Life Span Development II School Age and Adolescence

Life Span Development II: School age and Adolescence 3 (2+1)

Lesson 32 : Counselling during Adolescence

Who should be counseled?

The following types of students are in urgent need of counselling – adolescents who

1. Have a consistent record of under achievement and whose academic achievement drops suddenly.
2. Who lag behind their classmates in school achievement and need help in coping with their learning problems.
3. Find it difficult to participate in class and extra creative activities.
4. Are attention seekers and who find it difficult to adjust to college and suddenly decide to drop.
5. Have behavioural problems like drug addiction, aggressiveness, stealing, shyness, timidity etc.
6. Who continue to break the law or habitually fail to abide by school rules. Frequently, they are involved in such activities as using illicit drugs or alcohol, engaging in sex play, shoplifting, telling lies, being truant from school, abusing their peers or younger children, torturing animals, destroying property, carrying weapons and the like. Such clients usually are sent to the therapist by their school or by the juvenile court or by a social-service agency or by their own parents.
7. Who cannot get along amicably with their parents or other family members, so that their behaviour produces frequent conflict within the family.
8. Who suffer personal-identity difficulties and engage in practices that parents or school personnel – and perhaps even the adolescents themselves-believe are contrary to the teenager’s welfare. Such practices can include eating and drinking habits, use of tobacco, choice of companions, hobbies and recreational pursuits, and mode of dressing and grooming.
9. Who need guidance in making suitable educational and career choices for the years ahead.
10. Who suffer mental, physical, or social handicaps that interfere with their academic and social development and cause them problems of self-acceptance.
11. Who’s sexual attitudes or behaviour have brought them to the counselor for help. Such clients may include pregnant teenagers, youths suffering from sexually related diseases, those concerned or confused about their sexual identity (particularly homosexual propensities) and those whose parents consider them out of control in their sexual proclivities. These parents wish them to adopt more normal (in the sense which is more desirable or traditional) behaviour for their age level.