Counselling Approaches for Skills Acquisition among Adolescents in Yenagoa Metropolis, Bayelsa State

Effective counseling approaches for skills acquisition among adolescents are essential for equipping adolescents with practical skills needed for self -reliance and productivity. But socio -economic challenges in our society are increasingly multiplied in the form of low productivity, low self-reliance, high unemployment rate, high crime rate, societal unrest and other social vices among our youths due to inadequate knowledge gap on counselling approaches on skill acquisition. Thus, this paper seeks to investigate the relationship between counselling approaches like career counselling, vocational training, life skill development, and personal development; and skill acquisition in Yenagoa metropolis, Bayelsa State. This paper adopted a survey design using a sample of 120 secondary school students in Yenagoa metropolis. The study also adopted Spearman Correlation Coefficient data analyses techniques at 0.05 significance levels with the aid of SPSS software version 23. The result revealed that, career counselling approach, vocational training counselling approach, life skill education counselling approach and personal development approach are all positively, strongly and significantly related to skill acquisition among adolescents in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State. The study therefore recommended that; school leadership should collaborate with counsellors to engage her pupils and students on career counselling to encourage skill acquisition among adolescents, schools should incorporate vocational training in to its curriculum, create time for pep talks on life skill education with pupils/students, and school should inform its pupils and students of the importance of personal development counselling.