Identification of a Specific area where Counselling is used
This paper focuses on the area of identity formation where counselling is needed to help young people and children to gain confidence in tapping and utilising the underlying potential to the maximum. Young people experience various physical, cognitive and behavioural challenges that may hinder full attainment of their potential. Through counselling, it becomes possible for them to understand the implications of such challenges.
In a familial setting, some young people and children may experience various social problems such as domestic violence. The problems may be directly inflicted on young people. However, they (youths) can witness the issues when they unfold in their families or close friends. Since the majority of this group of people are in school, any psychological, social, emotional, and/or cognitive issue may deter their educational attainment. To mitigate this challenge, counselling is important since it enables the victims to overcome such experiences and navigate smoothly in their life-long careers.
Young people and children have different abilities. Such people become aware of their potential when they truly understand who they are. Hence, one of the specific areas where counselling is applied in children and young people involves helping them to come to terms with their self-identity. Counselling is applied depending on the unique needs of each person or group of persons (Geldard & Geldard 2009).
For example, in a school setting, children and young people may have similar challenges such as phobia, bullying, low self-esteem, and even behavioural issues that may influence their performance and identity.
Although special provisions are important when counselling young children who have behavioural issues that hinder their academic performance and self-identity, the situation may give rise to the perception that such young children have opposing personalities when compared to their colleagues. Such perceptions arise from concerns about the reasons why they are being placed on special learning schemes such as acceleration programmes.
Even though counselling young children and young people are important to help them in developing and building self-identity, various issues emerge. Some scholars have argued that counselling that focuses on young people and children who have self-identity issues leads to the grouping of students in a manner that does not guarantee equal educational attainment. For example, the early literature on ability grouping contended that ability grouping translated into the placement of some students in lower academic tracks that were thought to be administered by teachers who are less experienced or even less talented. This situation leads to inequitable and disproportionate education for different students.
Despite this challenge, a counsellor of young children who suffer from an identity crisis in school settings faces an additional challenge since he or she must understand what comprises identity formation for such a group of young people. A second challenge relates to the practical features that are involved in helping young people and children to have a healthy and appropriate identity. These issues give rise to the need for services of specialised counselling that targets young people and children who have identity problems.
How the Counselling Relationship May Address the Identified Issues
The importance of counselling young people and children cannot be stressed enough because they undergo several stress-generating experiences, most of which they are unable to manage. These disorders manifest themselves between childhood, puberty, and adulthood. Some disorders come early, while others come later. Identity formation disorder does not occur in exclusivity. One’s sense of identity is mostly dependent on the commitments and choices that the individual makes regarding his or her social and personal characters. Therefore, counselling should be considered an important aspect of harmonising the demands of different young people and children.
In the school setting, counselling relationships mainly dwell on behavioural issues and intellectual capacity. Hence, counselling young people and children on the best learning techniques for different areas such as mathematics, visual and performing arts, sports, and leadership among others is neglected or given inadequate attention, yet the goal of any education programme is to ensure that such people develop their full potential in various areas of learning.
Young girls and boys possess several common characteristics because of their similar emotional, cognitive, moral, and social development. The class of young people and children encounter challenges that stem from their diverse abilities and personality traits (Neu & Weinfeld 2007). Therefore, the development of their self-identity through counselling remains a noble course that is necessary for their full cognitive identity development.
Schools’ counsellors need to adopt and spend time offering psychotherapy in areas that match the characteristics of different young people and children, rather than just overemphasising behaviours and intellectual capacity. According to Pattison and Harris (2011), young people and children have unique problems such as self-esteem issues that need the counsellor to establish a victim-therapist relationship that addresses such needs in a friendly manner.
While guiding them, counselling relationships should focus on the specific needs of each group of students (Prever 2010). For instance, in case of young males, the counsellor needs to engage them in the psychotherapy process, identify their most preferred media, and/or adopt the appropriate helping styles. This strategy can help in understanding who truly they are in terms of their learning abilities.
Any attempt to ensure that young children and people develop their self-identity calls upon counselling relationships to respond to various challenges that such students face in their day-to-day learning activities. Such challenges include anxiety problems, depression, and isolation. Psychotherapy programmes also need to deploy similar mechanisms for building self-concepts that can be deployed in counselling all young people and children to rebuild their identity since most of them encounter identity issues in their growth process.
In the effort to enhance the academic achievement of young children and people, counselling programmes need to focus on mechanisms for handling the challenges of socio-psychological tensions. These challenges are the main causes of underachievement among many young children and people.
The development of identity for young people involves the interplay of delicate issues. Indeed, the manner in which such people integrate and/or develop their identity influences their life outside the school settings. Therefore, professional counsellors have the responsibility of enabling such children and young people to learn about their variations in abilities and the manner in which such variations can help in the construction of their self. Without the creation of contexts that uphold proper understanding of identity formation, the needs of young people who have identity crisis may end up not being met via counselling or any other professional agency that deals with the general issues of children and young people.
The Role, Function, and Structures of Agencies Relevant to Issues of Identity Formation
Concerns have been raised around the globe for ensuring that educational systems meet the peculiar needs of each student. This situation has given rise to many agencies and institutes that are dedicated to ensuring that children and young people who have issues when developing their identity tap their full potential. This goal is achieved by helping them and their families to understand their identity. The discussion of all such organisations across the world is not possible within the limited scope of this section. Instead, the discussion is limited to only two organisations, namely, Potential Plus UK and Davison Institute for Talent Development.
Established in 1967, Potential Plus UK is an independent charity agency working with families to enhance support for young children who have a high learning potential. The role of the agency entails working with caregivers, including teachers and parents to help in discovering young people and children’s potential and nurturing their gifts (Potential Plus UK 2016). The institution also works with counselling professionals in enabling young people and children to succeed in their areas, which in turn are expected to shape their identity.
The primary function of Potential Plus UK is to offer social, emotional, and learning support for young people and children. The agency aims at enabling young children to grow their confidence. It also provides tools that are critical for the formation and thriving of children identity. The agency offers specialist support coupled with advice that captures a range of issues that young children face in their daily life.
Such issues include low self-esteem, perception and feelings of isolation, frustration, insufficient challenging tests in classroom settings or even at home, and challenges in the formation of friendship in school settings (Potential Plus UK 2016). Indeed, Luxmoore (2006) identifies frustration and low self-esteem as threats that induce anger in young people. Therefore, Potential Plus UK is structurally designed to provide services that form the primary areas of focus in any counselling model that addresses young people and children when it comes to the formation of their self-identity.
Davison Institute for Talent Development is a United States-based non-profit organisation that supports the needs of young children who require counselling to induce their zeal in realizing their full potential in school. Jan Davison and Bob (software entrepreneurs) established it. Its function is to support the young children by providing informational resources, education opportunities that meet their needs, and networking, scholarships, and familial support (Davison Institute for Talent Development 2016).
The agency’s structure is divided according to various aspects that define its functionality. For example, it bears organisational structural aspects such as educational guide, Think Summer Institute, Nevada Davison Academy, and Davison young scholars among others. These units aim at ensuring that young people in the United States recognise their abilities and capabilities to the extent that they can exploit them to full potential. Hence, in the operations of the agency, a key pillar involves ensuring that young people recognise their self, which is instrumental in the formation of self-identity.
Bodies of Knowledge and their Application of Counselling Practices
Counselling young people and children requires the therapist to be equipped with a body of knowledge, which comprises a set of relevant terms, concepts, or activities that the counselling experts should engage in when interacting with the victim. Such a body of knowledge is the guiding principle in any profession. The application of these knowledge areas in counselling practices may enhance identity formation among young people and children. Luxmoore (2006) and Geldard and Geldard’s (2009) works form part of the crucial knowledge bases that counsellors need to be aware of when interacting with young people and children.
First, communication is important when studying human behaviour, especially when one is required to describe observations. Moreover, active listening of the young patients’ plight and/or encouraging them to open up by asking open-ended questions about their identity enables them to exercise their freedom of self-expression. The counsellor also needs to be aware of non-verbal cues.
The ability to interpret and use non-verbal communication such as facial expressions, posture, gestures, unconscious movements, voice tone, and pitch are very important skills. In line with Luxmoore’s (2006) work, counsellors here need to be aware of anger management since many young children and people dislike any form of shouting on them when learning is in progress. Hence, the therapist should select words that match the young people’s needs to minimise chances of inducing anger in them.
The counsellor also should be in a position to grasp the adolescents’ line of thoughts to determine what they need to improve on or abandon to maximise their underlying potential (Geldard & Geldard 2009). Secondly, most young people with identity formation problems have to deal with low self-esteem by re- examining their family and social background. For one to have a good hand in counselling such young people, the therapists need to gain their trust (Geldard & Geldard 2009).
Therefore, to be effective, they should demonstrate smartness in their delivery of content to this group of young people and children. For example, the therapist may explain to them that he or she was smart and that he or she faced the same problem, for instance, being isolated in class in his or her formative years. The counsellor may need to explain how he or she overcame such odds to be the role model that people see today.
References
Davison Institute for Talent Development 2016, Supporting Our Nation’s Brightest Young People. Web.
Geldard, K & Geldard, D 2009, Counselling Adolescents, Sage Publishing Ltd, London.
Luxmoore, N 2006, Working with Anger and Young People, Jessica Kingsley, London.
Neu, W & Weinfeld, R 2007, Helping boys succeed in school: A Practical Guide For Parents And Teachers, Prufrock Press, Waco, TX.
Pattison, S & Harris, B 2011, Research on Counselling Children and Young People, BACP House, England.
Potential Plus UK 2016, NAGC helping children with high learning potential. Web.
Prever, M 2010, Counselling and Supporting Children and Young People: A Person Centred Approach Sage Publishing Ltd, London.