AMINU KANO COLLEGE OF ISLAMIC AND LEGAL STUDIES, KANO
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES
DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL STUDIES
SOS DM
GROUP ASSIGNMENT
COURSE TITLE: INTRODUCTION TO GUIDANCE AND COUNSELING
COURSE CODE: EDU 324
GROUP (8)
Topic:
Drug Abuse Counseling
2022
Introduction
It has been remarked that guidance is accepted as an integral part of education.
Whatever may be the objectives of school education, students need the assistance of
teachers and others connected with them to be able to make satisfactory progress.
No student has ever been able to manifest and maximize his potentialities on large
extent, make appropriate career plans, get a suitable occupation and make
satisfactory adjustment in the society without assistance of guidance programme
organized in school.
It constitutes parents, teachers, community members, administrators, guidance
workers, specialists etc. The cause is, in the modern complex society it has become a
difficult task on part of home and community to provide appropriate and adequate
guidance to students as per their needs and requirements. Hence, the school has a
vital role to play in guiding the students.
Guidance has been defined and understood differently by different people,
administrators, statesmen, philosophers, leaders and educationists in different time
for which guidance has two types of meaning—one is old or traditional meaning and
another is modern meaning. Like other contents and subjects, the modern meaning
of guidance came into picture when the emphasis shifted and more attention was
given on economic problems, placement or employment and occupational trends.
Guidance is a means of helping individuals to understand and use wisely the
educational, vocational and personal opportunities they have or can develop and as
a form of systematic assistance whereby students are aided in achieving satisfactory
adjustment to school and in life.
Major Guidance and Counseling Services
The primary mission of a school's guidance and counseling program is to provide a
broad spectrum of personnel services to the students. These services include
student assessment, the information service, placement and follow-up, and
counseling assistance. These four areas should constitute the core of any guidance
program and should be organized to facilitate the growth and development of all
students from kindergarten through post high school experiences.
Guidance services in the school system include:
1. Orientation Services.
2. Appraisal Services.
3. Information Services.
4. Planning/ Placement Services.
5. Follow Up, Research and Evaluation Services.
6. Counseling Services
7. Assessment services.
ORIENTATION SERVICES
This refers to the service as type of services which involves services provided to help an
individual adjust better in the new circle or environment. This service is essential for individuals
who are new to an environment and in most cases coming into such environment and situation
for the first time. The essence of this service is to enable the new students adjust better and
effectively within such an environment for which they have little or no knowledge about and to
which they are not familiar. Thus, the orientation service applies to a student just entering a new
school e.g changing school, gaining entrance to a primary school, secondary school r higher
institution in a school setting. Therefore, orientation and adaptive services involve process as
familiarization of the students with the administrative setup.
The use of school facilities, course registration process, teaching staff and the use of
the school guidance programming serving their needs and so on.
APPRAISAL SERVICE
This service involved the collection, organization, arrangement, analysis and
interpretation of objective data for the purpose of better understanding of the client/individual.
The data or information concerning the client whom the guidance program is designed to help
can be obtained through observation, testing, interview and so on.
INFORMATION SERVICE
These services address the individual’s need for authentic, reliable, objective and usable
information that will enable him make adequate and realistic decisions at one time or the other
for the actualization of a satisfactory and fulfilled life. The quality of the information available to
the individuals determines the quality of the decision the individual will make. A student or an
individual who needs to make educational decisions will need to have adequate information
about catalogue of valuable decisions offering the hand of the student or course that answers his
educational needs, financial government scholarship loans, fellowships and other financial
assistance opportunities available, accreditation or in general educational standings of the school,
procedure for application, submission, health services available, housing and boarding system,
guidance potential of the institution.
PLANNING/PLACEMENT SERVICES
It has been described as services designed to help an individual in making short and long term to
actualize a particular need or goal. Placement service is designed to aid an individual to achieve
admittance into his school of his choice, to get him a job or secure treatment for some ailment. In
essence, placement entails such things as helping an individual in achieving or realizing the kind
of his educational experience he desires, obtaining a job or realizing his occupational choice. At
the same time, it involves aiding an individual in realizing other services as financial aids, health
services, social adjustment services etc. successful materialization of his educational needs,
vocational needs and general life satisfaction.
FOLLOW UP, RESEARCH AND EVALUATION SERVICES
All these services are part of the guidance services and they are generally concerned with
advancement, improvement, refining guidance process and programme. Some of the essence of
the follow up research and evaluation services is identified as follows:
1. To improve counseling services.
2. To devise new counseling techniques.
3. To reveal the state, effect and misinterpretation of techniques in counseling.
4. To aid in obtaining quantitative information.
5. To learn the major and extent of progress.
6. To determine areas of positive adjustment and areas that needs further
adjustment.
7. Through these services noted that the effectiveness or the failure of the entire guidance
programme could be appraised. It has been noted that the follow up services is a
necessary tool for the counselor in establishing the nature and the essence of counseling
and in determining the areas of life that need further adaptation.
COUNSELLING SERVICES
It is one of the services of guidance programmes. Counseling is part of the total process of
guidance which is helping individuals achieve self understanding and self direction necessary to
make maximum adjustment at schools, home and community. This could be explained to the
effect that counseling service is concerned with the clarification of counselee’s self concept
through objective information which it is about attitudes, achievement and personal trait.
Assessment Services
The assessment service is designed to collect, analyze, and use a variety of objective
and subjective personal, psychological, and social data about each pupil. Its purpose
is to help the individual to better understand herself. Conferences with pupils and
parents, standardized test scores, academic records, anecdotal records, personal
data forms, case studies, and portfolios are included. The school counselor
interprets this information to pupils, parents, teachers, administrators, and other
professionals. Pupils with special needs and abilities are thus identified.
Conclusion
Guidance and counseling services play an integral part in the overall student
services department of any elementary or secondary school. The aims of guidance
and counseling programs in schools are to assist individuals to develop the ability to
understand themselves, to solve their own problems, and to make appropriate
adjustments to their environment. Major guidance services include student
appraisal, information giving, placement and follow-up, and counseling. Broadly
conceived, two methods of counseling include directive and nondirective
approaches. On the one hand, directive counseling focuses attention on identifying
and analyzing the problem and finding an appropriate solution to it using all
available data. Nondirective counseling, on the other hand, provides the counselee
not with a neat solution, but instead with the ability to meet her problem in a
constructive way. Ten criteria are used in evaluating guidance and counseling
programs: student needs, cooperation, process and product, balance, stability,
flexibility, quality counselors, adequate counselor-student ratio, adequate physical
facilities, and appropriate record keeping.
References
https://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/education/guidance-in-schools/guidance-
services-in-schools-introduction-committees-and-scope/63674
Arogundade Tola (2020). The Organization of Guidance Services Guidance Services in the
School System.
https://www.academia.edu/33886797/
THE_ORGANISATION_OF_GUIDANCE_SERVICES_Guidance_services_in_the
_school_system_include
Fred C. Lunenburg (2010), School Guidance and Counseling Services. SCHOOLING VOLUME 1, NUMBER
1.
Cobia, D. C. (2007). Developing an effective and accountable school counseling program. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
