Video quick keys
Transcript

Have you created a personal profile? sign in or create a profile so that you can create alerts, save clips, playlists and searches.

Length: 0:00

Planning homework

Video Type: In Practice

Transcript

Auto scroll
  • Tools
    Tools icon close
    • Cite
    • Share
    • Embed
    • Download PDFopens in new window
Summary

Noah is a 30 year old graduate student, married to Joanne with a 3-year old daughter, Samantha. His life is currently very hectic, and he has been struggling with the pace of things. He has been concerned about his mood lately, saying he feels “down” much of the time. In one session, he reports distress about an incident that happened a few days ago. He was in a small town and met another young man, who, upon learning that Noah was Jewish, asked “How come you're not in the ovens?” David and Noah here agree on some possible “homework” for the coming week. The exchange follows on two segments from Chapter Thirteen: Directing attention to an embodied emotion and Identifying exceptions to emotions. Noah has identified previous activities that helped to counteract the problem of “the racing” (feeling stressed and overwhelmed) that he has described. How does David prepare Noah for entertaining homework for the week ahead? What does he do to ensure Noah's plan is concrete and achievable? What additional task does David pitch into the mix and why? What aspects of the counselor's practice might you have done similarly/differently? In effect, homework is goal-setting. It involves collaborating with clients to establish some steps they will take which will hopefully lead to a preferred outcome. Not all clients are interested in establishing concrete homework tasks for the week between therapeutic conversations. In this case, Noah has clearly shown he is interested in concrete tasks, and David reminds him of that before joining Noah in planning homework for the week ahead. As in any collaborative goal-setting, David anticipates obstacles to achieving the homework and invites Noah to anticipate these, so that the agreed-upon tasks are achievable in Noah's present context.

locked icon

Sign in to access this content

Get a 30 day FREE TRIAL

  • Watch videos from a variety of sources bringing classroom topics to life
  • Read modern, diverse business cases
  • Explore hundreds of books and reference titles