INDIVIDUAL AND GROUP GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING

STRATEGIES, TOOL AND TECHNIQUES IN GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING

STRATEGIES INDIVIDUAL AND GROUP GUIDANCE

INDIVIDUAL GUIDANCE

          Individual guidance is guidance that is not given to persons or regulated. Persons generally or to a class of regulated person. It will normally be given. To one particular person, which relates to its own particular circumstances or. Plans.

The Individual Guidance Plan

1. Observe a pattern of mistaken behavior: The teacher notices a pattern of behavior that could indicate trouble in a child’s life. Any child is entitled to an occasional day that includes conflicts. A pattern of atypical, extreme, or inappropriate behavior for more than a few days, however, indicates potentially serious unmet physical or emotional needs.

2. Build the relationship: A child facing life challenges needs a helping relationship with a teacher. Acknowledge the child’s efforts, achievements, and frustrations. Find times outside of the conflict to get to know the child. Often “good morning time” (quality time with the child upon arrival) is a wise investment in preventing conflicts during the day. Be sure to build a relationship with the child’s family. Start as soon as each child enrolls in the program. Having an established relationship with family members makes it easier to address serious conflicts should they occur.

3. Use consistent guidance intervention techniques: The teacher responds in firm but friendly ways to the mistaken behavior, using interventions like guidance talks, conflict mediation, and crisis management methods (mainly to calm). In classrooms with a teaching team, one teacher may be designated as the lead for each child, to ensure predictable limits and consistent interventions.

 4. Obtain additional information: The teacher seeks to understand the child and the child’s behavior more fully. She or he charts incidents of mistaken behavior by days of the week, times of the day, and events in the daily schedule. Strategies for gaining more information include talking with the child, recording anecdotal observations, discussing what you learn with staff, and contacting the family to exchange information about the child’s activities, experiences, behavior, and progress. The teacher uses the new information while repeating steps 1 through 3 for a reasonable number of days or when having a meeting with the child. Then the teacher reassesses the situation.

 5. Hold an Individual Guidance Plan (IGP) meeting: Over the designated period, if steps 1 to 4 do not result in fewer and much less severe conflicts, it’s time for an Individual Guidance Plan team meeting. See Part Two: Notes for Conducting Individual Guidance Plan Meetings for information on preparing for and holding the meeting. Team members include the family, teaching staff, and other involved adults. In developing the IGP, the team may use or adapt information from Part Three: Individual Guidance Plan Worksheet. The team shares the plan with the child.

 6. Implement the Individual Guidance Plan: The team works together to put the IGP into operation. One necessary component of most plans is staff’s continued building of relationships with the child and the family. A second is adaptation of the educational program to ensure that the child has increased opportunities to experience success, leading to a decreased need to experience conflicts. The plan may include referral for assessment by special education or other helping professionals. (If special education services are warranted, an Individualized Education Program [IEP] process may supersede the IGP.) Counseling or other professional services also may be part of the plan.

 7. Monitor the Individual Guidance Plan: Staff review the IGP, communicate with the family, and make modifications if the approach is not helping the child learn new behaviors. If necessary, the team holds a second IGP meeting.

GROUP GUIDANCE:

          Group Guidance is a service made available by guidance personnel to a large or small group of people to solve their common problem.  It is a group enterprise or activity assisting individuals in the group to solve their problem.

     Group guidance is an important part of the guidance programme. It is true that the most important objectives in the guidance process are to help the individual achieve self-direction, self-knowledge and self-realization-these objectives cannot be achieved in a cultural vacuum. Many important experiences must take place in group setting, since it is the only way they can be learned realistically.

   Groups are best suited for discussing educational and vocational plans, problems relating to adjustment to college and social situations, problems relating to choice of options and choosing a career, economic and occupational problems, personality adjustment problems, etc.

A number of techniques can be used for imparting group guidance:

1.      Informal Discussions: Informal discussions, if done under the able and skillful leaders, can prove very helpful. These discussions should Centre around desirable objectives and should be so guided as to result in conclusions that may be helpful to the group as whole.

2.      Group Reports: If the students are divided into groups which have certain specific problems to tackle and later these reports are presented in larger groups. They can help all the members of the group in gaining awareness of a number of problems and their solutions.

3.      Lectures: Lectures delivered by experts on certain problems too can impart group guidance in an effective way.

4.      Dramatics: This is another good technique of group guidance. If certain interesting topics are dramatized, the students can be given guidance in an interesting way. How to appear for an interview, how to prepare for an examination, how to prepare notes- all these can be dramatized land guidelines suggested to the students in an interesting way.

5.      Question box: “Question-box” says Jones, “if carefully organized and not too frequently used, is also a desirable technique, for it gives the shy and retiring pupils and opportunity to propose a question that is bothering him without revealing that it is his question”.

6.      The case conference: Here the problem faced by the majority of the group is stated concretely by way of a case. Each member of the group reviews his own experience in a similar situation. The group is guided away from the more immediate and temporary advantages to be gained toward more remote and temporary values. Then the effect of the exceptions may be discussed. Some other conditions that should be considered in deciding a plan of action are also gone through. Some generalizations are also formulated which may prove helpful another situation.

Kinds of groups for group guidance

1.      Regular subject classes.

2.      Special groups organized for the consideration of special topics.

3.      Tutorial groups.

4.      Advises under a particular adviser.

5.      Conferences such as career and educational conferences.

6.      Clubs or other groups organized around some common interest.

7.      Students with common adjustment problem and use all pertinent tools and techniques in its solution.

INDIVIDUAL & GROUP COUNSELLING

Individual Counselling

Ø  Individual counselling (Sometimes called psychotherapy, talk therapy, or treatment) is a

             process through which client work one-on-one with a trained mental health clinician in a safe,     

             caring, and confidential environment.

Ø  Individual counselling is counselling focused on the    individual’s immediate or near future concerns.

Ø   Individual counselling may encompass career   counselling and planning, grief after a loved one

             dies or dealing with problems at a job before they   become big.

Advantages of individual therapy

1.The confidentiality of the client’s issues is most easily maintained in individual therapy.

2.The client receives one-on-one attention from the therapist, and this allows the therapist to be very  

    thorough in understanding the specific problems of the client and in developing an individualized

     approach to helping the client.

3.The level of analysis and treatment can be much more intense and comprehensive in individual

   therapy compared to group therapy.

4.The pace of the therapy can be tailored to the specific client. It can be sped up in cases where clients

   can handle more focused on intense interventions, or it can be slowed down in cases where clients

    need time to adjust and move slowly.

5.The therapeutic alliance, which refers to the working   relationship between the client and therapist, is

    strongest in   individual therapy. Research investigating the components of   effective therapy have

     consistently pointed out that the   therapeutic alliance is a key component of a successful therapy

     intervention.

6. Individual therapy allows for the development of self-awareness by discussing issues and getting

     feedback from the therapist.

7. The client can arrange a time for the therapy sessions that is most conducive to their schedule.

8. Individual therapy allows for the development of communication skills in individuals who need help

     with these skills.

Disadvantages of Individual therapy

1.Individual therapy is typically more expensive than group therapy.

2.Some clients may have a strong need to identify with other individuals who share similar

  problems/issues. This need client best addressed in group situation.

3.Clients in individual therapy need to be motivated and are obviously in the spotlight. Clients who are   

    not committed to changing, doing the work, and applying principles learned in therapy may struggle

    when they are the center of attention.

4.The research supports the notion that individual therapy is generally effective for treating most nearly

    every different psychological disorder, condition, and problem that is generally addressed in a

    therapeutic environment.

5. Leakage of privacy (though as a counselor   everyone take oath to not to disclose the privacy

     of a client.)

6.If not counselled properly, it may lead to more negative impact.

7.Initial hitch.

8.            Long term to cure.

Group Counselling

»           Group counselling is counsel with multiple    individuals facing a similar concern.

»         The strength in group counselling is that if you have    3, 5 or 10 people together all facing the same issue or   similar issues, then they can work together.

»         For example, group counselling is common for those   in the midst of a divorce.

»         The individuals in the group act as a source of insight    and support while reinforcing the idea that each    individual is not the only one experiencing these     problems.

Advantages of group Counseling

1.Group therapy assures individuals that they are not alone and that other individuals share similar

    problems and struggles.

2.Group therapy offers the opportunity to both receive support from others and to give support to

    others. Both of these notions are important in treatment. Receiving support from others is part of the

     bonding or therapeutic alliance that occurs in groups, whereas giving support to others allows for

     growth and learning.

3.The therapeutic alliance that occurs in groups in broader than the alliance that occurs in individual

    therapy. This allows for the incorporation of many different points of view.

4.Group therapy helps individua's develop communication skills and socialization skills, and allows

     clients to learn how to express their issues and accept criticism from others.

5.Group therapy allows individual to develop self-awareness by listening to others with similar issues.

6.Sharing one’s experiences with others with similar problems is often itself as therapeutic.

7. Group therapy provides a broad safety net for individuals who may otherwise be hesitant to discuss   

   their feelings, perceived weal messes.etc.

8. Individuals in group therapy can model the successful behaviors of other individuals who have gone

   through similar experiences. Modeling is a form of learning where individuals learn by copying or     

    imitating the actions of others.

9. Group therapy is typically less expensive than individual therapy.

Disadvantages of Group Counselling

1.The client is not the focus of attention. In many groups, the old adage “the squeaky wheel gets the

    grease” seems to apply. Thus, the level of intervention is not as focused and   intense for any single

    person as individual therapy.

2.The level of confidentiality in groups is far less secure than itis an individual therapy, although group

   members are generally instructed that the information and events that occur in the group are to be

   held confidential and only to be shared with group memes during therapy, the potential for a breach

    of confidential far greater in group therapy.

3.The notion of social loafing is a problem with all group efforts. Some individuals in groups do not

    actually, make changes but simply ride on the success of others. Group may allow unmotivated

     individuals to hide their issues and avoid accountability.

4. Although the therapeutic alliance is broader, it is not as focused and strong in group therapy as it is in

    individual therapy.

5. Groups typically meet at specific time. There is less opportunity to fit the therapy into the one’s

     personal schedule.

6. Group therapy may be inappropriate for certain types of individuals, such as individuals who are

    extremely antisocial, impulsive, passive-listeners, aggressive, psychotic etc.