Collaborative consultation

SECTION A (6 marks) 1. What are active listening responses and the reasons for using them ? 2. What are 'I messages' ? When do you use them and what are the reasons for using them ? 3. When is it appropriate for a collaborative consultant to make suggestions to a consultee about how they might address difficulties or problems ? 4. Why is it important not to ask a question at the same time as making an active listening response or when sending an 'I message' ? 5. Why is it important not to combine an active listening response and an 'I message' together in the same response ? 6. Why when listening or speaking as a consultant is eye contact, positive facial expression, and an open body posture so extremely important ? SECTION B (10 marks) For each of the following scenarios and responses, please indicate why you think the given response is inappropriate and provide what you think would be a better response. 1. A year 9 student confides in you as a consultant: "I don't get along with people my age. My classmates are not my type. I feel as though I am a person from another planet. My parents are divorced and hate each other. It is lonely being me." Response: "I think you are lonely because no one likes you. How do you get on with your parents ? Do you need to go to another school ?" 2. A mother confides in you as a consultant: "I had a very unhappy time at school when I was girl. Now whenever I come into school for a meeting with my child's teacher, I start shaking, feeling stressed and have a headache." Response: "I know how you feel. But the more you do it the easier it gets. Just keep persevering and it will get better." 3. A teacher confides in you as a consultant about a year 8 student: "I know why Tom is frequently absent from school. He is scared of me because I put pressure on him to complete his homework, but I won't change what I am doing " Response: "You feel frustrated because Tom is missing so many days from school." 2 4. You are in a picture theatre and someone keeps talking during the movie distracting your atttention. Response to the person talking: "I came here to hear the movie. I want you to stop talking during the movie." 5. Someone has just broken up with her boy friend. After telling a friend what has happened the friend responds: Response: “Just forget about him. I always thought he was a jerk anyway. There are lots of fish in the sea.” SECTION C (4 marks) In this section you are working as a consultant. Please indicate what you might initially say in response to the following situations, applying what you have been studying. 1. You are in an IEP team meeting and the discussion is getting nowhere. You are feeling frustrated and angry and decide to do something about it. What might you say, when might you say it and who might you say it to ? Why ? 2. When working as a collaborative consultant with a class teacher and a boy's parents, Sue the teacher asks the parents to punish their son at home whenever he misbehaves at school. As a collaborative consultant you are concerned at what the teacher has said. Why might you be concerned at what the teacher said ? As a collaborative consultant how might you respond and why ? SECTION D (5 marks) How might a collaborative consultant have tackled this consultation differently ? Jenny, a 54 year old, went to see an endocrine specialist to help her manage her diabetes. On her first visit the specialist weighed her, tested her blood sugar level, explored her symptoms and asked about any medication she was taking. He then told Jenny she needed to lose 25 kilograms and to go on a strict liquid only diet for the next 6 months and possibly for the rest of her life. He told Jenny that if she lost this amount of weight she wouldn't have any further symptoms of diabetes. No mention was made of any other way of managing her diabetes. The specialist was disappointed when Jenny appeared reluctant to follow his advice but the specialist didn't explore the reasons for her reluctance. He simply stressed how important it was for Jenny to follow his advice and that this was the way to overcome her diabetes. The session ended with Jenny being told to immediately start the liquid only diet which she could buy at her local chemist shop, and to return to the specialist in two or three weeks time for a follow-up appointment. If this specialist had been a collaborative consultant how might he have conducted this consultation differently and why ?