Course Title: Facilitate the counselling relationship and process

Part B: Course Detail

Teaching Period: Term2 2020

Course Code: OHTH5923C

Course Title: Facilitate the counselling relationship and process

School: 375T Vocational Design and Social Context

Campus: City Campus

Program: C5360 - Diploma of Financial Counselling

Course Contact: Jo Wallwork

Course Contact Phone: +61 3 9925 3983

Course Contact Email: mary-josephine.wallwork@rmit.edu.au


Name and Contact Details of All Other Relevant Staff

Nominal Hours: 120

Regardless of the mode of delivery, represent a guide to the relative teaching time and student effort required to successfully achieve a particular competency/module. This may include not only scheduled classes or workplace visits but also the amount of effort required to undertake, evaluate and complete all assessment requirements, including any non-classroom activities.

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites

None.

Course Description

This course describes the skills and knowledge required to support clients to identify and work through their concerns, and to manage the overall counselling process to its conclusion.  The counselling skills developed within this course will be considered in a financial counselling context.

This course is clustered with three (3) other courses:

  • Establish and confirm the counselling relationship CHCCSL001
  • Apply specialist interpersonal and counselling interview skills CHCCSL002
  • Support counselling clients in decision-making processes CHCCSL007

These four courses are delivered and assessed together. 


National Codes, Titles, Elements and Performance Criteria

National Element Code & Title:

CHCCSL003 Facilitate the counselling relationship and process

Element:

E1. Support clients to identify concerns

Performance Criteria:

1.1 Follow the client’s story and stay with their perspective to assist the client to feel comfortable and express their concerns freely

1.2 Explore the client’s presenting issues and establish their nature and depth, giving attention to the possibility of underlying issues

1.3 Identify and promptly deal with situations requiring immediate action

1.4 Support clients to identify their primary concerns in relation to the presenting issues and to prioritise concerns on which to work

1.5 Recognise indicators of client issues requiring referral and report or refer appropriately in line with organisation requirements

Element:

E2. Support clients to work through concerns

Performance Criteria:

2.1 Identify and work with uncertainty and ambivalence of clients

2.2 Support clients to experience and process difficulties

2.3 Draw attention to, and discuss parallels and links in client’s experience as appropriate

2.4 Identify and implement interventions that have meaning for the client’s immediate situation and that are most likely to facilitate client understanding and actions

2.5 Support client to identify and use known and previously unknown strengths

2.6 Explore perceptions of client’s feelings by reflecting back, clarification and review

2.7 Assist clients to become aware of underlying issues where appropriate and begin to identify ways of dealing with them

2.8 Acknowledge and work with changes in client’s life as appropriate

Element:

E3. Monitor the counselling process

Performance Criteria:

3.1 Monitor and review the counselling process with clients to ensure it remains of value

3.2 Proactively identify and work on threats and disruptions to the counselling process with clients

3.3 Review and compare own and client’s perceptions of the process and provide suggestions and advice in response

3.4 Address any tension between client’s hopes and expectations and the reality of resource limitations

3.5 Facilitate change at a pace the client can tolerate and assimilate

3.6 Recognise and assess the appropriateness of ending the current counselling

3.7 Acknowledge, value and work with individual uncertainty in the counselling relationship

3.8 Apply ethical codes of conduct in addressing counselling dilemmas

Element:

E4. Bring the counselling process to an end

Performance Criteria:

4.1 Enable client to identify when the process is approaching its conclusion

4.2 Enable client to identify, acknowledge and evaluate what is and is not changing, both in the counselling process and in their situation and understanding

4.3 Use the ending process to enable client to understand the nature and impact of earlier issues

4.4 Use boundaries of the counselling relationship to assist the ending process

4.5 Plan, structure and contract endings appropriately with client

4.6 Support client’s sense of autonomy during the ending process

4.7 Inform clients about any opportunities for further support

4.8 Identify unresolved issues and discuss further work if appropriate

4.9 Complete documentation and reporting according to organisation requirements


Learning Outcomes


On successful completion of this course you will have developed and applied the skills and knowledge required to demonstrate competency in the above elements. By applying these skills and this knowledge, you will be able to use specialised communication skills within a counselling process.  With the other counselling courses, you will be able to use a structured approach  to establish the counselling process. This will involve working with clients to clarify goals, options, and courses of action and managing the counselling process to its conclusion.


Details of Learning Activities

In-class (campus-based and online classroom) activities:

  • teacher directed group activities/projects
  • peer teaching
  • group discussion
  • class activities to review discussions/lectures
  • role play activities

Out-of-class activities:

  • independent project-based work online and other research
  • independent study


Teaching Schedule

Workshop 1 

Structured approach & ‘Person-centred practice’

Information required before seeing client

Legal and ethical considerations for initial stages of counselling and how to apply these – codes of conduct/duty of care/mandatory reporting/privacy-confidentiality-disclosure/work role boundaries/practitioner-client boundaries/discrimination/human rights

Using the initial session to gather client information as a foundation for counselling process

Communication techniques to support the initial session’s objectives

The client's needs and expectations

Establishing the nature of the counselling relationship

Context: financial counselling – discuss: how does financial counselling sit within a counselling framework? This is an essential point to keep coming back to.

To consider: Explaining clearly the (financial) counselling process

How this fits with client’s expectations, needs and immediate concerns – clarify, confirm or modify client’s expectations where needed

Addressing anxieties re counselling process

Identify when client’s issues are beyond scope of own role and report/refer where necessary

Workshop 2

 Working on a plan for counselling in collaboration with client

Making documented agreement with the client

Communication techniques identifying communication barriers and developing strategies for overcoming these

Workshop 3

Micro-skills – what these are and how to use them

Non-verbal communication

Impacts of different communication techniques on the client-counsellor relationship based on context of individual clients

How to take notes unobtrusively

The sequence of a counselling interview

Identifying when specialised counselling interview skills are appropriate for inclusion, and when they can impact positively to enhance client development and growth

How to identify and respond appropriately to strong client emotional reactions

How to reflect on and evaluate how you have communicated with the client: why do this? how to do this?

Identify when/how/what skills need developing

Workshop 4

Micro-skills required for effective counselling (communication techniques)

Looking at: Following the client’s story and staying with their perspective (so client can feel comfortable and express themselves/their concerns freely)

What the client’s presenting concerns are – exploring these to see if there are possibly underlying issues

How to identify and promptly deal with situations requiring immediate action – this is in a financial counselling context, but will need to focus on crisis situations, family violence, abuse, etc.

Recognising indicators of client issues that require referrals or reporting

Working with client barriers – these could be uncertainty/ambivalence/anxiety

How to support clients to experience and process difficulties

Paying attention to the particular story of the client in regard to parallels, links in client’s experience and meaningful interventions (related to client situation)

Workshop 5

Strengths-based approach – what this is, how this can work in financial counselling context

Using techniques such as: reflecting back; clarification; review

Working with the client to look at underlying issues and collaboratively working on how to deal with them

Acknowledging and working with changes in client’s life as appropriate

Workshop 6

Monitoring and reviewing counselling process with client to ensure relevance, including how counsellor and how client both perceive process and progress

How to address tension between client’s hopes/expectations and the reality of resource limitations

Facilitating change at a pace that the client can work with

How to bring the counselling process to a conclusion: Identifying this point with the client

Workshop 7 

Looking at what can be changed, what can’t be, in client’s life/situation

Using boundaries of the counselling relationship to assist ending process

Support client’s autonomy during ending process

Work with the client to identify any opportunities for further support

How to deal with what seems unresolved 

Workshop 8

Assisting clients to clarify goals and requirements

Identifying and exploring client’s aims, requirements and ideas

Assisting client’s with goals – how to identify these, including requirements for these

How client-strengths contribute to goal setting/modifications

Identifying when client’s aims/requirements can’t be met and what to do (includes referrals to alternative sources of guidance and support)

Review Communication techniques – micro-skills etc

Exploring options with clients – look at this in counselling context and financial counselling context

Working collaboratively with client in considering potential courses of action for meeting client’s goals 

Workshop 9

Looking at factors that can influence a course of action

What are consequences of possible courses of action?

How to work with client to identify these, and how to ensure client understands these

Looking at possible courses of action – how to work with the client to look at possible advantages and disadvantages and how this matches client’s requirements – Use financial counselling context Case study activities

Working with the client to decide on course of action, and how to consider alternatives where necessary.

Documenting decisions and agreeing ongoing support within organisational guidelines

Workshop 10

 In-class final assessment workshop


Learning Resources

Prescribed Texts


References


Other Resources


Overview of Assessment

Your knowledge and understanding of course content is assessed through:

  • Practical demonstration of skills
  • Case study scenarios
  • Written assignments/questions


Assessment Tasks

This course is assessed in accordance with competency-based assessment.

To demonstrate competency in this course you will need to complete the following assessment tasks to a satisfactory standard. You will receive feedback from the teacher when you have completed the assessment tasks. You should refer to the assessment plan which is available on Canvas for details of each assessment task and for detailed assessment criteria.

Assessment Task 1: Role Play/Video submission counselling session

Assessment Task 2: Case studies and written questions

Assessment Task 3: Case studies and written questions

Assessment Task 4: Role Play/Video submission counselling session

Assessment Task 5: Case studies with questions Assessment

Task 6: Role play/observation (in class)

Grades that apply to courses that are delivered and assessed in accordance with competency-based assessment are:

CA: Competency Achieved

NYC: Not Yet Competent

DNS: Did not Submit for Assessment


Assessment Matrix

The assessment matrix demonstrates alignment of assessment tasks with the relevant unit of competency. These matrices are available with the assessment tasks on Canvas.

Other Information

Please refer to the RMIT student page for extensive information about study support, assessment, extensions, appeals and a range of other matters: rmit.edu.au/students 

Course Overview: Access Course Overview