The time is now!! Each year during Back to School Season, my co-counselors and I spend time and effort putting together a presentation for staff about our counseling program. This is such an important part of what we do! Whether you are a specialist teacher (ESL/EFL) or a mental health professional (school counselor, psychologist, etc), it is crucial to present to staff about your program and what your job entails. Even if you spend most of your work week on one campus, with the same colleagues and administrators, many staff on campus probably do not know all that you do during your work day. And this can be tricky- because when colleagues and administrators don’t know what we do, they might think we need things to do. Or worse, they might feel resentful if they think our job has less duties than their job. So, in this post, I will give you lots of tips and resources to create a presentation that lets you explain your dynamic program to your staff! As always, I’ve included a lot of helpful resources- just click on the green links below which will take you right to an article, video, or product you can use. Plus, my Bilingual Learner quarterly counseling newsletter just went out in August with lots of new resources and freebie downloadables- sign up in the newsletter box in the right column if you didn’t get your newsletter!
Before getting into all the details of our program presentations to staff, here are a few important Bilingual Learner updates…
BILINGUAL LEARNER UPDATES
- New Bilingual Learner Freebie on TPT: The Ten Commandments of Classroom Management with Behavior Chart!
- Here’s a new Bilingual Learner resource to present your program and yourself to your students and families! Check out the Meet Your Counselor booklet here.
- Lots of excellent group counseling guides and ESL/EFL lessons guides are ready to go! In order that you can get as many as you need, I have a Back to School buy-one-get-one-free deal going on ANY of the teaching or counseling eguides such as:
- Relajate: Bilingual Stress Management Group Counseling Guide with Spanish/English Activities
- ESL for Beginners Lessons Guides with Activities
- ESL in the Middle Lessons Guides with Activities
- The Unstressables: Stress Management Group Counseling Guide
- Get Your Goal On: Academic Achievement Group Counseling Guide
- Thanksgiving in America: Bilingual eBooklet & Funquiz
- ESL Survival Skills: Exploring US Culture (with Halloween activities!!)
- ESL Diagnostic Test with Scoring Key
- Girl World: Girl Empowerment Group Counseling Guide
- Charla Entre Chicas: Bilingual Girl Empowerment Group Counseling Guide
- Cope Into Hope: Grief Counseling Guide
- Be Cool: Anger Management Group Counseling Guide
- And More!! So head on over to my product page and get your freebies today. (Once you purchase your first eguide, just email me at bilinguallearner@hotmail.com with your receipt number and the title of the eguide you’d like for free and I’ll email you your freebie right away.)
- I am proud to be a part of 22 counselors who came together to share their best with you. Check out this amazing counselor ebook where every single page has a freebie.
- Follow Bilingual Learner now on our Instagram page @ instagram.com/bilinguallearner/ to see pics of my counseling and teaching adventures with students!
- Look for my new intermediate ESL guide, ESL in the Middle Volume Two, next month! It will be an intermediate English lessons guide for ESL/EFL students, organized into 4 weekly units. Here’s a freebie preview of the guide, so you can check it out!
- We now have a Texas School Counselor FB group to share ideas, exchange resources, ask questions, and get support on all things counseling! Join our FB group and add all your counseling colleagues here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1327148357311451/.
- Just-revised group counseling guides, Girl World, Charla Entre Chicas, and Get Your Goal On are ready! I provide free revised editions of all our Bilingual Learner guides to customers who request them- just email me at bilinguallearner@hotmail.com with your name, the name of the guide, the date you purchased it, and where you purchased it from (our website, TPT, Amazon, etc) and I’ll get an electronic version of your revised guide emailed right out to you!
PROGRAM PRESENTATION TO STAFF
So, at my school, we ask for 30-45 minutes of a semester one professional development day, and then we present our program to staff through a Powerpoint with handouts. We also include an ending activity where they can apply what we’ve presented to them. It is a lot of work to put the powerpoint together, but it pays off in spades, because for the rest of the year they understand what we do, how we help students, and how to utilize our services. In our presentation, we cover the following topics using lots of color, cartoons, memes, jokes, interesting anecdotes, games, prizes, and anything else we can think of to make the presentation as eye catching, interesting, and interactive as possible.
Presentation Topics
- The official characteristics and duties of our role in the school (according to the guidelines set by governing state, board, campus, national or professional organization)
- How we can support teachers in their work with students
- How we support students
- Procedures for how staff and students can utilize our services
- A summary of the top 3-5 most important points of our presentation
Here is a link to our counseling powerpoint presentation.
Here is a link to an excellent ESL/EFL presentation by Ms. Marnee Dubrowski.
PHOTO GALLERY!
Also, as promised in the previous August post, below are photos of our counseling office. I am still in the process of setting up my ESL/EFL classroom, so I will post those photos next month. However, I presented last month at a professional development workshop on how to include culture lessons in working with ESL/EFL/ELL students, so I’ve also posted a few pictures of this presentation below!
Bibliotherapy Corner Counseling Bulletin Board
College Swag Group Rules
Group Counseling Session Setup Entrance Area to Counseling Office
Presenting to Fellow Educators About How to Infuse Cultural Activities into ESL/EFL Lessons and Groups
That brings me to the end of this month’s post. Check back here again next month for my post on the art of saying no gracefully to non-counseling or non-ESL/EFL duties! As always, you can find out about Bilingual Learner’s latest promotions, free stuff, or my counseling/ESL adventures by following my Facebook Page, Twitter Page, or Pinterest Page. And don’t forget to follow me on my new Instagram Page!
Source: Bilingual Learner
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