Page 3 - euroguidance-insight-newsletter-2014-autumn

occupational psychologists - aims at deepening school
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counsellors’ knowledge which is essential for providing
pupils with career guidance services. Upon completing the
seminar, the participants are expected to achieve learning
outcomes such as:

• understanding the school counsellor’s role of in the
process of guidance
• upgrading their understanding of the career decision
making process and career development path

• applying assessment techniques for enhancing
pupils’ individual capacities for decision making

• enhancing cooperation skills with teachers, parents
and community stakeholders in order to support
pupils’ career development.

... to name but a few.

Apart from school counsellors who are directly involved in the
guidance process, teachers also play their part in defining
their pupils’ career paths. Working closely with pupils often
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enables teachers to get to know them better than the school
counsellors, whose work per se does not imply daily contact
with students.

Also, through assigning homework and in-class assignments,
teachers play a vital role in developing their work habits. This
is precisely why the Euroguidance seminar is trying to equip
teachers with techniques tailored for assessing individual
abilities, work motivation and occupational interests of their
pupils.

Over two days of plenary lectures and interactive small-group
workshops teachers discussed learning and behavioural
issues of pupils that may interfere with school success and
future career. They learned how to introduce the topics
related to the development of educational/vocational interests
in classrooms. This ranges from history classes, where pupils
can discuss how certain occupations have changed over the
past, over biology classes where learning about the human anatomy could easily set ground for
learning about specialists in medicine, linking body parts to the medical field (e.g. heart –
cardiology), to Croatian and foreign language classes where writing their first CVs and
motivational letters encourages pupils to reflect on their own individual strengths. Also, by
encouraging teachers’ collaboration with other school staff members, parents and local career

1 Trainers: Darja Masli! Ser"i!, Ph.D., Professor of W/O Psychology, Department of Psychology, University of Zagreb;
Vlasta Vizek Vidovi!, Ph.D, Professor of Educational Psychology, Institute for Social Research, Zagreb.

2 An elementary school techer is assigned between 90 and 270 minutes of classroom work with the same group of
students per week.

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