Between 8 and 11 August 2022, 22 teachers from the country’s gymnasiums and lyceums participated in the summer school for teachers who will teach the optional discipline Harmonious Family Relations at gymnasium level in the 2022-2023 school year.
Teachers, guided by the psychologist Tatiana Turchină, head of the Moldova State University’s Continuing Training Center, Valentina Olaru, PhD in pedagogy, and Liliana Istrate-Burciu, La Strada, spoke about conceptual benchmarks of the curriculum for the optional discipline Harmonious Family Relations (HFR), components of the HFR curriculum set; family and the family value system; the culture of harmonious family relations; the art of communicating in the family, the roles of its members, commitment and responsibility in family relations; what consent is, including sexual consent, online relationships, desirable and undesirable signs at the stage of initiating a relationship; boundaries in a relationship; toxic and abusive relationships; the provisions of the legislation on combating domestic violence, support and counseling services in cases of domestic violence and abuse; gender equality; methodological benchmarks for the design and realization of the educational approach within the optional discipline Harmonious Family Relations.
La Strada specialists developed the curriculum set for the optional discipline Harmonious Family Relations, intended for the students of the grades 10-12, nine years ago, being concerned about the lack of educational programs for young people to focus on cultivating the values of harmonious and sustainable families, in which problems are analyzed and solved non-violently.
According to the teachers who taught this subject, it has become one of the most popular optional courses in their schools.
The optional discipline Harmonious Family Relations is a source of information for teenagers, but also a discipline for meditation, a laboratory in which they acquire new skills of assertive communication and of forming sustainable, healthy relationships in their future families.
The adaptation of the Harmonious Family Relations course for grades 8-9 is a continuation of La Strada efforts to prevent gender-based violence and reduce violence against women by educating young people across the country.
The summer school was held at Codru complex in the city of Orhei and was organized by La Strada Moldova in partnership with the Ministry of Education and Research, UN Women Moldova, with the financial support of Sweden.