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Here is an excellent video that discusses the Do's and Don'ts of Groups. This video discusses group counseling from more of a clinical setting and therapy groups, however, it can be utilized from a school counseling setting as well with psychoeducational groups. Click here for Supportive Counseling Do's and Don'ts YouTube video.

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Group Counseling --Leadership Skills I--Impact Therapy

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Goups are not static, they are dynamic and ever changing and evolving. Both the leader and the
members have the task of accurately assessing a group’s ever-changing character,
as well as its effectiveness, and adjusting accordingly in order to overcome obstacles and challenges to move forward and make progress (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

The Middle School "Why Try?" Resiliency group will utilize the "Why Try" program (click here for website). It is a resilience education curriculum that provides simple, hands-on solutions to reduce behavioral, social and emotional problems and to increase academic success. The idea is straightforward: teach social and emotional principles to youth in a way they can understand and remember.

The group will be tasked with completing resiliency training through the "Why Try" program, and the group phase will consist of the following typical time schedule for Middle School group meetings:

Opening (5-10 minutes)

Activity (10-15 minutes)

Process (10-15 minutes)

Closing (5-10 minutes)

(Sink, Edwards & Eppler, 2012).

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Group cohesion is the primary characteristic of a well-functioning working group (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

Group cohesion creates action-oriented behaviors such as:

self-disclosure

giving and receiving feedback

discussion of here-and-now interactions

constructive confrontation

translating insight into action (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

Working Stage Characteristics include:

The level of trust and cohesion is high.

Communication within the group is open and involves an accurate expression of what is
being experienced.

Members interact with one another freely and directly.

There is a willingness to take risks and to make oneself known to others; members bring to the group personal topics they want to explore and understand better.

Conflict among members, if it exists, is recognized and dealt with directly and effectively.

Feedback is given freely and accepted and considered non-defensively.

Confrontation occurs in a way in which those doing the challenging avoid using judgmental labels.

Members are willing to work outside the group to achieve behavioral changes.

Participants feel supported in their attempts to change and are willing to risk new behavior.

Members feel hopeful that they can change if they are willing to take action; they do not feel helpless. (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

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According to this YouTube video entitled "Group Counseling- Leadership Skills", by Dr. Jacobs and Dr. Schimmel (n.d.), the leader of the group must have the following skills:

Clarity of purpose

Clear of your role as a leader (or facilitator?)

Active leadership model

Read the energy of the group

Change the format as needed

Help engage students, teach them how to look at others when they are talking.

Set the tone.

Use your voice effectively.

Be aware of the focus of group (person, group, or activity) create the focus, keep/hold the focus, shift the focus if needed, and deepen the focus to where it has impact. Use this website for strategies to deepen focus: impacttherapy.com

Kami's Leadership Style:
There are many different types of leadership styles. I believe my own personal style of leadership is Transformative Leadership. Transformational leaders motivate others to do more than they originally intended and often even more than they thought possible. They set more challenging expectations and typically achieve higher performance. Leadership styles can change, as your tone would change, depending on the audience/type of group. In the beginning stages of a group, the leader may have more of a democratic leadership style in coming up with the group rules with the students. The leadership style may shift to transformative or facilitative, depending on the groups needs. I believe my leadership style will be effective, as leadership is my strong suit because of my ability to connect, build trust, and motivate others to action.

Laura's Leadership Style:
In regards to leadership style, I do not think that there is just one role leaders can fill when they are leading a team, and say that that is there style. I believe that an effective leader may need to include multiple styles of leadership roles, especially when leading a larger group, in order to best meet the needs of the working individuals who make up the team as whole to ensure success. As Alexander the Great said, "I am not afraid of an army of lions lead by I sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion".
Although my leadership style over change or evolve time with experience and continuing education, If I had to select a leadership style right now, I would tend to view myself as more of a democratic leader, as well as somewhat of a strategic leader. When leading a group counseling session, the success of the group depends on the success of the individuals making up the group. This is where I would also include aspects of strategic leadership style, as the strategic leader is not limited to just those at the top, but instead is geared to a wider audience at all levels who want to create a high performance life, team, or organization (Mathiasch, J., 2017).  As a group leader, I would want to continue working to motivate the group members to want to experience success for themselves, which will ultimately contribute to the success of the group counseling as a whole. As Chris Hadfield stated, leadership is about keeping your team focused on a goal and motivated to do their best to achieve it...it is about laying the groundwork for others success (my role as the group counseling leader), and then standing back and letting them shine.

Heather's Leadership Style:
My own personal leadership style tends to depend upon the group or class in which I am teaching. I try to allow the group to work through the various activities and collaborate with the group to have them help me lead in the direction they would like to have the group go. However, at the same time, I understand I need to guide and connect with the students to avoid conflictual issues, which could cause the group to come undone.

Click here to read more about the different kinds of leadership styles discussed in this article entitled 12 Different Types of Leadership Styles (Mathiasch, 2017).

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Diversity can play a positive and negative role within each stage of the group. Within the termination stage, diversity is a real life difficulty to those who struggle with letting go, who have cultural norms which are different than others within the group. When there is a mix of different races, genders or socio-economic classes within the group, there could be difficulties with understanding how the group will end and what will become of the relationships afterwards. It is important that the facilitator takes time to work through the termination stage to focus on some of these multicultural issues which could impact the way a student is thinking and feeling.

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DON'T avoid termination! The potential for learning permanent lessons may be lost if the leader does not provide a structure  that helps members review and integrate what they have learned (Corey & Corey, 2014).

DON'T allow group members to miss opportunities to explore and discuss other concerns that other group members may have as well-this can put the the client's therapy at risk .

DON'T write off clients who terminate their therapy without any notice-reach out and try to contact them via text, email, telephone, etc., Communicate with these individuals to explore their motivations for terminating, and encourage members to remain in the group long enough to address possible reasons for termination (Corey & Corey, 2018).

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During the working stage, members become much more comfortable with sharing freely, than in  previous stages. Students will not need to wait to be invited into the discussion, rather, they will involve themselves. Students play a key role in the direction the group takes and while they are more involved, they are not leaders or co-leaders, rather active members. Members are committed to the group, and to exploring issues and problems. Not all groups make it to the working stage, but for those that do, a significant commitment to the group and to pushing through challenges and barriers that they may encounter is needed (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

During the working stage, group norms that were previously established, are developed and solidified in depth, and group behaviors will look like the following:
• Students are supported, challenged and given positive reinforcement for making positive behavioral changes.
• The group leader provides a variety of interventions to promote further self-exploration, new behaviors, and growth.
• Students will initiate interaction with each other and rely on the leader for initiation and interaction less.
• Students will interact with each other more directly, making eye contact with each other during discussions rather than looking directly at the leader when a peer speaks.
• If conflict emerges, students tend to have a discussion and work through the issue.
• As healing begins, there is less of a need to put up a wall or facade, as members learn to accept and appreciate themselves, and each other (Corey, Corey & Corey, 2014).

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11 Curative Factors of Group Therapy. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg_ORuB3MWU&index=1&list=LL1Z0NExRHI9wpM54Ky6ptAA

12 Different Types of Leadership Styles (Mathiasch, J., 2017). Retrieved from: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/12-different-types-leadership-styles-jim-mathiasch

Addressing Conflict Between Two Members of a Small Group. Retrieved From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idWeAY0K6kU&feature=youtu.be

Alle-Corliss, L. & Alle-Corliss, R. (2009). Understanding Group Development. Developing Group Skills. John Wiley and Sons, 2009.

Bernard, H., Burlingame, G., Flores, P., Greene, L. , Joyce, A. (2008). Clinical practice guidelines for group psychotherapy. International Journal of Group Psychotherapy, 58, 455-542.

Cole, D. (2016). Dealing with anger and conflict in group therapy. Group Solutions Network. Retrieved From: http://www.groupfind.com/dealing-with-anger-and-conflict-in-groups/.

Corey, M. S., Corey, G., & Corey, C. (2014). Groups: Process and practice (9th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole. Retrieved from: http://neoraihianstvo.org/forum/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Marianne-Schneider-Corey-Gerald-Corey-Cindy-Corey-Groups-Process-and-Practice.pdf

Group Counseling- Leadership Skills. (Jacobs, E. & Schimmel, C., n.d). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz6E1-Lu3wM

Hall, P, and L Weaver. 2001. "Interdisciplinary education and teamwork: a long and winding road." Medical Education 35, no. 9: 867-875. Education Source, EBSCOhost (accessed April 4, 2018).

Impact Therapy (2018). Retrieved from impacttherapy.com

Lefever, R. (2015). Group Therapy for Beginners. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpjszSrNdJk

Levy, N. B. (2001). The Yalom Reader: Selections From the Work of a Master Therapist and Storyteller. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 158(4), 665-7. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/220472173?accountid=1229

Murray, D. (2008).  The Why Try Reality Ride. Retrieved April 2018 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMuTcypb03M

Role of a Middle School Counselor. Retrieved from  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yh6n53OXfkw

Sink, C. A., Edwards, C., & Eppler, C. (2012). School based group counseling. Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.

Steen, S., & Bauman, S. (2014). Group Counseling with Children: A Multicultural Approach. Published by Psychotherapy.net. Retrieved April 2018 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSOGSDGmNt4

Supportive Counseling Do's and Don'ts. (n.d.) Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRSxkZsmWsc

The 4 MUST Do´s of ENDING GROUP THERAPY! Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=4NxMtG4Jp98

Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. C. (2010). Stages of Small-Group Development Revisited. Group Facilitation: A Research & Applications Journal, 1043-48.

The WhyTry Program (n.d.) Retrieved from www.whytry.org

Wilson, C. (2010). Bruce Tuckman's Forming, Storming, Norming & Performing Team Development Model. Retrieved from http://sst7.org/media/BruceTuckman_Team_Development_Model.pdf.

Yalom, I. D.,Leszcz, Molyn. (2005) The theory and practice of group psychotherapy. New York, NY: Basic Books.

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During this stage, more in-depth exploration of important issues is the norm because members are more ready to work.

The school counselor remains at the school and available for consultation if the student needs.

The school counselor can check in with the student after the group ends. (Corey, Corey, Corey, 2014)

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Yalom states that groups, in time, will develop into a social microcosm (Yalom, Leszcz & Molyn, 2005). Given enough time, students will begin to trust each other, and their "true colors" will begin to come through and begin to be themselves.

Students will begin to interact with group members as they would interact with others in their own social circle. In essence, they will create their own interpersonal world that they have always inhabited, but within the group, demonstrating how they interact day to day. In other words, they will automatically and inevitably begin to demonstrate their maladaptive interpersonal behaviors- thus where the work begins (Yalom, Leszcz & Molyn, 2005).

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* Apprehension over the impending loss between group members
* Saying goodbye
* Removal of symbols or cleaning up of tasks/thoughts with others that may have not been fully completed
* Reflection from peers to celebrate how far each other has come over time (Wilson, 2010).

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Survey Monkey

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Below is a list of items that describe people. Please circle the number for each item that best describes you using a rating scale of 1-5, with " 1" meaning you " Strongly Disagree" with the item and " 5" meaning you "Strongly Agree"with the item:

1 =Strongly Disagree 2 =Disagree 3 =Undecided 4 =Agree 5= Strongly Agree

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Below is a list of items that describe people.

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At the facilitating stage, members are working to introduce each other, including developing spoken and unspoken norms that will govern group behavior (Corey & Corey, 2016). Group members as a whole will naturally share their fears, concerns, and anxieties in regards of what to expect as the group progresses.

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The storming stage will cause students or persons within the group to react affectively (or emotionally) to tasks and possibly with conflicts (Hall & Weaver, 2001).

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During the termination stage of group counseling, the major task facing group members includes consolidating their learning, and transferring it to the outside world. This time is for review and reflection of the meaning of the group experience.

Tasks include:

Dealing with feelings about separation.

Beginning to generalize learning to everyday life.

Completing any unfinished business, thoughts or feelings.

Reviewing and reflecting the impact of the group and remind students that change takes time, effort, and practice.

Making decisions and plans concerning changes members want to make and how
they will go about making them.

Applying in-group learning to an action plans in their daily lives.

Evaluating the group

Attending some type of follow-up session such as checking in with the school counselor, or being available for consultation if the student needs to stop in.

Here are some additional key tasks for members:

Find ways to cope and work through problems without
the support of the group.

Find ways to continue new behaviors through
some kind of self-directed plan for change (Corey, Corey, Corey, 2014).

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The Why Try Program (https://whytry.org), allows middle school students to find an understanding of basic life skills such as dealing with peer pressure, obeying the rules and laws, how decisions they make now could have consequences,  and finding appropriate support systems.

The Why Try Program works to assist students and staff to find a common ground with emotional health, violent behaviors in the schools, increasing GPA with at-risk students and increase the resiliency skills students need to focus on outside "real-world" struggles (https://whytry.org).

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“Why Try” Program Closing Lesson Plan: You Can See Over the Wall

Objective:

The purpose of the closing lesson plan is to provide students with an overview of the lessons from the “Why Try” program that we have been learning about over the course of the past 10 weeks. During this time, the group members have been working to develop a set of identified skills and appropriate coping strategies that are necessary to support the student’s ability to positively manage their own behavior, frustrations, and stressful situations effectively. Over the weeks, group members have been working to further their knowledge, and continue to increase their own understanding of the lessons being taught by researching additional information, exploring new ideas, asking new questions, and making connections to the real world.   Additionally, students have also worked towards identifying meaningfully relationships between the skills they have attained over the course of the program, and how this information can be applied in their everyday lives.

Lesson Opener:

Students are presented with their final visual resource, “You Can See Over the Wall”, of the Why Try program. Point out to students that the steps leading up to the wall are labeled in order of all of the previous weeks’ lessons, starting with our opening lesson, “Reality Race”. Review the lessons learned over the course the Why Try program with students and go through each step. Remind students that every lesson plan is like a stepping stone, and each one is a component of achieving the ultimate goal of reaching Opportunity, Freedom, and Self-Respect.

Lesson Body:

Ask students to look at the two different figures on the page and identify the difference between their two different views (“Limited” and “Big” view). Ask students to look at the person under the stairs who is facing the wall. Why is he there? (He took the shortest and easiest path to get to one of the two views ((i.e., the short roller coaster path with the hard crash at the end from our opening lesson, “Why Try Reality Ride”))) How did he get there? (He kept tripping over a specific “step”, i.e., Why Try lesson plan component). What is he really facing when he is looking at the wall? (He’s facing negative outcomes such as failure, anger, fighting, drug use, etc. His view and options to grow are extremely limited to non-existent). Now ask students to look at the second figure, who is standing on top of the wall. Why is he there? (He chose the outcome that he wanted, which was to reach Opportunity, Freedom, and Self Respect. In order to achieve his desired outcome, he had to take the longer and not as easy path, i.e., the longer and not as easy roller coaster path, to get there.). What is he really facing when he is looking at the wall? (He is facing the outcome he set out as his goal to achieve. As a result, his view is much bigger, offering and endless amount of opportunities to grow and continue from there.)

Supporting Visual Resource:

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This is a video that is from the clinical and mental health side of counseling, but the 4 Do´s can be applied to the termination stage of school counseling.

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The 4 MUST Do's of ENDING THERAPY! Mental Health Videos with Kati Morton

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Group Characteristics:
* According to Tuckman and Jensen (2010), the group members within the storming stage are characterized by anxiety, being guarded, dependency and confusion. With this, the group members will cause more conflict for themselves.

Six Problem Behaviors:
*  Challenging authority
*  Resisting opinions or improvements made by others in the group.
*  Negative mindset about the group members or team.
*  Competition or sub-grouping
*  Questioning other's goals or resisting the goals of the group.

Working Through Conflict
According to Corey, Corey and Corey (2014), working through conflict allows the group to build a safe environment to vent and take risks with his or her emotions.
For middle school students having a safe place to work through his or her experiences and emotions would allow for middle school students to build appropriate relationships later on, outside of group.

Things to Avoid
The group counselor would need to avoid labeling  students and possibly individualizing students and placing the students into small sub-groups based around these preconceived labels  (Bernard, Burlingame, Flores, Greene et al., 2008).

Diversity
At times some cultures will dictate what members keep private and what members of the group share (Alle-Corliss & Alle-Corliss, 2009).
Group members need feel as though they are safe from bias opinions and can trust that what they say will stay within the group.

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Pelajar akan mula berinteraksi dengan ahli kumpulan kerana mereka akan berinteraksi dengan orang lain dalam lingkungan sosial mereka sendiri. Pada hakikatnya, mereka akan mencipta dunia interpersonal mereka yang selalu mereka tinggali, tetapi dalam kumpulan itu, menunjukkan bagaimana mereka berinteraksi dari hari ke hari. Dengan kata lain, mereka secara automatik dan pasti akan mula memperlihatkan tingkah laku interpersonal yang tidak sesuai - sehingga di mana kerja itu bermula

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Pelajar akan mula berinteraksi dengan ahli kumpulan kerana mereka akan berinteraksi dengan orang lain dalam lingkungan sosial mereka sendiri. Pada hakikatnya, mereka akan mencipta dunia interpersonal mereka yang selalu mereka tinggali, tetapi dalam kumpulan itu, menunjukkan bagaimana mereka berinteraksi dari hari ke hari. Dengan kata lain, mereka secara automatik dan pasti akan mula memperlihatkan tingkah laku interpersonal yang tidak sesuai - sehingga di mana kerja itu bermula

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First and foremost, group cohesiveness is extremely important for a group to function properly.

During the beginning stages of forming a group and pre-planning for the group, students will be screened for their appropriateness in the group, and for group cohesion.

School counselors should exercise caution when creating a group and its members (Sink, Edwards & Eppler, 2012). Homogeneity among the group is important in many ways such as the need to be in the group (resiliency group) and members being at the same developmental level. However, it is important to include students of different race, ethnicity, religion, culture, and so on, in order to give different perspectives (Sink, Edwards & Eppler, 2012).

During the middle school years, there are various perspectives on having mixed gender groups.  Evidence suggests that same-gender groups foster an environment in which members are able to maintain increased focus (Sink, Edwards & Eppler, 2012). When pre-planning and interviewing students for the group, the counselor will determine whether or not a mixed-gender group is more appropriate, or same-gender group.

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* Conflict within the group is going to happen.
*  According to Cole (2016), dealing with conflict within the group can allow the group members to grow and understand how to deal with the conflict, anger and other issues more effectively outside of the group setting.
* Cole (2016), states counselors should be more welcoming to conflict and not fear conflict within the group setting.

Click here for the YouTube Video
that explains conflict resolution and how to address conflict between two or more members within the group.

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Addressing conflict between two members of a small group

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Middle School Group Counseling /is extremely important to meet the social emotional, developmental and academic needs of students. In the video found below, "Group Therapy for Beginners", Dr. Robert Lefever does an excellent job of addressing the importance of group counseling, and explaining the benefits members receive by being part of a group therapy. The video serves as a very useful resource to help viewers gain a better understanding of the concept of group counseling, and it's importance in the school setting. While this video particular focuses on group counseling for addicts, the content of the video's group descriptions could easily be applied to the group dynamics of a school counseling/resiliency group for students who are at risk for academic, social and/or emotional failure.

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The overall characteristics of the group in the facilitating stage focus on orientation and exploration (Corey & Corey, 2016). At this stage, the focus of the group is also to work to begin establishing trust, which will be a critical component in assessing the overall success of the group requirements; if there is no trust, there is no reason to participate fully and meaningfully, resulting in negative outcomes for the both students and the impact of the group as a whole.

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Things to avoid at this stage include not having a structured environment to lead the group in, as this can easily lead to increased levels of anxiety, and there will probably be hesitation and requests from members for direction (Corey & Corey, 2016.).

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Group members who are in the storming stage tend to be more combative with each other. They will test the boundaries and see how far they can push the leader of the group or the school counselor. The group members tend to have more conflict with each other as the members are trying to understand who has the power in the group or who is the leaders within the group.

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Trust is critical in that it also represents safety, and how safe the student feels both physically and emotionally when working in this particular group. Trust can either be lost or gained by how the leader handles conflict or the initial expression of any negative reactions (Corey & Corey, 2016). Trust can be described as the faith you have in a person or program to accomplish what they promise to achieve or demonstrate. If the school counselor has trust in the group process and has faith in the members capacity to make significant changes in themselves, students will be likely to see value in their counseling group as a pathway to personal growth (Corey & Corey, 2016.). As the group leader, one of the most effective instructional strategies the school counselor can implement with students is teaching by example. Modeling behavior such as demonstrating acceptance of those who’s views may be different from their own will help students learn to accept others as unique individuals with the right to have differences from others, and view them as equals within the safe and effective learning environment in which they all share.

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When forming a counseling group, students may come from a wide variety of diverse social and cultural backgrounds, depending on the school demographic area. Being culturally aware is essential for a school counselor, as different cultures may have different expectations as to what they consider to be acceptable and unacceptable behavior or practice in a group setting. For example, some members may consider it to be inappropriate to disclose personal information in a public group setting; additionally, members that seem to be, "holding back", when they are really just being true to their cultural heritage (Corey & Corey, 2016).
In the following video, the school counselor demonstrates the use of incorporating a multicultural approach to group counseling with students in the school setting. The counselor in the video introduces the group by announcing an activity. In this activity, the counselor explains to the students that they will each be getting 6 strips on paper; on 4 of the strips of paper, the counselor asks students to write how they are similar or have something in common with someone else in the group. The counselor then directs students to write two things that are unique or special about themselves that makes them different from everyone else. When the students have completed the task, the counselor goes around and asks students to share what they have written on their strips. By sharing their similarities and differences, this helps promote cultural awareness in a group setting as students learn how they are the same or what they have in common with their peers, as well as what makes them different; and acknowledging that different doesn't mean bad, different is what makes you special and unique from everyone else, and realizing that everyone has something different about them, in addition to similarities. To view this demonstration, please click on the video below:

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Group Counseling with Children: A Multicultural Approach Video

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Yalom created 11 therapeutic factors, that assist with and explain the group therapy process and its benefits. Here is a synopsis of the 11 factors, and a wonderful YouTube video that explains these 11 factors and how they work in group therapy.

The instillation of hope creates a feeling of optimism.

Universality helps group members realize that they are not alone in their impulses, problems, and other issues.

Imparting information helps to educate and empower students with knowledge pertaining to their specific psychological situation.

Altruism allows students to gain a sense of value and significance by helping other group members.

Corrective recapitulation provides for the resolution of family and childhood events within the safety of the group family.

Socializing techniques promote social development, tolerance, empathy, and other interpersonal skills.

Through imitative behavior group members learn to adopt the coping strategies and perspectives of other group members.

Interpersonal learning teaches students how to develop supportive interpersonal relationships.

Group cohesiveness gives members a sense of acceptance, belonging, value, and security.

Catharsis releases suppressed emotions and promotes healing by disclosing information to group members.

Existential factors incorporate learning how to just exist as part of something larger than oneself. This factor brings a client into the awareness that life will continue on, with pain, death, sadness, regret, and joy. By living existentially, students learn how to accept these conditions without escaping from them. Instead, they learn how to live with them and through them (Levy, 2001).

Click here for the YouTube Video that explains Yalom's factors more in depth as they relate to group therapy in a clinical setting, however, these are still applicable to the school setting.

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When working with a small group, it is important to be up front and honest about the confidentiality rights regarding student and teacher expectations. Honesty is especially important at the secondary level, where many students may already be very wary or resistant to participating because they have not yet established a trusting relationship with the counselor. Before any deep discussions, inform students and their parents at the very beginning of the counseling session about the counselor’s obligations and responsibilities regarding confidentiality. The counselor may provide examples of when confidentiality may lawfully have to be broken, such as a situation where the safety or well-being of the student is at risk, such as when a student states that they plan to hurt themselves or others. Since no one in the group has really shared anything personal yet (as the counselor is still only in the introductory stage going over basic rules, class expectations, paperwork, etc.,), most students will be in agreement and acknowledge that this example meets the criteria of a situation where confidentiality should be broken. Even if the student has had previous thoughts of hurting themselves or others, since they have not yet revealed this information, they may not feel as concerned about news initially. Later on, if they do choose to share such information, they would have already been previously informed of the confidentiality obligations and responsibilities of the school counselor. Thus, there won’t be any unexpected surprises or breach in trust, as the counselor would have been up front with and honest with them from the very beginning.

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For the group opening activity, I would introduce the lesson, "The Reality Ride" from the Why Try program our group has chosen to implement for our group counseling sessions. "The Reality Ride" is appropriate for an opening lesson, as it addresses the overall purpose for the group, goals for the program (both long and short term), and provides students with the opportunity to identify and express their current frustrations, in a group setting with other students who are experiencing similar difficulties. "The Reality Ride" uses the metaphor of a roller coaster to help teach students the concept that there are two paths to take in life, one that leads to negative consequences ("crashing of the roller coaster"), and one that leads to positive consequences ("Freedom, Opportunity, and Self-Respect"). While one path seems faster and much shorter than the other, the result is a crash landing that will put you right back where you started in the beginning, with no reward. The other path is longer and has ups and downs, but the end result is worth the hard work, and is the positive outcome they truly wanted from the very beginning.
In addition to the lesson plan, I would also include the following "Why Try" video to show to students during the introduction to supplement the lesson plan. To view the full lesson plan, as well as the accompanying video, please click on the images below:

Full Lesson Plan:

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Reaksi Peribadi

I try to take a survey of the group members thoughts and feelings of what is going on within the group process to see how the group members can collaborate on an effective way to help each other.