Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
THE IMPORTANCE OF KNOWLEDGE OF
COMMON AND SPECIAL NEEDS OF STUDENTS
Assistant Professor Angela Monica BARA
University “1 December 1918” Alba Iulia
Summary: This study presents some aspects related to the typology of
students’ needs and the need to identify them by the experts in education and social
protection of children. Of all categories of needs faced by children and young
generation of today, the emerging ones in recent times are increasing and
dramatically affect their overall development. Therefore, without an appropriate
intervention to know them, deal with them and solve them, these needs generate a
lot of issues that will have negative effects with major impact throughout society.
The idea of need is not limited to the usual sense, explained by the
dictionary, but it refers to a whole complex of situations and contexts in which
youth and children may have influence on life and its development.
Knowing the child's needs is a first step to the understanding of what
happens to him and to know how it can be helped and educated. The idea of
studying and presenting the needs of children emerged from some empirical
observations and opinions of those who have the duty and burden of care and
education of children and youth. And because every child is different, it is essential
for him to be respected and supported in his gradual transformation, in his own
pace, according to his needs.
Thus, at three years, the child is already a small figure. He has a history,
knowledge, own experiences of life. But his interest centers revolve specifically
around himself and those around him. A child’s needs during the first three years
are relatively simple: love, emotional security, firmness, listening and openness to
the world.
During this period, the child needs relationships with both
parents/substitutes, need that, satisfied, contributes to the establishment of his
sexual identity. My father and mother, each of them has his specific role,
irreplaceable and complementary, which engages children to respect life when they
become parents.
Over the next three years (3-6 years) and preschool period, the child will
open to the outside world by beginning to make friends with whom he relates,
discovering that he is a child among many others.
But to know and understand the many and diverse needs of the child, we
must start from knowledge of human needs in general, needs presented by the
american psychologist Abraham MASLOW, which included schematically in
seven steps, imagining a pyramid that bears his name, from basic needs, and
139
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
ending with
pyramid:
I.
II.
III.
higher needs, from the top. They are, in ascending order of this
Physiological necessities: food, shelter, sex, leisure, health;
Security necessities: to be safe, outside threats
Necessities related to belonging and love: the need to be together
with others, to belong to a group or social category, to be accepted
by others;
IV. Necessities related to societal appreciation and esteem: the need to
achieve, to be competent, to gain approval and recognition of others;
V. The need of knowledge: the need to know, to know and explore;
VI. Aesthetic necessities: symmetry, order, beauty;
VII. Need of auto-updated: self-realization and exploitation of their own
potential.
A. MASLOW found from his own experience that once the basic needs are
met, the man is constantly attempting to overcome his social condition, to auto
realize, tending to the upper steps of the pyramid. In explaining these findings, the
author argues his theory about the needs arouse from a deficit (food, shelter,
protection etc.), the needs of development (competence, social recognition,
independence etc.) and meta-necessities, having as values the truth, beauty, unity,
transcendence, justice, order and simplicity.
Few people reach the needs on the top of the pyramid; they are personalities,
which manifest themselves autonomous and independent, having an exception
existence. But without food (oxygen, protein, vitamins and water) nobody reaches
cognitive, ethical and aesthetic necessities (not necessarily for survival, not lifethreatening, as would happen if dissatisfaction primary necessity deficit, the human
dignity being given by the meta-necessities.
So the necessities that man is born with are the physiological ones which
remain for the rest of the life in a dynamic specific to each human need. Of these,
from the first day of life, the need for food appears, dominant in the beginning of
the life and decreasing in intensity at the old age.
The relationship between the needs of the deficit (the pyramid), the
development (mid-pyramid) and the self-realization of self, not limited to stacking
and lag relationships of their emergence (only after completing basic necessity
arises meta-necessities problem) but also the individual's age (time factor):
imagine a newborn that would manifest the necessity of independence!
The fullness of psychic life can be achieved only by providing physiological
needs that require a series of social conditions. Given this, it can be said that some
people can not be placed on the upper steps without having satisfied the basic
needs, so having no relation with the base of the pyramid.
A. Older, conventional needs, common to all human beings
The needs, viewed from the traditional perspective, are involved in the
development of the person in the whole evolutionary process, but very close to the
social, economic or political environment of the person's life.
140
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
Specific to conventional needs is the fact that they are required to be met so
that the proper psycho-physiological functioning of the person not to be affected. If
they persist and are not satisfied, they are causing discomfort for the child even
though in different social contexts, some basic needs undergo suitability and
refinements to the context. The extension of these basic needs can lead to the
appearance of emerging needs, needs that tend to become PHENOMENA.
Every child needs to grow healthy and normal physically, intellectually,
moral and social in the conditions of freedom and dignity. He needs a safe and
stimulating growth. To develop and grow in harmony, physically and
psychologically, the child not only needs food, clothing, rest and shelter, which are
basic needs without which other needs are not expressed. In other words, the care a
child needs is not only to meet its basic needs, basic or fundamental common
interests of any person, but consists in establishing a deeper relationship with
others, an emotional communication with them. The insurance of the harmonious
development of a child requires the best physical and human environment.
The ambient of the family is the material, spiritual and moral climate in
which the children are formed, i.e., the place where they acquire the ABC of
education or “the seven years from home”. After the French psychologist Henri
Wallon, for children, the family is the “problem to be or not to be”, by finding him
self sitting through his birth, in a group intended to assure: food, maintenance,
security, education.
All these constitute the so-called common needs that are burdening the
principles to be followed. Thus:
- All children need a family, a climate of harmony, affection and
understanding;
- Every child needs to grow healthy and normal physically, intellectually,
moral and social, in conditions of freedom and dignity;
- The child needs a safe and stimulating growth.
These principles should guide the whole activity of the factors responsible
for raising and educating children.
B. The special needs of children in need
Given the regulations, it is considered a child in need the children who have
no family or whose family is unable to offer suitable conditions for growth and
education and children with disabilities (sensory, physical, and intellectual) and the
misfits.
The article 20 of the Declaration of Rights of the Child states that “any child
who is temporarily/permanently deprived of his or her family or in his own interest,
can not be left in this environment, is entitled to protection and special aid from the
state”.
Thus, any child who is temporarily or permanently deprived of his or her
family or, in terms of its own interests can not be left in this environment, is
entitled to protection and special aid from the community, to an alternative care
141
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
that can be carried out as foster care, adoption or if necessary, entrust an institution
of care.
The children from the first category, considered social problem children
(being deprived of their biological family) are institutionalized by the age of 18
years in institutions of social protection, residential: investment centers. They are
designed to ensure the care and education of the child without family and settles
family occupying, becoming surrogate family by taking over the family of origin
requirements’, child care and education and creating a favorable environment in
which children can develop normally.
The child in difficulty, as the institutionalized, has primarily needs, social
assistance. In the center's substitute family placement, education takes place in
physical and human climate of the institution, the active role being fulfilled first by
the educator, which contributes with care and maintenance staff. Therefore, parentchild relationship (adult-child), is essential for creating the socio-educational
climate from the Placement Center, is supplied mainly by the teacher-child
relationship.
The emotional security, communication, belonging, love and understanding
necessities meet only in the context of interpersonal relationships, mutual
acceptance. Thus, a precondition of communication and mutual acceptance is
responsive to the problems of life educator of children. Not infrequently, children
need time and patience, attention and understanding to resolve their problems.
If we consider the main task of the specialized educator from the placement
center, that of a person / professional at all times with the child learned to nurture,
educate and advise its social and professional integration, we must underline that,
along with the functions related to professional quality, those related to the
relationship with the child are determined by the need to meet the child's needs
taking into account the special requirements of institutionalized children, which
can be grouped into four broad categories:
a. The need for prevention and care;
b. The need for communication;
c. The need for education;
d. The need for socializing.
To develop and enhance in harmony, physically and mentally, the
institutionalized child does not have only basic needs, basic or common to
everyone. There are other essential needs that the institution must meet arriving
like a normal family environment: to be loved, to know that you want to participate
in decisions that concern him, to feel protected, to feel they belong to a family.
The child in difficulty needs understanding and support for establishing
emotional relationships with adults and other children. Only thus, the baby can get
a sense of trust and enter into contact with the outside world. Like any person, the
children have problems they can not tell anyone. Therefore, they need reliable
people to communicate and to be “any time” prepared to answer troubling
questions for kids (Why can not I have a family? - replacing the lack of parental
love, relationship lack of communication and emotional empathy).
142
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
The need for time for children from orphanages may be caught in their eyes
express request: “Please, take some time for me”. Responding to this imperative, a
very strong emotional bond is established between children and educators, in most
cases, investing heavily in their children, leaving deep scars in the investment
behavior and attitudes of children. But it is not enough just to spend time with
children; it is not enough even to love them, because only such attitudes alone are
not always the solution of their problems. These children must be understood at the
same time.
The emotional/personalized relationship with the child, as a way to relate
mainly to the child placement Center, involves restoring relations “parent-child”,
achieving emotional support they need, creating a warm atmosphere, security, of
the type “parental home”. For this the teacher should be in relationship with
children, calm, loving, always available for them, and not (as often happens) tired,
tense, discouraged, rushed, bored, etc.
C. New emerging needs
Emerging needs of children is a new concept that defines a connected set of
challenges, problems, opportunities and threats relevant events in the general
development of children and young people and generates or has the potential to
generate a series of effects with major impact on their lives.
The concept of emerging needs (NEN) was developed by Nico van
Oudenhoven and Rekha Waziri, experts at the International Child Development
Initiatives, Netherlands (ICDI). The peculiarity is that these needs were not seen in
previous generations of children and young people or whether they have been
encountered, there is an increase in their incidence. They are “new” in the sense
that they have not existed until now or have not generated so far known effects.
The emergence of these needs was seen emerging in the late '80s due to the
correlation between scientific and technological development, with major effects
on the quality of human life.
The emerging needs have a multiple and complex causality, the result of the
different features of society, in terms of technical, scientific, social, educational,
health system, legal system, the conception of the relationship and communication
between people. The causes of the new emerging needs differ and may extend from
local to international level, and vice versa, making a concrete and specific concern
for professionals who now have a specific name for multiple types of situations,
events, challenges and opportunities that characterize society at a time and have
effects on child development and youth. The most common cause of NEN is
represented by the challenges caused by globalization, the power of media and
information technology, demographic changes, environmental pollution, medical
interventions, consumer culture and new ways of social communication.
Assuming that all children's new behaviors are caused by environmental
factors and accelerated changes in society, it will be easier instead to label as many
adults tend to do, find ways to gradually give these kids an alternative.
143
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
There are many new challenges which have emerged in the lives of children
today, issues and opportunities which were not given sufficient attention or not at
all so far and there are no appropriate policies and intervention measures. From
these cases, we illustrate only a few more common to children and young
generation who consider that they are part of the emerging needs:
- The situation of those students who have a tendency to obesity, give up
physical education, presenting a medical exemption because they are ashamed of
their colleagues who shout “fatty”;
- The situation of those students who do not have friends and spend more
time at the computer, becoming an expert in this field, but after a while their
passion for computers turns into a dangerous defect because they drop out school,
isolate from their parents, they become emotionally unstable, moving to states of
depression irritability;
- The problematic situation of those pupils, who, having their parents gone
to work abroad, are left in the care of relatives, and who take some of the parents’
responsibilities (cleaning, care of siblings), are overburdened with household
chores and thus begin to allocate increasingly less time at the expense of school
learning;
- Hyperactivity and suicide at an early age are two trends in the development
of children from certain areas of the world that can be identified as emerging
needs.
These processes, individually or combined, create a variety of different
situations faced by children, each representing an “original” challenge for children
and determine changes in attitude and behavior, generate effects with major impact
on child development and youth and create new special needs that require special
attention.
As a complex and diffuse phenomenon, emerging needs touch almost every
dimension of life, so that the examples of emerging needs can continue with
situations in the field of health (physical activity are replaced by those in the virtual
environment, drug abuse, alcohol and tobacco, mental fragility and emotional,
generalized trends of obesity among children has increased, not only of adolescents
and adults) from the sphere of education (negative effects of addiction to Internet
and computer games are already evident in many countries), the sphere of human
relations (relations have gradually replaced the virtual reality of direct human
interaction) and social environment (deterioration of interpersonal communication
and replace them with virtual communication, insufficient time spent by parents
with children, aggression, adopting non-values promoted by the media), personal
development (investment in education and employment are not conditions for
professional achievement, the prevalence of material desires and preference for fun
create an alternative reality by consuming time on the computer and television,
lack the skills to make choices because of the large volume of information and lack
of discernment).
The complexity of these phenomena, emerging to several areas of life,
engaging different dimensions of life: family, friends group, access to technology
144
Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Paedagogica-Psychologica
advances, society as a whole, dramatically affecting the overall development of
children and young people have increased dramatically in recent times and without
appropriate intervention may experience some negative effects with major impact
throughout society.
Thus, the display of some needs need not do anything but give us
information about children's health, education, nutritional style, style and
willingness to work etc. However, they can be approached differently - an issue
that reflects the integrated health must be addressed, because the causes and
therefore solutions touch many areas.
This brief overview aims to notice the complexity of the problems
created by students of various unmet needs. Thus, this study draws attention
to the importance of identifying all of these needs, new and old alike, which
affect children in the current generation and for which custom solutions
must be found, having an ameliorative and preventive purpose.
A holistic approach to welfare and development of children requires drawing
attention towards the needs of all three levels continuously and simultaneously, not
sequentially or in terms. Thus, attention to new needs do not involve a little
attention to old needs related to poverty or underdevelopment, or the fact that they
are no longer important. Many children still live in poverty; child malnutrition
remains a serious problem, a large number of children not attending school and
others who work since they were small. In many parts of the country, child abuse
remains a serious problem, but one that hides, just like their disability.
Today, children face many challenges, threats, opportunities and risks, quite
unknown to them, for which the adults do not have the necessary experience to
guide them, leaving them aside, to treat these new emerging needs. In that
situation, adults, at any position they are: teachers, parents, educators, policy
makers, but at the same time shop owners, clerks, farmers, simply because they are
adults, have a moral obligation to be concerned about the welfare and healthy
development of the generations to come.
REFERENCES
Civil Society Development Foundation (FDSC), Children of Slovakia
Foundation (Slovakia) and the International Child Development Initiatives
(Holland), a guide for identifying and addressing emerging needs of children in
Romania, 2010, Bucharest
Van Oudenhoven, Nico, Waziri, Rekha, and Newly Emerging Needs of
Children: An exploration, Publisher: Garant Antwerp, 2006
www.wikipedia.org
145