Coaching and Counselling for Health and Wellbeing

Subject Overview

Promoting, motivating, and supporting health, wellbeing, and positive behaviour change, is a highly valued and necessary competency for many professional roles, particularly in the areas of health/mental health, psychology/counselling/coaching, disability and rehabilitation, complementary medicine, welfare, community outreach, human resources, and management. Many people, however, would like to feel better equipped and trained in this area of their work. Coaching and Counselling for Health and Wellness examines a range of evidence-based and best-practice approaches to coaching and counselling for health and wellbeing, and develops practical skills via peer and client practice, under supervision.

Learning Outcomes

1. Competently apply coaching and counselling micro skills when working with a real client on goal setting and behaviour change. 
2. Integrate subject learning material, practitioner approaches, and selected models, to competently plan, organise and conduct coaching sessions with a client. 
3. Evaluate and justify, from a professional coaching/counselling perspective, the approaches used in the four coaching sessions, and incorporate reflective practice, including identifying applicable improvements to successive sessions. 
4. Apply reflective practice to one’s own personal development as a professional practitioner in the coaching/counselling arena. 
5. Integrate goal-setting and behaviour change principles, in order to design and create client-oriented goal-setting/behaviour change templates. 
6. Practice and develop coaching and counselling techniques with a student partner ‘client’, across a range of issues and contexts. 
7. Understand and apply a range of interpersonal communication tools, including assertiveness training, and conflict resolution techniques. 
8. Understand and discuss selected models, evidence-based and best-practice approaches popular in coaching and counselling, and apply these approaches working with a student partner ‘client’, and with a volunteer client for 4 sessions. 
9. Understand a range of cultural contexts applicable to working with clients. 
10. Understand and apply professional ethical practices as outlined in the Australian Counselling Association’s code of ethics.

Assessments

• Assessment 1: Reflective practice journals (10%, due week 4)
• Assessment 2, Part A: Conduct 2x 1 hour coaching sessions and submit a critical analysis of sessions 1-2 (45%, due week 6)
• Assessment 2, Part B: Conduct 2x 1 hour coaching sessions and submit a critical analysis of sessions 3-4 (45%, due week 10)