Educational Guidance

John Parankimalil

INTRODUCTION

Guidance is based upon a philosophy of human uniqueness, goodness, worth and dignity all of

which can be nurtured. The guidance processes are based on the belief that given certain

conditions, an individual’s potential to make a choice and make a decision can be utilized for

maximum benefit to the individual and society.

As a teacher, you may have come across youngsters who are confused and indecisive when

called upon to take decisions regarding choice of subjects, others activities in school or

interpersonal difficulties with friends or siblings at home. You may have often wondered what

you can do to help these children. Need for professional guidance is increasing due to

increasing complexities of daily living.

The goal of education is to bring out and develop the inherent potentialities of an individual.

Guidance has an important contribution in achieving these goals. School educational

programmes consist of a variety of co-curricular activities which can, if guided properly become

a vehicle for self-development.

MEANING OF GUIDANCE

To guide means to indicate, to point out, and to show the way. It means more than to assist. A

man falls on the street; we assist him to get up but we do not guide him unless we help him to

go in a certain direction.
The synonyms of ‘to guide’ are – to lead, to conduct, to regulate, to direct, to steer, to show, to

channel, to point.

Guidance involves personal help given by someone; it is designed to assist a person to decide

where he wants to go, what he wants to do, or how he can best accomplish his purpose; it

assists him to solve problems that arise in his life. It does not solve problems for the individual

but helps him to solve them.

The focus of guidance is the individual, not the problem; its purpose is to promote the growth

of the individual in self-direction. This guidance may be given to groups or to individuals, but it

is always designed to help individual even though they may be in group.

DEFINITION OF GUIDANCE

Ruth Strang. “Guidance is a process of helping every individual, through his own efforts, to

discover and develop his potentialities for his personal happiness and social usefulness.”

A.J. Jones. “Guidance involves personal help given by a competent person; it is designed to

assist a person in deciding where he wants to go, what he wants to do, or how he can best

accomplish his purposes; it assists him in solving problems that arise in his life. It does not solve

problems for the individual, but helps him to solve them. The focus of guidance is the individual

and not the problem; its purpose is to promote the growth of the individual in self-direction.”

Knapps. “Learning about the individual student, helping him to understand himself, effecting

changes in him and in his environment which will help him to grow and develop as much as

possible – these are the elements of guidance.”

Secondary Education Commission, 1952. “Guidance involves the difficult art of helping boys

and girls to plan their own future wisely in the full light of all the factors that can be mastered

about themselves and about the world in which they are to live and work.”

Crow and Crow. “Guidance is assistance made available by personally and adequately trained

men or women to an individual of any age to help him manage his own life activities, develop

his own points of view, make his own decisions and carry his own burdens.”

John Brewer. “Guidance is a process through which an individual is able to solve his problems

and pursue a path suited to his abilities and aspirations.”

Woodworth. “Guidance helps an individual to develop his personality and enables him to serve

the society to the best of his capabilities and talents.”

Kitson. “Guidance is ‘individualised education’. Each student is to be helped to develop himself

to the maximum possible degree in all respects.”

V.M. Proctor. “Guidance is a process through which an individual or groups of individuals are

helped to make necessary adjustment to the environment – inside or outside the school.”

Nature of Guidance

Guidance is education itself. Guidance aims at educating the individual for understanding

himself, unfolding his potentialities to their maximum so that he may eventually prove himself

to be an adjusted and pragmatic member of the community. Guidance therefore is a significant

education procedure. It is in short education itself.

2. Guidance is a process. Guidance is a process that enables an individual in discovering himself
(Options)
in the most satisfying and positive manner. It provides direction to enable an individual harness

his potentialities, abilities, interests and aptitudes.

3. Guidance is a continuous process. Guidance is a dynamic and a non-stop process. In this

process, an individual understands himself, learns to use maximum his own capacities, interests

and other abilities. He continues his struggle for adjustment in different situations. He develops

his capacity of decision-making.

4. Guidance is related with life. The process of guidance is related to life, its problems and

challenges and how to face them. Problems and challenges are the building blocks of our

personality. Guidance helps people to live a balanced and tension free-life with full satisfaction

under the circumstances.

5. Guidance is self-direction. The nature of Guidance is not to thrust itself on an individual. It

does not make choices for him. The ultimate purpose of guidance is guide the individual to

direct himself in the right direction, to make his own choices, to fix his own life-goals and to

carry his own burden.

6. Guidance is individual-centered. Whether given on individual or group basis, the focus of all

guidance programs is the individual who need to manage himself for a joyous today and a

happy tomorrow by a healthy alignment of individual desires and aspiration with socially

desirable good.

7. Guidance is a qualified and complex and organized service. Guidance is given by qualified

and trained personnel. Hence guidance is a skill-involved process. The varied and complex

nature of human life leaves its imprint on the guidance programs which are a totality of
experiences. Guidance depends on prior study of the individual, his assessment, initial

counselling, interview, case study and a host of other subsidiary activities that qualifies

Guidance as a complex process.

8. Guidance is based on individual differences. Individual differences or, the fact that

individuals differ significantly, forms the basis of Guidance. If all the individuals had been alike,

there was no scope for guidance. Individuals differ not only in their appearances but in their

mental and intellectual endowments, desires, aspirations, and aptitudes.

9. Universality of guidance. Guidance is for all. Every person needs guidance at all the stages of

life situations from childhood to old age. He needs guidance for solving problems to adjust in

the family as well as in the society.

10. Guidance is making potential actual. Studies indicate that each person is born with more

potential than he uses. Guidance programme aid the individual in the discovery of a hidden

potential individual for his own benefit that that of the community. Thus guidance programme

is used as an aid to discover the talent and use it for the progress of the country.

11. Preparation for future. The process of guidance is helpful in preparing a person for his

future. Guidance helps in the choice of one’s career, one’s partner in life etc. Guidance helps

the individual to march towards the future with confidence.

12. Modification of Behaviour. Guidance helps the persons in his adjustment in different

situations and to modify one’s behaviour. Negative personality traits have been modified

through skillful guidance and counselling. According to Carter V. Good, “Guidance is a process

of dynamic interpersonal relationship designed to influence the attitudes and subsequent

behaviour of a person.”
Goals of Guidance

Guidance and counselling programs are organized under three areas namely: educational,

vocational and socio-personal.

Educational Guidance:

 Help students with their academic difficulties and adjustment to school.

 Assist in developing appropriate educational plans by providing information about the

educational alternatives available to them at each stage of their schooling.

 Understand how education relates to occupational choices.

 Help both parents and children by giving information related to various courses and

different colleges/schools located in the region.

Vocational Guidance:

 Promote the culture of work ethics and dignity of labour.

 Help to explore career alternatives.

 Organise in-school and out-of-school experiences, activities and interest to learn more

about self and the world of work to make choices and plans.

Socio-personal Guidance:

 Help student understand the various physical and social-emotional developments that take

place in the concerned stage of life.

 Help students to know and appreciate themselves.

 Guide him to relate effectively with others.

 Help to overcome the fear, anxiety, tension, etc. Which hinder their well-being and personal

adjustment.
Scope of Guidance

The scope of guidance is too wide. In the words of Crow and Crow, “Guidance touches every

aspect of an individual’s personality- physical, mental, emotional and social. It is concerned

with all aspects of an individual’s attitudes and behaviour patterns. It seeks to help the

individual to integrate all of his activities in terms of his basic potentialities and environmental

opportunities.”

Any needy person can be guided. This can include the persons of different age, different

interests, various characteristics and persons of different nature. Hence, we cannot draw

boundaries around the process of guidance.

The following factors are responsible for the expansion of the scope of guidance.

1. Complex nature of personality. Industrialization brings with it a number of tensions such as

adjustment with the job, with the place of work, with the physical and social environment, and

also with the advancements of technology and modernization. To cope with all these, guidance

is essential. So the scope of guidance in the field of adjustment with almost all spheres of life

has increased.

2. Complexity of Occupation. In the process of industrialization, automation and cybernetics,

many new occupations are coming up and a few old occupations are dying. In U.S.A., an

average man changes seven occupation through his life. The trend is bound to effect as the

process of development will need very complex sophisticated and complicated occupations for
which higher educational background and intensive training will be necessary. This complexity

is bound to increase the scope of guidance in so many ways.

3. Complexity of Training. For the new jobs, new type of training, new courses of studies, use

of new types of machines and above all to prepare oneself for employment in the changing

world are some of the problems which will have to be tackled in an effective way, with the help

of guidance. The scope of guidance will be to put right man in the right job.

4. Increasing Areas. With the passing of time and complexity of circumstances, scholars like

Brewer have prepared about 10 areas of guidance i.e., educational, vocational, religious, home

relationship, citizenship, leisure time and recreation, personal well-being, right doing,

cooperation and cultural action. The fact remain that more complex the society, more will be

the need for guidance.

5. Migration. Because of industrialization process, people move from one state to other states.

In India, the states are quite different in their religion, culture, mode of living, dress, eating

habits and marriages. When they move from one social set up to another one, the problem of

adjustment becomes serious for which guidance is needed.

The similar types of adjustment problems are found when the people from one country migrate

to another country for employment, education or training, for which guidance if required.

6. The Expansion of Education. The days are gone when only a few privileged were to be

educated. Now, education has become asset for the nation and right placement of persons

need a lot of guidance.

7. Areas of guidance. The Scope of guidance is classified into several areas where and individual

needs guidance. These areas can be classified into educational guidance, vocational guidance,

personal guidance, social guidance, avocational guidance and Health guidance.

Thus guidance is a continuous, complex, dynamic and comprehensive process. Guidance is

concerned with educational, vocational and other problems along with personal problems.

Guidance work can occur anywhere and can be provided even through magazines, books and

correspondence.

Need and Importance of Guidance

Life problems are becoming more and more complex. Traditional mores and personal

convictions concerning rightness and wrongness of attitude and behaviour are breaking down.

Many diverse factors inherent within our home, school and social and occupational activities

and relationships pull us in different directions. We often find ourselves in such a state of

confusion and bewilderment that it is difficult to steer ahead without the help of a proper

guide.

It has been assumed that more is the advancement and modernisation; more will be the need

for guidance. It will be needed from the point of the individual, (i.e. interests, attitudes,

aptitudes, personality etc.) from the view of society (i.e. team work, socialisation, migration, job

performance etc). The absence of guidance may result all types of wastages. If a person makes

a wrong selection of profession, he is simply wasting his energy. If a student, having attitude for
Arts subjects, takes up Science subjects, he is also wasting his time, money and energy. If all

these persons had made use of guidance services, they would have made the proper use of

human energy. It reveals that every individual or student stands in great need of guidance

service.

We are all witness to the increasing problems of millions of children addicted to drugs and

alcohol, alarming number of abused children, teen suicides, gender bias disgraceful number of

homeless, resurfacing of various forms of prejudices, crime, violence, the school dropout and

unemployment problems, bankruptcy of values pervading all over the world and more so in the

third world countries. Many of these problems not only require remedial treatment but more

importantly, preventive efforts of the guidance profession, if they are to reduce to any degree.

Guidance helps an individual achieve well on various areas personal and social life, as well as in

educational and career pursuits, which would ultimately help in proper utilization of

manpower. A society consisting of well-achieving and adjusted individuals would contribute

more to achieving the national and social goals. Such a society would also have individuals who

are aware of social problems and can deal with them more humanely.

We shall highlight the need for guidance considering some reasons and factors:

1. Different stages of development. The bringing up of the human beings can be divided into

the stages of infant, childhood, pre-adolescent, adolescence and manhood. One needs different

types of help to adjust with every stage. The maximum problems are faced at the time of
adolescence, when there are problems due to physical development, mental development,

emotional development and social development.

2. Differences among persons. Psychology reveals that no two persons are alike and no two

person get similar opportunities in life. Hence, every individual needs the help of guidance

service, in order to know the particular kind of profession for which he is most suited.

3. Changing conditions of work. Gone are the days when a child was supposed to take up the

profession of his father for earning his livelihood. Now-a-days professions or occupations have

become so varied and so complex that everyone has at first to get general education and then

to undergo a long training for the profession to be adopted. He has also to get a special

education pertaining to that profession.

4. Educational growth. Guidance is needed for development of abilities and skills facilitating

learning and achievement, and habits and skills for lifelong learning.

5. Career Maturity. Guidance is required for the development of healthy and positive attitudes,

habits, values, etc. towards work through broadening aware of the world of work, planning and

preparing for one’s career.

6. Psycho-social development. Guidance is required for assistance for understanding and

developing a positive self-image and development of social skills for learning an effective and

satisfying personal-social life.

7. Guidance for good family life. It includes working with parents and children for

understanding of family relationship, attitudes towards home and role of family for healthy

growth.
8. Guidance for good citizenship. Guidance creates an understanding of socio-cultural values

and awareness of social issues, concerns and problems, overcoming prejudices, developing

right attitudes and values of co-operation, tolerance, righteousness and social justice for peace

and equality. Promoting ideas and values of democratic and secular constitution and promoting

unity and national integration.

9. Guidance for channelization of manpower requirements. Efforts at development and

channelization of individual potential with a view to meeting manpower and social

requirements for national growth and betterment of society.

10. Proper use of leisure time. Today many individuals waste their precious time with a lot of

unhealthy activities. People need to be guided to use their leisure time profitably. Proper

balancing of work and family is also important. Many youngsters roam around the streets with

nothing to do, having no purpose in life, waste away their health and time through drugs,

alcohol, gambling etc. Guidance will help them to make use of their leisure time to achieve

happiness, to enhance their education and career advancement.

11. Lack of Instructions at home. There is a lack of guidance for the young ones at home. In the

past, home acted as the most important agency of informal education. The children followed

the instructions given by parents and elders. Today, many parents are failed in this

responsibility. They are too busy in their work and transfer this responsibility to the teachers

who are also not in a position to guide them with their own responsibilities. So there is a need

for guidance cell in schools.

12. Improvement in the status of women. Due to the influx of women in almost all spheres

including active defence services, more and more women are taking up jobs. Because of the
double responsibility of home and office, women are facing all kinds of trauma, anxiety and

stress. They need guidance to adjust to this changing scenario, especially in a male dominated

society.

In short, Guidance will be required:

 To understand oneself, one’s talents, abilities and potentialities and also the limitations.

 To recognise and develop favourable attitudes and habits and the elimination of

undesirable traits.

 To develop resourcefulness and self-direction in adapting to changes in society

 To select appropriate courses in line with individual needs, interests, abilities and

circumstances.

 To get information on occupational opportunities and trends and suitable employment.

Principles of Guidance

Need for guidance, and the nature and aims of guidance are based on certain principles and

assumptions. The principles of guidance generally accepted are the ones given by Crow and

Crow. They are:

1. Principle of all-round development of the individual. Guidance must take into account the

all-round development of the individual when bringing about desirable adjustment in any

particular area of his personality.

2. The principle of human uniqueness. No two individuals are alike. Individuals differ in their

physical, mental, social and emotional development. Guidance service must recognise these

differences and guide each individual according to their specific need.

3. Principle of holistic development. Guidance has to be imparted in the context of total

development of personality. The child grows as a whole and even if one aspect of personality is

in focus, the other areas of development which are indirectly influencing the personality have

also to be kept in mind.

4. The principle of cooperation. No individual can be forced into guidance. The consent and

cooperation of the individual is a pre-requisite for providing guidance.

5. The principle of continuity. Guidance should be regarded as a continuous process of service

to an individual in different stages of his life.

6. The principle of extension. Guidance service should not be limited to a few persons, who

give observable evidence of its need, but it should be extended to all persons of all ages, who

can benefit from it directly or indirectly.

7. The principle of elaboration. Curriculum materials and teaching procedures should be

elaborated according to the view point of guidance.

8. The principle of adjustment. While it is true that guidance touches every aspect of an

individual’s life, it is chiefly concerned with an individual’s physical or mental health, with his

adjustment at home, school, society and vocation.

9. Principle of individual needs. The individual and his needs are of utmost significance.

Recognition of individual freedom, worth, respect and dignity is the hallmark of guidance.

Freedom to make a choice and take a decision needs to be respected and encouraged.
10. The principle of expert opinion. Specific and serious guidance problems should be referred

to persons who are trained to deal with particular area of adjustment for their expert opinion.

11. The principle of evaluation. The guidance programme should be evaluated in terms of its

effectiveness and improvement. Evaluation is essential for the formulation of new goals or re-

drafting the existing goals.

12. The principle of responsibility. Parents and teachers have great responsibility in the

execution of the work of guidance. The responsibility for guidance should be centred on a

qualified and trained person, who is the head the guidance centre.

13. The principle of periodic appraisal. Periodic appraisal should be made of the existing

guidance programme so that requisite changes, if any can be carried out for its improvement.

Conclusion. Wise and experienced leadership in guidance is, extremely important. It is often

said that “As the principal is, so is the school.” This statement holds equally for organized

guidance programs. Intelligent application of the basic principles to the operation of a school

program of guidance services has value not only for the young or older pupils for whose benefit

the program has been organized but also for their parents, the members of the school staff,

and the community at large.