Can you say that PSHS learners are the typical adolescents describe in the material I shared with

you?

Based on your readings and perhaps personal experiences, how can adults/helpers support adolescents’
optimal health and development?

There are specific requirements for one to become an effective teacher-counselor and to ensure that
the helping process is successful. Based on the PSHS Learners’ Profile, please answer the following
questions:

A. What are the common characteristics and challenges of your learners?

B. What are the characteristics (knowledge, skills, values, and attitudes) a PSHS teacher-counselor
should possess/develop in relation to your answer in A?

What factors do you need to consider when counselling a client whose cultural background differs
significantly from your own?

Explain why understanding personal biases and values is important for the counselling professional.

Explain what are the counselor’s ethical and professional obligations are in regard to the following
scenarios:

a) A student tells the counsellor that he is using illegal drugs and selling them to his peers.

b) A student tells the counsellor that she has been shoplifting regularly at the local shopping center.

c) A student tells the counsellor that he hated his younger siblings that sometimes he feels like “killing
them”.

Consider the following case scenario.

You and the student you are helping have developed a strong rapport over the months that you have
been meeting. During a session, the student presents you with a jar of chocolates to thank you for your
support and assistance. You graciously accept and display them in your office. A few weeks later you
receive tickets to a concert from this same student. The student explains that his parents handles many
large advertising and sponsorship accounts and that it is common practice for them to give advertisers
and sponsors free tickets, as a way of thanking them and also to keep their business. They often have
spare tickets and love giving them away because the tickets get used and it costs them nothing. He tells
you that he mailed them to you because you happened to mention that you are a fan of the performer.
Not long after, you receive gift vouchers to a day spa from this student. Again, the student insists that
they are purely to say thank you for all of your assistance and support.

Describe the moral and ethical dilemmas you, as the counsellor, are facing. How would you resolve
them?

After meeting with a 17-year-old high school student who has been truant from school and has a history
of acting-out behaviors, you find evidence that an uncle who is five years older than she, molested her
when she was 12 years old. What are your moral, ethical, and legal obligations?

On a daily basis we are generally not faced with such difficult situations as the one just described,
however, as teachers and helpers we are periodically confronted with complicated and sometimes
delicate situations in the work that we do. In these moments, we need to know how to respond. If we
are to respond in the best manner possible, it is important that we know the difference between our
moral, ethical, and legal obligations.

Morality is generally concerned with individual conduct and often reflects the values from an
individual’s family, religious sect, culture, or nationality.

In contrast, ethics generally describes the collectively agreed-upon “correct” behaviors within the
context of a professional group (Remley & Herlihy, 2010).

Therefore, what might be immoral behavior for a teacher might be ethical behavior for a counselor. For
instance, relying on his or her sect’s religious writings, a teacher might oppose abortion. On the other
hand, relying on ethical guidelines that assert a client’s right to self-determination, a counselor will not
stop a client’s decision to have an abortion.

Sometimes an individual’s moral beliefs will conflict with his or her professional ethics (when a
counselor’s religious beliefs concerning abortion are in conflict with ethical obligations to preserve the
client’s right to self-determination). Clearly, trying to make sense of one’s values, what is personally
“right” or “wrong,” and professional ethics can at times be quite an undertaking. And to make things
even more confounding, sometimes the law will contradict one’s values, sense of morality, and even
professional ethics (examples: the legalization of abortion and divorce, death penalty, use of
contraceptives).
Finally, despite the fact that ethical codes guide our behavior, perceptions of what is or is not ethical can
vary greatly.