ONLINE STUDY PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE IN COUNSELLING
Learn appropriate practices and procedures in the counselling profession.
I have done several counselling courses in the past and the coaching course fitted in well with the learning experiences I had encountered previously. The reading material was detailed and interesting and the feedback was detailed and constructive.
- Sarah, Life Coaching
It is essential that if the counsellor is to enable the client to experience growth, they themselves must discard stereotyped roles in order that they can become a real person in a real relationship.
It is the counsellor’s own genuineness, alertness, and ability to make life choices that are the inspiration for clients to make changes to their own lives.
Of course, this does not have to mean that the counsellor is on top of everything at all times in their own life, but rather that they are willing to make changes where necessary. As such, the counsellor is able to convey to the client that taking risks and instigating changes can be worthwhile.
Lesson Structure
There are 7 lessons in this course:
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Understanding Counselling:
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The client-counsellor relationship
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Effective counselling
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Counselling the counsellor
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Counsellor’s values
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Multicultural counselling
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Ethics & Confidentiality:
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Needs
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A code of ethics
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Informed consent
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Right to privacy
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Legal requirements
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Use of psychometric tests
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Ethics and multiple relationships
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Keeping records.
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Understanding the Self:
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Self-awareness
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Self-monitoring
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Self-concept
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Social Perception
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Attribution theory
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Implicit personality theory
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Relationships
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Social exchange
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Love and intimacy.
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Personality:
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What is a healthy personality?
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Trait approach
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Psychodynamic approach
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Humanistic approach
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Social learning and cognitive approaches.
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Emotions & Behaviour:
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What are emotions?
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Emotions and Counselling
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Effect on communication
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Aspects of emotions
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Emotional expression and counselling.
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Supervision:
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Why supervision?
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Working with others
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Quantity and effectiveness of supervision
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Personal counselling
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Dependency
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Types of supervision.
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Referral Practice:
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Counselling v mental health issues
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Secondary care counsellors
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Abnormal psychology
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Anxiety
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Depression
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Schizophrenia
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Personality disorders
Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.
What You Will Do
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Explain why a counsellor needs to be open to personal growth.
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Discuss personal qualities that are beneficial to a counsellor.
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Discuss how the counselling of a counsellor can be of benefit to their personal effectiveness’
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Describe how a counsellor’s own values can impose on the counselling process’
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Outline the importance of an ongoing education and an awareness of other cultures.
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Demonstrate an awareness of other useful counselling qualities.
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Discuss the importance of having a ‘code of ethics’ in counselling.
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Describe what is meant by ‘informed consent’.
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Discuss the extent to which the client has a ‘right to privacy’.
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Understand when and how psychometric tests may be used.
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Describe how to keep client records.
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Discuss how the counsellor’s own sense of self-awareness can affect the counselling process.
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Describe how self-perception can influence identity, roles and self-actualisation.
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Define schemas, scripts, and attributions and their influence on social-perception.
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Discuss the effect of attractiveness, closeness and similarity on relationships.
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Discuss the effect of different levels of self-disclosure on the counselling relationship.
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Describe symptoms of relationship breakdown.
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Define a ‘healthy personality’.
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Discuss the effect of nature and nurture on personality.
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Describe the use of 2 different personality tests.
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Compare and contrast 2 different approaches to personality and their application to the counselling process.
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Discuss what is meant by emotions.
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Describe the effect of emotions on communications.
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Define different aspects of emotions including: physiology, cognition and behaviour.
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Demonstrate ways in which emotional expression can affect the counselling process.
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Discuss different methods of supervision of counsellors.
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Describe how dependency can evolve in the counselling process.
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Discuss the importance of upgrading skills and ongoing supervision.
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Outline methods of observation used in supervision.
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Discuss the counsellor’s responsibility to the client.
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Explain what might be considered as abnormal.
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Define symptoms of commonly encountered disorders
Some Sample Course Notes
Effective Counselling
A number of characteristics of effective counsellors have been identified:
-Sense of Identity
They know who they are, what they want, what they need and what they are capable of.
-Self-Respect
They are able to offer help to others because they have a sense of self-worth. As such they can respect others.
-Power
They recognize their own power and are happy to allow others to feel power in their presence. They do not use power for their own means, but only where it may facilitate the counselling process.
-Changeable
They are happy to give up the security of what they know, in order to make changes if they are not satisfied. They are prepared to grow.
-Ability to make Choices
They are able to make decisions about others, themselves and so on, but are also able to revise decisions that they made earlier in their lives. They realise that there is no absolute state and that everything needs to be continuously revised and re-assessed.
-Liveliness
They have the ability to make life choices and live life fully, rather than merely exist. They do not remain static.
-Sincerity
They strive to be sincere at all times. Genuineness is one of the greatest tools for reaching out to clients.
-Humour
They retain a sense of humour, and are capable of laughing at themselves. They may also call on humour as a means of demonstrating a sense of the ridiculous and irony where appropriate.
-Accept their Fallibility
They realise that they are capable of making mistakes, but do not dwell on them. Positive elements can be gleaned from mistakes.
-Live in the Present
They are aware of past influences and future goals, but live in the present.
-Cultural Awareness
Have a broad understanding of the influence of culture on both themselves and the client. They will strive to maintain and improve this awareness.
-Commitment to Welfare
They are genuinely concerned with the welfare of others. This is essential if they are to construct a collaborative and caring relationship.
-Involvement
They become deeply involved in their work and are able to derive meaning from it. As such they will seek to improve their knowledge and remain actively involved in their profession.
-Psychologically Healthy
They are able to leave the emotional strains behind them when they go home.
It would be totally unrealistic to expect any individual counsellor to possess all these traits. However, if they are each viewed as a continuum, then the individual counsellor can assess to what extent each of them is characteristic of themselves, and to what extent they may need to develop others in order to achieve personal growth.
Why Study with Us
- International Recognition
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- More focus on learning, less on Assessment
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Our bookshop offers a range of counseling and psychology courses which you may find useful. You can see our range of books at –
http://www.acsbookshop.com/books_productcategory.aspx?id=14
Not sure whether counseling is the right career for you or if you would like to know more. You can find out more about careers in psychology and counseling at - http://www.thecareersguide.com/articles.aspx?category=14
