Various types of supplementary materials are now available to aid leaders in motivating group interest in pertinent topics of discussion.
These materials need to be used with discretion, however. Supplementary group guidance materials include appropriate books, motion pictures and film strips, radio and television programmes, and tours or visits.
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Added to these can be “try-out” experiences for young people, especially on the junior- high-school level.
1 Reading Materials:
Much reading material for use with young people has been published. National Forum, Inc. has prepared a series of books and eye catching charts for guidance classes, grades seven through twelve.
Many pamphlets or handbooks, some for young people and others for teachers and counsellors can be obtained from Science Research Associates, Inc. Individual books and pamphlets as well as journals and magazines are available for use by young people, teachers, and counsellors, or parents.
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School people are beginning to recognise the value of utilising appropriate reading matter in connection with group-guidance projects.
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Some schools prepare their own pamphlets. Student handbooks are common in educational institutions from junior high school through college.
They also can be found in a few elementary schools. These handbooks include information of value to both’ the young people themselves and their parents.
A series of leaflets dealing with elementary-school counselling contains pen-illustrated, tersely stated information about the guidance services in the elementary schools of Tacoma, Washington.
Some of the titles are: “Ways to Use the Elementary School Counsellor”, “The Teacher as Counsellor”, ” Teachers and Counsellor Work Together”, and “How Counsellors Work with Parents”.
2. Audio-visual Aids:
Motion pictures films depicting life situations offer excellent approaches to guidance in group situations for pupils and parents.
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Also available for group sessions of teachers, teacher-counsellors, and counsellors are films in which ways of using guidance-pointed techniques in and out of the classroom are presented.
In the utilisation of motion picture films or film strips it is important that the members of the group be prepared for their showing and the subsequent discussion.
The leader of the group (1) selects an appropriate film and previews it, (2) makes certain that the running of the film goes smoothly and that the time consumed in its showing does not prevent immediate discussion of it, (3) alerts the group to the purpose of showing and suggests points to be considered during the showing, (4) after the showing, asks a few pertinent questions about what has been viewed, and (5) then encourages free discussion.
Unless the group is properly prepared for the viewing of a film, some individuals may concentrate on unimportant details and miss the film’s purpose. This situation is likely to occur especially in film-viewing by children.
Some of these programmes and recordings have guidance value. Like appropriate films, they can be used to pinpoint discussions in guidance class sessions.
Similar programmes presented on commercially sponsored radio and television networks can be recommended for viewing by parents as a basis for child-study group meetings. The suggestions offered for showing motion picture films should be followed here as well.
3. Other Group Guidance Media:
Visits by young people or parents to community agencies, such as health centers, local institutions of higher learning, or business houses and industrial plants, serve as aids to programmes of guidance in group situations.
The leader of the group or a member of the agency visited conducts a discussion on the agency’s offerings.
Try-out courses, especially on the secondary-school level, give young people an opportunity to observe, participate in and discuss in group sessions various occupational fields.
In some junior high schools, interested pupils may engage in several of these group-guidance experiences during the course of a school term or year. It is the counsellor’s responsibility:
1. to recommend to groups of pupils the kinds of courses for which they seem to be fitted by inter groups of pupils the kinds of courses for which they seem to be fitted by interest and special aptitude,
2. To follow them through their try-out activities, and
3. In group sessions, to discuss with them whatever they need or want to know about the occupations.