Kids In Rental Flats: How Does Living In Small Spaces Really Affect Children? | Talking Point

foreign you might have bumped into them it was really good money I have to carry up this button interacted with them they might be uncomfortable feel alert like loneliness or even worked with them I honestly don't think that we have it easy the rising of course it's just something that we couldn't expect but do we really see them what are they hiding this is beyond Plain Sight the reason why I deliver my favor can say it has a TV that's it my favorite place is uh in the hall where I always usually hang out with my friends home is the bathroom because I is only around this size no this size my living room is the most crammed era because there's like a lot of things squeezed together like the teeth here at the front then the couch and then there's a study table my least favorite dish was like kitchen because the kitchen is full of mess yeah so when I was growing up I used to live with not one not two but eight family members there were my parents my siblings my grandmother plus my aunt and my cousins so it was always a Full House when I was a kid and I didn't get so much of my own personal space [Music] but that was a five-room hdb flat now imagine living with your family no matter how big or small in a space that takes up only three car parked Lots that's about the size of a two-room rental flat in Singapore which usually consists of one bedroom one kitchen and one living room hello my name is here I'll show you a tour my house [Music] over here I sleep over there and my mom and dads sleep over here and over there the road there might be not enough space because I'll grow taller and taller I order I'm like a big bedroom haifeng moved into this two-room public assistance rental flat when he was just one which means he knows no other type of home iPhone can you show me your favorite toy yes tell me oh do you have like a toy drawer okay which is your favorite this Burning top oh okay so what else is your favorite thing here the savings come your savings account for me is that tin can up top oh wow I'm saving up for for changing to a new house why do you have that dream to call the mid my size all right do you know what kind of house you live in now yes and I live in the in the rental property like a flat that you rent from the government and do you know who usually rents it from the government or who lives in a rental flat for people at low income what does low income mean to you low income meaning low pay they mean you get like but not too much money there are over 23 000 children like hyphen living in public rental households these flats are essentially interim housing for low-income singaporeans who cannot afford to buy a flat and have no other housing options the rent they pay is dependent on their household income with rents ranging from between 26 to 120 Singapore dollars a month for a one-room flat for a two-room public rental flat vivintan's family pays about 130 Sing dollars a month she lives in this 46 square meter space with four other family members actually I sit here then my brother sleeps here and this mattress will be like on the floor for my sister to sleep and where do your parents live um they were still like on that beat because it's like the biggest and yeah so five of you are in one room yeah this is my kitchen oh yeah what happens if you have a big family dinner my parents usually like eat later like after us then my brother will be like eating at the chair there okay do you ever have your friends come over oh no because like it's a small space so like they might be uncomfortable and there isn't like really much to do here what do you usually say when oh yes can I come over there's like nothing to do or like because my parents don't allow foreign my interaction with the children of the low-income household about half of them are from rental Flats Catherine foo's team is currently developing an after-school program for disadvantaged kids are there any long-term outcomes for a child living in a cram space children can feel uncomfortable they tend to develop loneliness depression and also sometimes affect their their academic as well I think most often you know children from rental homes they face greater stresses they face greater uncertainty I spoke to some kids and it does seem like they notice that they're in a small space What would be their concerns apart from this they actually experience the loss of control because nothing much that I can do can change the situation yeah and and it can lead to you know a lot of their self-esteem issue there have been no specific studies done on the learning potential and emotional well-being of children who spend their lives in public rental housing I want to know what the long-term impact is on these kids living in such an environment so I am sending some of the kids I've met for an assessment Grace fight between [Music] [Applause] [Music] okay [Music] this is my young brother he's going five years old I take care of him since um 13 years old when my mom working every day teenagers they mostly sleeping in this morning or they will like going out with their families but then like every like every weekend I will doing this early in the morning hello artina hey what sort of chores do you do over the weekend uh over the weekend I really like cleaning the floor mopping the floor do you need help with the cats yeah I used to have cats come here you've already sweeped the kitchen is it do you want me oh yeah yeah the kitchen yeah yeah okay so we've tidied up the house you swept the floor now you're mopping how do you feel about having to do all of this um just all I do like since younger so just like considered my responsibility because my mom with guys will be working if you could choose anything else that you could do what would it be go out and like see my friends then hang out with them wardina and her mother first moved into her grandfather's rental flat when she was three years old they then moved into this rental flat when she was eight in between she spent two years in a children's home before moving back to this flat I feel a lot like loneliness why do you feel like that because during weekends I'm mostly at home then I not never I never go out at all so like during weekends I'll be mostly here then my mom will be working actually I go work but I go work on like we like holidays what work do you do I worked two years ago like sending parcel wow yeah okay why do you have to work got Financial issues then I have like no money to buy food or because my mom was like struggling I go to work and then earn money so with all these responsibilities how has it affected you in school accidentally affected a lot when I totally stressed out like about money I worry if I cannot go to school or I worry if like I can not be on it there or something [Music] wardina is 17 much older than haifung and Vivian she's also lived in a rental flat for much longer and Exhibits real signs of stress this makes me wonder if children living in rental Flats experience more stress and if this in turn affects their learning potential and mental health our Clinic we administer a range of tests some of the tests that we do is intelligence tests achievement tests and attention tests I'll be using this test today it's called the basc tree it's a self-report questionnaire that looks at Children's thoughts and feelings about themselves it will cover how they feel towards School how they feel towards their parents how they feel towards their peers and also how they perceive themselves did you go to school this morning yeah are you ready yeah all right let's get started iPhone Vivian and wardina will be tested on their learning abilities grace fight between garnish ridiculous other Stone sky and fill up a questionnaire that will determine their emotional well-being while Francis has previously conducted such tests on families who come from lower income households this is the first time she is concentrating solely on kids who live in rental Flats Frances will need about a week to get back to me on the results of the test meanwhile the plight of rental flat kits have not gone unnoticed this is equal dreams it's a brand new facility intended to house students living in rental flats for five years without charge apart from accommodation they will also have after-school programs today is recruitment day and one of the interested applicants Vivian very big the rooms you have like roommates to like study with you know have a good opportunity here and can help guide her where she want to go anything she asked me like I'm not really understand like the education and education for me is a really important currently Vivian has to share her study space with her two siblings it gets that crunk after a month of waiting Vivian's application is accepted [Music] I just got my sentence letter to Eco dreams I'm so excited and very happy about it [Music] every day for the next five years Vivian and 24 are the secondary school students will live here and go home only on weekends they each will get their own bed and their own study space they will also have access to tuition sports activities and even the Arts [Music] Stanley time spent the last couple of years working to get equal dreams off the ground at the moment there are also programs in place to help families living in rental homes how is this facility different from that there is no such program at the moment in terms of offering the children the full support of accommodation academic health and life skill help there are individual programs that help them with study the tuition there are programs that help them with other activities but not Consolidated in one place nor is it program done by the same consistent group of people [Music] [Music] hello Vivian first official day at equal dreams how do you feel about having your own space now actually because not like things don't get lost so easily what is the one thing that you're most excited about being here the new friends yeah and the new things I'll get to learn what kind of things are you interested to learn maybe clothing oh wow okay I've met Vivian a couple of times and this is the first time I've seen some hope in her she even has aspirations of learning coding which is some of the many after school activities she will have access to here at equal dreams free of charge I'm not too sure yet if this place is going to be good for her but if this is a start then I'm hopeful I really am it's been a week if you recall we tested the kits we meet on this show wardina hyphen and Vivian on their learning abilities and mental well-being and I'll be getting the results [Music] foreign [Music] I've been meeting children and teenagers living in rental Flats I got three of them to undergo a series of tests aimed at finding out if their Years of Living in a public rental flat had affected their learning potential and mental well-being what did the results show iPhone and Vivian did well on the academic achievement tests and also they performed well in school whereas wadina she didn't do so well on the achievement test in fact she scored much slower across all areas what I understand is that Latina came from a single parent family and they were also struggling with some family issues during her early childhood but all these three children they actually showed indicators of Behavioral issues such as stress Faith arising from academic performance all three students also worried a lot about their future they had struggled with self-confidence self-esteem they worry about how others perceive them for haifung some of the concerns that were reported was he had difficulty paying attention it was quite Restless and and also in when he came in he I noticed that he he can be a little bit impulsive another concern that he had brought reported was not being able to get along with peers for Vivian um she reported a lot more and anxiety and depressive symptoms for Wadena I think what dinner struggled with quite a lot of family issues she has slow self-esteem low confidence she actually shows signs of dyslexia so as a result now that Medina is now 17 there is a very big literacy gap in her reading and writing level how much of affected does growing up in a rental flat play a part in these issues you found students who grew up in a rental apartment they generally live in much crowded places so they usually don't have a conducive study area for them to come home to and concentrate on their learning so for example in the events family there were five of them living in a one-bedroom apartment it actually affects their concentration and when they can't concentrate that itself can cause stress especially for Vivian in wadena's family she has to take care of a five-year-old brother while her mom's out at work and when children are assigned responsibilities at a very much younger age that itself can be quite stressful for them plus having to balance their schoolwork and learning it can cause over time accumulated stress anxiety or depression but I think for iPhone he has some attention issues and impulsivity and when students come from rental Flats most of the parents are not aware of these conditions and they're not likely to get help despite the sobering test results things seem to be looking up for Vivian at equal dreams a boarding facility for children living in rental Flats over the past two months she's had weekly study buddy sessions and I even got to check out her coding class what we need to do with the football set LED hot light to one [Music] but the test results did point to Vivian having anxiety and self-esteem issues I'm bringing her report to Stanley [Music] a lot of the programs at equal dreams are very focused on academics would you consider adding more programs to help the kids cope with their mental and emotional well-being is that obviously the first thing we've got to be concerned about is their ability to cope with their school and we can help improve their their big splash programs are not cast in stone we will modify them evaluate them and include other aspects so we do intend to be quite comprehensive in the way we explore what works best with this case unlike Vivian Hai Fung and wardina do not have access to a structured program like equal dreams and when I presented their parents with the test results there were parts of it that clearly got them worried so he scored quite high on hyper activities you're not surprised why not right yeah he keep on jumping on top of that also um Hai Fung did score somewhat high on anxiety and depression if that's the test result I was really really looking to it I'm worried that you can talk to me or any other school teaching I was getting might be reclusive I will try to wait to find them wardina scored weaker than students her age on her literacy test possibly due to dyslexia she was also assessed to have low self-esteem I'm shocked with the results because I couldn't believe that she has those weakness there and stress where she never ever did share with me as her mental health I I'm also quite worried about it because I don't really know what she's thinking about in her mind because most of the time she knows that I'm I'm very tired of working 12 hours in a day what do you plan to do about it maybe I I would just spend more time with her and he gave her a little box not so stressed instead yeah on the surface they may seem like they've got it together coping with whatever resources they have but beyond Plain Sight they are under tremendous stress as far as learning abilities go two out of three kids I tested actually showed potential meaning that they could actually flourish in spite of the environment that said all three showed a higher risk of Behavioral issues such as anxiety low self-esteem and even depression and that's a sobering thought okay stress is homework because I don't get any help I worry about my academics and my grades I get stress about finances we grateful that we're staying a rental flat at least we have a house yeah [Music]

Channel: CNA Insider

Views: 480,305

Keywords:

Id: yeFokfn8IkM

Length: 23min 24sec (1404 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 27 2023