Set Specific Goals for Each Study Session
Counselling and guidance, referred to as psychological and educational support, provided to pupils/students in nursery schools, schools and other educational institutions involves identifying pupils’/students’ individual developmental and educational needs and psychological and physical abilities, and environmental factors which have impact on their functioning in a nursery school, school or educational institution; and addressing the needs identified. The assessment of children’s and young people’s developmental needs is one of the main responsibilities of teachers and specialists working with them. First, given the opportunity to engage in a learning activity, a student determines if the activity is one that is known to be interesting. If so, the student engages in the activity. If not, then the student evaluates the activity on two factors—the stimulation (e.g. challenge, curiosity, fantasy) it provides and the personal control (e.g. free choice, not too difficult) it affords. If the student perceives the activity as stimulating and controllable, then the student tentatively labels the activity as interesting and engages in it. If either condition becomes insufficient, then the student disengages from the activity—unless some extrinsic motivator influences the student to continue. If the activity is repeatedly deemed stimulating and controllable, then the student may deem the activity interesting. Then the student will be more likely to engage in the activity in the future. If over time activities that are deemed interesting provide little stimulation or control, then the student will remove the activity from his or her mental list of interesting activities. The challenge, then, is to provide teaching and learning activities that are both stimulating and offer students a degree of personal control. Self-reflection is a powerful tool for supporting meaningful change. Techniques teachers use to promote self-reflection include exploring a student’s values and then considering how his/her choices align with those values. During this conversation a student should become aware of incongruences between her values and realities, and is thereby empowered to make different choices and plan appropriately. Assessments can also enable self-reflection. Assessments may focus on values, personality characteristics, or specific skills. In IXPOE a teacher works with the student to make sense of the feedback from the assessments and create an action plan for working on opportunity areas.
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