| CODE | COU5137 | ||||||||||||
| TITLE | Advanced Counselling Skills | ||||||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 05 - Postgraduate Modular Diploma or Degree Course | ||||||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 7 | ||||||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 5 | ||||||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Counselling | ||||||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | This study-unit builds upon COU5105 and covers the development of advanced counselling skills through a combination of didactic instruction and role-plays (including required videotaped role-plays). This study-unit will include 50 hours of practicum and is divided in three parts. Part 1 During the first part, the focus is on advanced skills dealing with the establishment of a working alliance, establishing and maintaining a therapeutic rapport, formulating advanced appropriate directions for therapy, and conceptualising strategies for intervention. Specific skills include client assessment, establishing a contractual agreement, listening, and formulation of questions, empathic responses, immediacy, challenging, moving the interview forward, goal setting and the use of imagery. Individual attention on skills acquisition is given. Part 2 Part 2 will focus on using the appropriate counselling skills with specific case studies. This will also involve role plays of real counselling situations and their implications for counselling practice in the light of theories like existentialism, humanism, psychoanalysis and post-modernism. It will also give counsellors the opportunity to explore how to develop thoughtful practice by questioning through the relational aspects of both client and counsellor. It will also deal with inner and outer conflicts that involve direct interventions by counsellors. Part 3 As part of their second year field placement, trainee counsellors will complete 50 hours of their course supervised field practice during this study-unit. During this field practice they will be closely followed by their supervisors who will assess their competence in counselling situations. The supervision will include counselling supervision in groups. Trainee counsellors will be asked to work more on counter-transferential issues with the study-unit supervisor. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Explain the importance of establishing a therapeutic rapport; - Demonstrate and conceptualise appropriate directions for therapy; - Discuss appropriate strategies for counselling intervention; - Critique and explain the appropriate use of counselling skills; - Demonstrate a good working knowledge of issues that arise from the counselling process including transference and countertransference. 2.Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Demonstrate an appropriately apply skills related to; assessment, listening, empathy, and immediacy; - Utilise role-playing as a means to strengthen individual skills acquisition; - Utilise Supervision in preparation for practicum; - Evaluate personal strengths and identify areas of growth in relation to professional development; - Demonstrate the ability to formulate appropriate interventions and responses within a variety of counselling situations; - Establish at least one practicum placement. Required Texts: - Loewenthal, D & Snell, R. (2003). Postmodernism for psychotherapists: A critical reader. London: Routledge. - McLeod, J (2009). An introduction to counseling (4th ed.). . Buckingham: Open University Press. Reading List: - Capuzzi, D & Gross, D.R (1997). Introduction to the counseling profession. London:Allyn & Bacon. (stated chapters) - Compas, B.E., Gotlib, I.H., (2002). Introduction to clinical psychology. New York: McGraw Hill. - Loewenthal, D. (2005). Psychotherapy, ethics and the relational. In L. Hoshmand (Ed.), Culture, psychotherapy and counselling: Critical and integrative perspectives. London: Sage Publications. - Loewenthal, D. (2007). Case studies in relational research. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. - Phares,J., Trull, T.J., (2001). Clinical psychology. London: Brooks/Cole. (stated chapters) - Rogers, C. R. (1996). On becoming a person. London: Constable. - West, J, & Spinks, P. (1988). Clinical psychology in action. London: Butterworth. - Woolfe, R & Dryden, W (1996). Handbook of counseling psychology. London: Sage.(stated chapters) - Yalom, I. (1992). When Nietzsche wept. New York: Harper Perennial. |
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| ADDITIONAL NOTES | Due to the nature of this study-unit and the profile of a counsellor, students must obtain a pass in each assessment component for an overall pass mark to be awarded. | ||||||||||||
| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture and Practical | ||||||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Roberta Attard (Co-ord.) Marlene Cauchi |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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