Course Reflection and Theory Integration
May 13, 2012
Reflect on the content of this course
overall. What part of the course was most meaningful to you and why?
As I reflect upon content of this course
overall, I appreciated having a choice of the articles and videos each week to
ponder my learning. The uses of you-tube
videos and Theories in Action DVD were very effective because I could see each
theory being demonstrated with a therapist and client after reading the content
about the theory. Exploring the
different theories helped me realize how they can be intertwined. Furthermore,
I liked how Dr. Frels would compare the theories in a chart during her
lectures. This helped me understand and visualize the differences and
similarities of the theories.
During the first week I learned that
helpers must first explore self, understand family origin and life transitions.
I discovered the important
ingredients of a successful therapeutic relationship with children are:
- Establishing
a working relationship through open and honest communication for the child
to conduct self-exploration;
- Allowing
children the need to feel free to reveal their story and identify what
they want to change or attain from the problem;
- Creating
a climate for change by being transparent, genuine, empathic, respectful,
and acceptance of the child in
his/her current state of being;
- Helping
to identify the problem through formal and informal assessments; and
- Helping
the children create goals both external and internal for the desired
change through problem solving techniques.
Next, I appreciated how this course allowed us
to examine the use of nonverbal changes and Carl Roger’s theory in Week One to
help develop skills for building relationships with clients. Each week this
course provided us with research, articles, and videos about the theory we were
studying and allowed us the opportunity to relate our new learning with our
daily lives.
During Week Two, I valued the research of
STEP and learning about the history of Adlerian theory. Adlerian theory focused on family
constellation, personality priorities, early recollections, dream analysis,
identifying basic mistakes, and assessment of life tasks. “Lifestyle is the most fundamental of Adler’s entire
concept. It is the most fundamental as “The
sum total of all the individual’s attitudes and aspirations, a striving which
leads him in the direction toward his goal of believing he has significance in
the eyes of others.” (Frels, 2012) Adler believes that the style of life was
developed in early childhood allowing children to strive for perfection or
superiority” (Sharf, 2012). The tasks
that could be incorporated into a school setting are encouragement, creating
images and the “act as if” technique.
We explored the Reality theory in week
three. The Reality Theory is based on
five basic needs:
·
Power (which
includes achievement and feeling worthwhile as well as winning).
·
Love &
Belonging (this includes groups as well as families or loved ones).
·
Freedom (includes
independence, autonomy, your own 'space').
·
Fun (includes
pleasure and enjoyment).
·
Survival (includes
nourishment, shelter, sex).
By using the “Cycle of Managing, Supervising,
Counseling, and Coaching” l was able to explore Reality Theory from a different
prospective. This activity helped me to
understand how each basic need could be used from a teacher and parent view to
discover change in behavior and how RT is a cycle.
The final
week of exploring theories was Week Four.
We studied the Solution-Focused theory. Using quotes from movie clips
and you-tube was useful for understanding how to relate it to my work. Writing
about an experience that required me to use strength based theory help to
discover some probing questions about myself.
Finally in week five, we had to develop our own personal theory of
counseling, this activity provided an in-depth analyzes of one. The final project was the beginning
realization of how to develop a counseling session for a student. This course has been an eye opener for
looking within self, understanding counseling theories and which technique the
counseling is being used during individual and group sessions
Using the article by Watts (2003) for Selecting a Guiding Theory, compose
a reflective essay that describes a selected guiding theory and the integration
of any other theoretical techniques relevant for working in the school setting.
Include a reflection of your personal approach with students.
This
essay should be one to two pages in length.
After analyzing several theories, the theory
that most related to my personal beliefs and a value is solution–focused
theory. Solution-focused therapy focuses
on people's strength, competence, and possibilities instead of their deficits,
weaknesses and limitations as other theories. The benefits of solution-focused
brief therapy include the finding of solutions to problems that the client has
been facing. Another benefit of solution-focused brief therapy is that clear
goals are identified early on. It is can be done in conjunction with other
forms of therapy. In a school setting,
the counselor has only brief periods to conduct counseling session. According
to Erford (2011), individual counseling involves a confidential relationship
between a student and the professional school counselor that can last from a
single session to several sessions which could involve a variety of techniques,
and strategies that help students explore academics, career, personal and
social issues.
In solution-focused therapy, the therapist
is not concern with what went wrong in the past, but solutions to setting clear
and concrete goals to solve their problem.
Solution-focused therapy is sensible and flexible because it identifies whether
a problem need changing. A variety of techniques are used to help the
client/student with change. “Change is the focus of therapy, and examining
pretherapy change is one of the first things solution-focused therapists do”
(Sharif, 2012). The coping questions and miracle question can start this
change. The most important technique is
the miracle question to help develop specific goals. Another technique to use is the scaling
questions to help set goals, measure progress, assess the motivation, and
establish priorities for taking action. Finally, solution-focused theory allows
the therapist to incorporate creative play therapy for children to visualize
the change through drawings, role playing, and art. The solution message, a written summary of
the session, is the final step in solution-focused therapy that can provide the
student with a visual representation of their effort to finding a solution
(Nims, 2007).
In solution-focused therapy, it is easy to
incorporate other theoretical techniques.
I would use encouragement from Adlerian theory to help build
relationship to bring about a change with students because it is similar to
complimenting. “The encouragement
process is an important one, continuing throughout the entire process of
therapy, and can be helpful in applying a solution-focused approach” (Sharif,
2012) (Watts, 2000, 2003). Another
Adlerian technique I could use with children is the “act as if” technique by
using play, toys or art to encourage child to explore what change would look
like in their solution. From reality therapy I would begin the counseling
session by making a sincere effort to build a relationship with the student
that will sustain throughout the sessions by using the friendly involvement
technique. Also, I would incorporate humor with the student to create a greater
sense of friendly involvement and to help the student meet the need for
belongingness. Finally, I would use Adlerian technique of termination and
summarizing the session to set clear time limits and to summarize the session
to provide a clear picture of the goals and changes from the session.
Before the session, I would visit the student in
the classroom to start building a relationship before I pulled the student into
my office. The personal approach I utilize with solution-focused is the
questions designed to help students explore their strengths and resources
rather than concentrate on their problems and deficits. The questions can
help students identify what their goals or preferred future will look like when
they have overcome their problems or challenges. I know a little about your
problem but before we discuss it I would like to find out a bit you as a
person. What are your interests, tell me about your family, tell me about
your friends, or tell me about school?
For nonverbal students, I could use the sandtray or drawings for the
students to make visual image of their world. Another technique I would use is
scaling. The use of scales
is a flexible technique that can be used to help students identify movement in
their problem or challenge. It is especially helpful when the student is
struggling to identify goals or exceptions to their problem. The scaling chart I use is range of happy/sad faces to determine how
the students’ feelings about the problem or solution for change. Since there
are exceptions to problems, I would have the student draw pictures to identifying exceptions to the problem and how
they are already coping through questions.
Finally, I would provide the student with a solution message to affirm
the successes, connect the goals and tasks, and notice the actions and
observation for changing on the scale by terminating the session on time.
References:
Corey, M. S. & Corey, G. (2011). Becoming a helper. (5th ed.). Pacific
Grove, CA: Thomson Brooks/Cole
Erford, Bradley T. (2011). Transforming the school counseling
profession (3rd ed.) Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education,
Inc.
Frels, R. K., Leggett,
E. S., & Larocca, P. S. (2009). Creativity and Solution-Focused Counseling
for a Child with Chronic Illness. Journal of Creativity in Mental Health, ,
4:308-319.
Nims, D. R. (2007).
Integrating Play Therapy Techiques into Solution-Focused Brief Therapy. International
Journal of Play Therapy , 54-68.
Sharif, R. S. (2012). Theories
of psychotherapy. Pacific Grove, CA: : Thomson Brooks/Cole.
