GROUP PSYCHOTHERAPY AND PSYCHODRAMA IN THE COLLEGE CLASSROOM-THE APPLICATION OF MORENO TECHNIQUES TO THE NURSERYSCHOOL TRAINEE

Abstract

It had started as a class in Children's Literature; but by semester's end, in order to meet the urgent needs of my nursery-school trainees, it had become, as well, a class in psychodrama, with often overtones of psychotherapy. The trainees, working for associate degrees in Early Childhood Study, had had courses in both General and Child Psychology, but their learning had been academic only, not active. Consequently, after working in the nursery training school a short time, they soon discovered the jarring discrepancy between the mere learning of psychological factors and the challenge of actively dealing with them in live situations. Not only did they then encounter interpersonal problems with their charges and with the parents of their charges, but also introspective personal problems with themselves, with resultant development of, or appearance of, feelings of uncertainty, self-consciousness and, in some cases, an overwhelming panic of incompetency.