During Dnipro missile attack on July 15, sitting in the basement, I tried somehow to calm my child. My always cheerful, intelligent, inquisitive five-year-old son cried bitterly and inconsolably. I could feel his heart beating wildly and was looking for words that could calm my child's fear and despair.
As a result of the full-scale armed aggression of Russia in Ukraine, more than 1,015 children were injured. These numbers are not final, as work is ongoing to establish them in places of active hostilities, in temporarily occupied and liberated territories. 353 children killed, they will never grow up. 662 – injured, physically maimed. The children of Ukraine were robbed of their childhood. All our children are exposed to terrible stress, the psychological consequences of which will remain for a long time. All their lives they will remember what they are going through now. What can we adults do? We can protect them and love them even more than before. Just as the great humanist Janusz Korczak, also known as the Old Doctor, did it – a Polish doctor, teacher, writer, publicist, public figure of Jewish origin.
Janusz Korczak (polish – Janusz Korczak, real name Henryk Goldschmidt) was born on July 22, 1878 [1879] in Warsaw in a Polonized Jewish family. In March 1905, he graduated from the medical department of the Imperial University in Warsaw, receiving a doctor's degree. In the same year, he participated in the Russian-Japanese war as a military doctor. In 1903–1911, he worked in the Jewish Children's Hospital named after Bersoniv and Baumaniv, then a teacher in summer children's camps, was a member of the Jewish charity Society for the Aid of Orphans. In 1911, he founded the Jewish Home for Orphans, which he managed until the end of his life. Exactlyhere Janusz introduced a system of broad children's self-government, which was innovative for those years. During the First World War, he served as the junior head of the divisional infirmary, mainly in Ukraine. During the Polish-Bolshevik War (1919–1921), he was a doctor in the military hospitals of Łódź and Warsaw. For his self-sacrificing work, he received the rank of Major of the Polish Army. In 1919–1936, he also participated in the work of the Polish boarding school “Our Home”. His radio programs – “Conversations of the old doctor” – were extremely popular not only in Poland, but also abroad. Also, Y. Korczak taught at the Free Polish University and at the Higher Jewish Pedagogical Courses, led work in the court in cases of juvenile criminals. He spent the last years of his life in the Warsaw Ghetto, where he ended up together with the children of the Orphanage. On the morning of August 6, 1942, about 200 pupils led by Janusz Korczak and teachers were deported to the Nazi death camp Treblinka. This day is considered the date of death of an outstanding teacherа.
Janusz Korczak left us a legacy of amazing, kind and instructive books. It is spoken to the readers in Ukrainian: “King Matt the First”, “Children of the Streets”, “How to Love a Child”, etc. Numerous works belong to his pen, in particular, fairy tales for the smallest, and most importantly - more than 20 books dedicated to raising children. Among them, a special place is occupied by a kind of humanist manifesto “How to love a child”.
During his lifetime, Janusz Korczak received the Officer's Cross of the Order of the Renaissance of Poland, the Golden Academic Laurel of the Polish Academy of Literature. In 1948, he posthumously received the Knight's Cross of the Order of the Renaissance of Poland. In 2018, he was awarded Poland's highest honor – the Order of the White Eagle. In memory of the three years of life that Korczak spent in Ukraine, in 2016 a street named after Janusz Korczak appeared in Kyiv, and earlier – a memorial plaque at 47 Volodymyrska Street, where he worked.
“When you are angry, tired, when children seem unbearable to you and you lose patience, when you scream without having the strength to restrain yourself …” – remember how your child's heart responds to this. Better hug her and watch an online class dedicated to Janusz Korczak.
Dilfuza Hlushchenko