71Process
Students share their examples of poor attending. Then they discuss the impact of
the counselor’s poor attending skills on the patient. The patient can offer her or his
impressions of the counselor’s behaviors after the other students have
commented.
Estimated time: 10 min.
Activity 7b: High-Level Attending Skills Model
Instructor and the same volunteer repeat the same role-play, only this time the coun-
selor displays good attending skills. Students take notes of examples of good attend-
ing behaviors.
Estimated time: 5 min.
Process
Students share their examples of good attending. Then they discuss the impact of
the counselor’s attending behaviors on the patient. They also contrast this role-play
to the low-level role-play.
Estimated time: 10 min.
Instructor Note
- After each role-play, students could work together in Think-Pair-Share dyads to
identify examples of attending behaviors and their impact on the patient before
sharing as a whole class.
Activity 8: Attending Skills Role-Play (Triad)
Three students practice physical attending skills in 5-min role-plays taking turns as
counselor, patient, and observer. Allow 10 min of feedback after each role-play.
Students should focus on using good physical attending behaviors. They can refer
to the section on Effective Counselor Physical Attending Behaviors for examples of
good skills.
Estimated time: 45 min.
Process
In the large group, discuss the following: How was it to do this exercise? What are
you learning about attending in general? About yourself?
Estimated time: 20 min.
Instructor Note
- Some individuals have very powerful nonverbals (e.g., a strong, loud voice,
piercing gaze, etc.). If this is the case for any of the students, the instructor
should give them feedback about how they might tone down intense
nonverbals.