Give_a_Critical_Account_of_a_Reflective_Practitioner_Model’

Contemporary Social Work 2008-2009 Second Assignment ‘Give a critical account of a reflective practitioner model’. This essay will critically analyse the significance of reflective practice in contemporary social work. It will do so by giving an overview of reflective practice and by discussing the advantages as well as the disadvantages. The essay will describe Kolb’s learning model and compare this with others, whilst showing how they can relate to reflective practice. The essay will commence with a definition of social work and the expectation of the social work role. Finally, it will give opinions from social workers currently in practice who have been on how they use reflective practice in their day to day work. The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) has defined social work as follows: ‘A profession which promotes social change, problem solving in human relationships and the empowerment and liberation of people to enhance well being. Utilizing theories of human behaviour and social systems, social work intervenes at the point where people interact with their environments. Principles of human rights and social justice are fundamental to social work’ BASW (2003). Whilst this statement shows that values and principles are central to the social work role, it is difficult to imagine how all of this can be achieved without thought and consideration of work practice. Therefore reflection can be a key skill to learn and a way to develop working practice which is anti oppressive as well as empowering for service users. As part of the GSCC (2005 p 16) requirements for the social work post qualifying specialist award (PQ), it is stated that social workers need to ‘use reflection and critical analysis to continuously develop and improve their specialist practice, including their practice in inter-agency contexts, drawing systematically, accurately and appropriately on theories, models and up to date research’. As Adams, Dominelli & Payne, (1998) PAGE suggest reflective practice requires social workers to ‘interpret our role in the world and focus on the particular combination of elements that social work takes up in the situation before us’. Furthermore, (Walker, (2008) considers that it creates the ability to link theory and practice with creativity and flexibility. The needs to reflect is similar to how most individuals lead their lives, insomuch as they would not make important decisions without considering the pros and cons. Therefore, as service users, they would and should expect that social workers would be giving time and thought to their interactions with them. As Milner & O’Byrne (2002, p.4) argue, knowledge is developed through interactions with other people and state ‘we do not suggest there is a single correct way to analyse human situations, but encourage social workers to be reflexive and develop a pragmatic truth that fits social work situations in a way which is most satisfying for service users, the end product being a story that is helpful to all concerned’. They go on to say that social workers should acknowledge the power they hold and that one way of doing so is to consider multiple interpretations of the situations they encounter. However, in order for reflection to be effective, it needs to be critical in nature. In other words, the analysis of events needs to be considered in a way that weighs up both positive and negative factors that have occurred in any interaction. The next paragraph will discuss this aspect in more detail. Gould & Baldwin (2004, p 1) refer to a sketch by the comedian Peter Cook where he is discussing the failure of his restaurant (which only served two dishes). When asked if he had learned from his mistakes he replied ‘I have definitely learned from my mistakes… and I could repeat all of them exactly again’. Whilst this is a humorous example, it highlights how reflection serves no real purpose if one does not learn from the mistakes that have been made. As Brookfield (1987) cited in Brown & Rutter (2006, p4) suggests, ‘thinking critically involves our recognising the assumptions underlying our beliefs and behaviours. It means we can give justifications for our ideas and actions. Most important, perhaps, it means we try to judge the rationality of these justifications’. Similarly as Yelloly & Henkel (1995) cited in Carnwell & Buchanan (2005,p.61) argue, ‘the capacity to draw back in order to reflect on what is happening...enables learning to take place in a way which allows thought-less action to become thought-ful’. Therefore, the ability to be critically reflective is a learning process that increases as skills are developed by the experience of interacting with a diverse range of service users. However, the ability to learn different concepts, such as critical reflection, can be linked to own personal preferences or abilities; but can also be enhanced by using learning models. In this respect Kolb (1984) developed an experiential learning model which will be described in the next paragraph. Kolb theorised that learning occurs in a continuous cycle. He considered that learners can move from concrete experiences, to reflective observation, to abstract conceptualisation and finally active experimentation. When applied to social work, Kolb’s theory would mean that knowledge learned at college for example, can be directly linked to different contexts, such as placements or in the workplace. In other words, when working on placement one can consider theories and principles that have been learned and apply them within actual practice. Kolb refers to this as concrete experience and how from this, one can reflect on events that have occurred and move on to applying theories, principles and concepts of social work. In doing so, one can then apply that learning to future concrete experiences. The continuous nature of the cycle means that one can start within the cycle at any point (Walker, 2008) Kolb’s theory therefore suggests that ‘theory and practice flourish and enrich each other in a never-ending circle’ (Brechin, Brown & Eby, 2000, p54). Whereas Schon (1983) developed a reflection in action model, which hypothesized that reflection should occur in action and on action within practice. In other words, in practice during the event, and on practice after the event. Wilson, Ruch, Lymbery & Copper (2008) when referring to Schon’s perspective, suggest that social workers are often unable to express what is going through their minds when interacting with service users. It is only after the event that they are able to recall their thoughts and feelings and reflect upon them. They suggest that the ability to reflect in action becomes greater as the experiences of doing so increase. Whereas, Lishman (1998) in Wilson et al p. 103) argues that, ‘we need to develop our self-awareness and capacity for critical reflection in order to ensure that our motivation and past experience are used to enhance our practice’. Whilst both models mentioned have positive merit for learning how to be reflective, it could be argued that the most significant method of learning is actually ‘doing the job’. This in itself not only gives one the opportunity to have direct contact with service users but also the opportunity to discuss thoughts and feelings with co-workers.