They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall

by Rauner, Diana Mendley

• ISBN13: 9780231118545
• ISBN10: 0231118546
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-08-01
• Publisher: Columbia Univ Pr

Summary

This book is a call to action to parents, youth workers, policymakers -- anyone who works for and worries about the next generation -- to recognize and promote the values of caring in public and private life. It is about teenagers -- those who no longer need the care given to babies and children but who still need support and guidance. Diana Mendley Rauner offers a rare focus on youth development as a process of experiencing care and learning social responsibility.Much public discussion of youth focuses on individual achievement and a limited set of markers of success, on the one hand, and increasingly punitive responses to failure on the other. Missing from these discussions is an appreciation for the importance of caring and social responsibility both in the environments we create for young people and in our expectations of how they should act and what they should become."They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall"develops ideals for caring interaction, articulating specific behaviors and habits for practitioners as well as policies and practices that characterize caring organizations and caring societies. Each chapter begins with a profile of a youth-serving organization, drawn from the fields of education, youth work, and counseling. Throughout, an intellectual framework for care is interwoven with the voices and experiences of the youth workers and young people involved in the struggle to create a caring society.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Caring for Our Youth: A Call to Action	1	(14)
Finding Words	4	(5)
An Ethic of Care	9	(2)
Beginning the Inquiry	11	(4)
The Practice of Care	15	(16)
A Model of Care: Attentiveness, Responsiveness, and Competence	20	(4)
Care: A Habit of Action	24	(1)
The Cultural Content of Care	25	(6)
Mutuality, Trust, and Boundaries	31	(15)
The Mutuality of Caring	38	(2)
Trust: The Foundation of Care	40	(2)
Boundaries: Protecting Youth and Protecting Caregivers	42	(2)
Care as the Context for Change and Growth	44	(2)
Learning to Care	46	(21)
The Role of Expectations and Social Norms	52	(3)
The Role of Instruction, Modeling, and Competence	55	(3)
Continuity and Turning Points in Development	58	(3)
The Impact of Youth Community Service	61	(6)
But What Does Caring ``Accomplish''?	67	(23)
Care as a Protective Factor	74	(4)
Caring in the Classroom	78	(5)
Special Relationships: The Impact of Mentoring	83	(2)
Measuring Care: Valuing the Process	85	(5)
Sustaining Care: Caring Schools and Other Organizations	90	(25)
Providing Care Beyond the Family	96	(2)
What Is a Caring Organization?	98	(4)
Caring by Design: Organizational Practices	102	(7)
Reaching Beyond the Walls: Practices That Create Connections in Young People's Lives	109	(6)
Building a Caring Community	115	(20)
Extending the Practice of Care	121	(3)
Trust as a Moral Source	124	(3)
The Challenge of Caring in Public	127	(8)
Reinventing Care in Public Life	135	(12)
Care as a Social Norm	136	(2)
Opportunities for Caring	138	(4)
Beginning the Journey	142	(5)
Notes	147	(24)
Selected Bibliography	171	(4)
Index	175