Three Different Approaches To Group Counseling

On the website, people.vcu.edu, it was said that group counseling starts as early as five and could go all the way up to age 18. With that said, different age groups were broken up so it could accommodate a specific age groups. In the beginning, just to sum up everything about children in group counseling, there are three different approaches when dealing with children in group counseling. The three different approaches are Crisis, Problem, and Growth centered groups. In a Crisis-centered group, this deals with a child or a group of children that have a conflict with each other or a disagreement. Depending on the situation, the child or the group of children that are not on the same page with each other meet up to discuss how the situation …show more content…
One thing a counselor may need to work on is not voicing their opinion to much because then it will look like counselors will judge them. Not only will teens feel like their being judge but they will take offense to what is being said by the counselor or even the group members. Some of the other problems that go on in a group dealing with children is probably the number one problem which is disruptiveness. Making sure the rules are established in the beginning is very important. Every child wants to get their point across and they always want to interrupt when someone else is talking. If a problem in sues and the problem within the child cannot be resolved, then you must ask that child or whom ever to leave the group. You want the dismiss of a child to be the last thing because they need to know how important it is to stay in the group so whomever can benefit from it. Another area of concern is polarization. This happens when the group is starting to become divided. It’s up to the counselor to make sure everyone is on the same page and let the children know that is very important that everyone sticks …show more content…
Also, within a session there will always be disagreements. It’s up to the counselor to turn that into a positive and let the group know that even though they are voicing their opinion, it’s always important to be respectful of others. Finally, in talking about this particular topic, the response within the counselor and other members of the group is important. Everyone feelings are very important within the group because if one doesn’t like the others response then that child or group of children may not come back for another session. Usually, it’s important to make sure that everyone response is honest but respectful. May want to acknowledge that you mean no harm in your response but I just want to let you know how the you or the other person may feel. The last problem that counselors may deal with are the parents of the children. Sometimes parents want to know what takes place in the session so that they can learn more about their child. Even though the parents that want to know what’s going on in the sessions, which is always a good thing, counselors can’t divulge information like