek a trusted person’s help;
- Refuse to be friends with such a person;
- Avoid being alone with that person at any time;
- Call Child Line (Help line);
- Do not hit;
- Get elder person’s help; and
- Get neighbor’s help (information from various projects).
- If the children are older, you can explicitly talk about sexual abuse. Sexual abuse of younger children
is discussed in the Bad Touch session. You can discuss this with a newspaper clipping of a child who
has been sexually abused. Remember to read out a story of boys being abused as well.
After reading out the story, remember to end by discussing what could be done. It is important
that children understand that they need not be helpless, that they are not to blame and that
someone can help. - Discuss the question “Who abuses?” meaning the social characteristics of the abuser. The
children should be able to see that violence and abuse are usually done by the more powerful
to the less powerful. Boys should understand that girls are especially vulnerable.
Write down examples such as: older bully and younger child, in-laws abusing a daughter-in-law,
husband abusing a wife, an adult abusing a child.
If the group is older, you may want to talk about sexual abuse such as between a pimp and a sex worker,
or cases of touching someone sexually without the person’s consent or threatening someone into sex. - Divide the group into groups of three to four and give them some situation cards. The children
produce a frozen picture. One child narrates what happens. The whole groups discuss what the
abuser and the abused feel and think about what the abused person can do.
Some situation cards are:- A bully has snatched your money;
- A shopkeeper talks ill of street children;
- A brother hits his sister;
- A teacher puts down a student;
- A mother beats her child;
- Boys get into a fight at school;
- Nobody speaks to a child at a function/event;
- An older man tries to force you to come with him;
- A relative warns you not to say anything about what he has done to you;
- A man is beating his wife; and/or
- A father is beating the mother.