Skip to Main Content

Lancaster School Counseling Program: Guidance Services

Individual Counseling

Any student at Lancaster has access to the counseling office for individual counseling during their day.  My role at Lancaster is to provide counseling that is brief and solution-focused in nature.  I often work with students for several meetings, touch base with parents after a few weeks, and then determine whether outside counseling should be pursued.

 

Should your child need to spend more time with an outside therapist, I can easily provide a list of referral names and contact information to you.

Small Group Counseling

The majority of the groups I run are social skills groups.  Some of the students that participate in these groups may need to develop some new friendships.  Others struggle with making and maintaining last friendships.  There is a strong focus on the following:

 

  • conversational skills
  • listening to others
  • complimenting peers
  • taking turns
  • making eye contact
  • tone of voice
  • using appropriate body language

I also facilitate the following groups on an as needed basis:

 

  • Grief: Assists students who have experiences a recent loss of a loved one within the past 3 years.  Students in the group create a memory book celebrating that person's life and discuss the feelings of grief and loss.
  • Self-Esteem: Students in this group participate in games and discussion, artwork, role-playing, books, and videos to gain awareness of their strengths and acceptance of their weaknesses.  
  • Anger Management: Assists students in understanding what triggers their anger as well as recognizing the signals from their body that indicate they are angry.  The students then learn and practice strategies to control their anger. 
  • Anxiety- provides students with the tools they need to overcome their anxious feelings.
  • Character Development: This group discusses themes such as Respect, Responsibility, Acceptance, Honesty, etc.
  • Social Skills: - Provides students with the opportunity to practice necessary social skills such as listening skills, body language, turn-taking, play skills (or peer relationships depending on age appropriateness), conversational skills, emotional intelligence
  • Study Skills (4th & 5th Grades) - Promotes beneficial study, homework, test- preparation, test-taking skills, and organization techniques

Students can be referred for groups either through their classroom teacher or through the parents/guardians.  The groups run approximately 6-8 weeks and last 30 minutes.  The student's classroom teacher provides an appropriate time that the student can leave class so that the student will not miss any direct instruction.

 

*Groups are conducted based upon the demand and number of students available to participate.