Guidance and Counseling:
Conceptualization and the Nature
of Counseling
Questions to think about
For what kinds of psychological
issues can someone seek out help
from a counselor or therapist?
What happens if they do not receive
any help?
Distinctions between
Instruction - Guidance – Counseling- Psychotherapy
Teachers >> Instruction
Administrators >> School management
School counselors >> Guidance & Counseling
(Psychological Services)
Guidance
“...is the assistance made available
by qualified and trained persons to
an individual of any age to help him
manage his own life activities,
develop his own points of view, make
his own decisions and carry on his
own burdens.”
(Barki & Mukhopadhyay, 1989, p. 2)
Educational context:
Guidance involves assistance for
- Course of study
- Academic achievement
- Using school resources
- Enhancing study habits
- Participating in activities
Counseling is more specific
“...enables the individual to know
him or herself and the present and
possible future situations in order
that he or she may contribute to the
society, and solve his or her
problems through a face-to-face
personal relationship with the
counselor.”
(Barki & Mukhopadhyay, 1989, p. 2)
Guidance - umbrella term.
Teachers and counselors provide
guidance.
Counseling is a special type of helping
relationship based on trust.
• Personal interpretation of events
• Self-awareness
• Interests
• Attitudes
• Goals
Counseling is learning oriented:
professional counselor attempts help
using appropriate procedures.
Counseling is goal-oriented.
Not just giving information.
Not just giving advice or
suggestions.
Counseling does not provide a set
solution to the problems of students.
Aims “change”.
Questions to think about
What would you like to change in
your life?
For which of those changes might
you need the help of an expert?
What are some inevitable changes
in a person’s life?
Example: Adolescence Period
It is a period of
difficult adjustment;
difficult emotions,
impulses, and stress.
Adolescents want
independence from
parent control and
authority. These
relations might
become tense, source
of frustration.
Adolescents favor peer
approval.
Besides independence,
adolescents also need
guidance.
Some Goals of Counseling
Achieve positive mental health,
Maximize individual freedom to choose
and act within the conditions of the
environment: Becoming aware of the
different forces in life and exerting some
degree of control over these forces.
Some Goals of Counseling
Lead the individual to have realistic
goals of personal growth.
Answer the need of individuals to
have good relationships with others.
Example of a change model
(The skilled helper - Egan)
How are things right now?
How do you want it to be?
Many complaints can actually be
reworded as wishes. (Remember
the examples we worked on, in
class.)
How do you get there?
• How do you create the change you want
in your life?
Counseling assists students to...
Come up with their own academic
and non-academic goals,
Make realistic plans and implement
those plans,
Solve their own problems,
Adjust to the changes in their lives
(A lifelong process).
One of the basic assumptions:
understanding of individual
differences is crucial.
That’s how different teaching and
guidance styles came up:
Not every problem needs the same
type of help, the individuals are
different. Counseling is tailor-made.
Guidance and counseling is
voluntary; yet education is needed
to let them know that they have
such services available to them.
See the glass half-full vs.
See the glass half-empty
Focus on strengths.
Build good things in life as well as
heal the worst things.
Fulfilling lives.
Work with the whole population and
not only those with diagnosed mental
illness.
Some Principles of Professional
Guidance and Counseling
Unique to the individual: People are
different on their attitudes, interests,
abilities.
Concerned with the total individual;
whole development of the individual
must be taken into account.
A professional activity.
(Nonprofessional help vs.
Professional help).
Some Principles of Professional
Guidance and Counseling
Guidance and counseling is for all those
who need help (Anyone who needs
counseling should receive it).
Not specific to any stage of
development; at every age and status.
In educational settings guidance and
counseling focus on issues such as
selecting vocations, school and home
adjustment, social relationships and
demands.)
Based on reliable data (tests, interviews,
info received within a trust relationship).
Types of Guidance
EDUCATIONAL: Identify HEALTH: Self-care,
and assist special learning importance of health, sex
needs, monitor academic education (STD’s, teen
progress, manage learning pregnancy), sports
difficulties, adjust to the activities, encourage
educational environment. medical treatment if
PERSONAL: Improve needed.
mental health, help them VOCATIONAL: Provide
take responsibility of their career information, train in
own development, entrepreneurship, discover
emotional maturity. their potentials.
SOCIAL: Appropriate AVOCATIONAL:
attitude for social life, Extracurricular activities,
social values, leadership games, recreation, positive
qualities, ability to do leisure activities.
teamwork.
Some questions to think about
What are the differences between
counseling and psychotherapy?
What are the differences between
preventive, crisis, remedial, and
developmental counseling?
How did counseling come to this
point?
Historical Landmarks in the
Development of Psychological Services
Late 1800’s, French Mental Illness
Reforms, Neurologists Pinel, Charcot,
Janet, restoring asylums and treating
hysteria (psychosomatic illness) by
use of hypnosis gave Freud (1895)
and new Freudians concepts of
unconscious and catharsis.
Dewey’s work on progressive
education (1919).
Mental Hygiene Movement
Clifford Beers founded the Connecticut
Society for Mental Hygiene (1909). The
Society expanded the following year,
forming the National Committee for Mental
Hygiene. The Society aimed to improve
attitudes and services for mental illness
and the mentally ill and to work for the
prevention of mental illness and promote
mental health. Increasing public
consciousness about poor treatment of
psychiatric patients.
Laboratory Psychology: William Wundt,
William James, John Watson, S. Hall
Scientific foundations departing from
traditional practice of healing and philosophy,
getting closer to positive sciences, following
the footsteps of medicine.
"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-
formed, and my own specified world to bring
them up and I'll guarantee to take any one at
random and train him to become any type of
specialist I might select--doctor, lawyer,
merchant-chief, and yes, even beggarman and
thief, regardless of his talents, penchants,
tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his
ancestors.” John Watson, 1923.
- What does he believe about human nature?
Good or bad?
Testing Movement, Quantitative
tradition through development of
various tests. Thorndike (1913),
Binet, Terman, Stanford (1905).
Tests of draftee selection for the
army in World Wars, evaluation of
performance of repeating elementary
school students, aptitudes assessed
for job applicants during economic
depression.
Sputnik, the
Soviet Republic
(USSR) launched a
space craft in
1957, leading to
federal fund
investment in US
education (National
Defense Education
Act) including
psychological
services.
Vocational Guidance Movement: Massive
unemployment, pointing out to the need
to make education useful to the world of
work. Schools are to go beyond teaching
3R (reading, Writing, R’tmatic). Frank
Parsons (1909) Choosing a vocation.
Humanistic Education: Rogers (1957),
nondirective, client-centered therapy,
plenty use of reflection as a technique of
help. Psychological help is opened to
professionals other than medical fields.
Contributions from philosophies of
existentialism. His book «Counseling and
Psychotherapy» in 1942. The term “client”
used instead of patient.
School adjustment & Personal
adjustment: Gilbert Wrenn (1962).
Personal growth, self-
determination, self-responsibility.
Prevention and early identification.
Preventive psychiatry model by
Gerald Caplan (1964).
Multiculturalism (1996) Sue, Ivey,
Pedersen.
Use of technology in counseling
Questions about counseling,
guidance, psychotherapy
Which one is more instructional in nature?
Which one does not take place in schools?
Which one (usually) takes more time?
Which one is considered the most intense?
Which one would be less satisfactory for a person with severe
depression?
Which one can be applied with large groups?
Which one(s) can be done with both individuals and groups?
______ curriculum
Career ____, Career _____
Which one is (usually) more educational in nature, counseling or
psychotherapy?
Which one is less likely to take place in clinics?
School ________
Psychological ________
4 Approaches to Guidance and Counseling
Crisis Approach: Wellbeing of someone is
threatened.
Remedial approach: ex. Concerning a deficiency
such as learning disability
Preventive Approach
• Example
Prevention of suicide: What is the previous step?
Prevention of depression: What is the previous step?
Prevention of teenage pregnancy: What is the previous
step?
All three approaches as problem-oriented. Focusing on what to avoid rather
than what needs to take place.
Developmental Approach
• Skills and experiences for school success,
• Interpersonal skills,
• Life skills,
• Self-understanding,
• Teaching, coaching, tutoring, informing, and counseling.
• Making decisions
• Healthy habits
Groupwork
Please form a small group with two
or three people sitting around you.
There will be groups of three or four
people. No more than that please.
Please spend the first few minutes to
get to know each other by asking
some basic questions to each other.
Then, please spend the rest of the
time discussing.
Make sure everyone in the group
gets a chance to speak.
Please share to the extent that you
are comfortable sharing.
What are some inevitable changes in a
person’s life?
What do you do during times of change?
Can you give an example? How do you
feel in the beginning? How do those
feelings change through time?
How do you adapt to new situations?
What is some advice that you could share
with your group members in terms of
adapting to new situations or new people
in your life?
Writing - Which will not be
graded or recorded
Please write down your feelings and
thoughts about this experience.
How did you feel before, during, and
after the groupwork?
