An Interview with Steve Goodman and Isabelle Trowler, co-founders of the pioneering Reclaiming Social Work (RSW) model

“Essentially, RSW frees up social workers to work alongside families to help them change, taking much of the bureaucracy away from social workers. It also acknowledges what a difficult job child and family social work is, particularly in local authority child protection contexts. The Social Work Unit, led by a Consultant Social Worker, brings together a small group of staff to work with families, bringing a range of perspectives and skills to bear on the complex work that needs to be done. It ensures faster work that is more reflective, evidence-based and expert, which achieves good outcomes for children.”

October 10, 2011Education

Professor Joyce Lishman introduces the latest title in the JKP Research Highlights in Social Work series

Professor Joyce Lishman was previously Head of the School of Applied Social Studies, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, UK. She was also General Editor of the Research…

September 16, 2011Autism

British Medical Association (BMA) Honours Three JKP Titles at 2011 Book Awards

We were so thrilled that three JKP titles were honoured at the prestigious 2011 BMA Medical Book Awards, which took place on Wednesday, 14th September at BMA House in…

September 12, 2011Counselling

Transformative Supervision for the Helping Professions – An Interview with Nicki Weld

“As I talk about in the book, my best transformative moments in supervision both as a supervisor and supervisee have come from boldness and braveness. They’ve also come from courage and creativity, where the supervisor has brought their knowledge and understanding of a person into the room and made a connection, or asked a question that takes the supervisee on a new direction. It’s also when a supervisee has said, “I want to go further, I want to look deeper, not just ‘debrief'”.

August 22, 2011Social work

A different way of thinking about foster care – An Interview with Dr Annabel Goodyer

“I would like to think that fostering will become less regulated, less “professional” and more like normal parenting. We need to select foster carers who can be “Good Enough” stable parents to children and young people who can sometimes be difficult and demanding. We need to trust them to get on with the task and offer support, back-up and additional services when and if they are needed”

August 12, 2011Social work

Social Work Under Pressure – Fighting Monsters Blogger interviews JKP author Kate van Heugten

“It is possible that social workers may be somewhat more prone to stress and burnout because their relationship with clients is so central to their work. Their work efforts revolve around empathy and understanding of service users’ situations and this can be draining. They may not have been assisted to know how to handle this inherent stress in their training, and they may not be aware that setting boundaries is critical to self-care.”

August 5, 2011May 8, 2017Education

Looking beyond “bad” behaviour – Melanie Cross on the importance of recognising communication difficulties in young people

“Non-compliance might be due to not understanding what’s been asked and not knowing how to ask for clarification. What might be seen as a refusal to explain might be due to difficulties constructing coherent narratives. Conflict resolution and negotiation require high-level language skills and if these are lacking, then aggression can result. If adults do not recognise the underlying communication problems, the children and young people who experience them can be misunderstood and even misdiagnosed.”

August 2, 2011Arts therapies

Dramatherapy Approaches for People with Profound or Severe Multiple Disabilities – An Interview with Mary Booker

“I have so many memorable experiences of using Developmental Drama: Someone’s face full of laughter and sheer joy when their name is ‘drummed’ to a climax in the warm-up…The sudden, unexpected and totally right response to a new event in the story…A whole group of children with multi-sensory impairment huddled together, looking upwards in wonder at a new and bright ‘hole in the sky!’ It goes on and on. I am a very lucky person.”

July 28, 2011Arts therapies

“I so want to see people flourish at work through supervision” – An Interview with Robin Shohet

“I believe that something can only be changed when it has been fully embraced first and then it seems to drop away. Trying to change by will does not work and is a kind of violence because it is imposed, even if it is ourselves that is imposing it. So in order to facilitate change, we need to listen and accept first.”

July 14, 2011May 8, 2017Counselling

Creating Change for Complex Children and their Families at the Croft Child and Family Unit

“Through individual and group work we aim to get to know a child really well in order to identify their strengths as well as their weaknesses. We also work closely with parents and have an opportunity to see how family relationships work on a day-to-day basis. We use the information we gain from these close observations to establish a holistic, integrated understanding of all the important factors driving the child’s problems and then use this to plan interventions.”