Training Material: Working in Group Care: Social Work and Social Care in Residential and Day Care Settings

Working in Group Care: Social Work and Social Care in Residential and Day Care Settings
Adrian Ward, BASW/Policy Press
ISBN 1861347065,
£17.99

STAR RATING: 4/5

This book offers an extremely useful theoretical and practical framework for analysing what happens in social work in a range of group settings and applies this to practice, writes Nichola Glover-Edge.

This second edition reflects the growth of service-user empowerment and embraces the changes in government and local policy.

The book has four perspectives and takes you on a journey from working within the contexts of group care, the team and its task, expectations of a worker and, most important, the service user’s experience of the care setting.

It focuses very much on the fundamental issues that as a worker you will need to address and the responsibilities that you will have to undertake within the realities of every day care and support.

It is excellent at looking at the how and why things happen, and provokes thinking. This is backed by some of the writers’ own experiences and emphasises the actual right and needs of the people using services.

The book is written in a jargon-free style and for issues that need further reading it provides an excellent reference guide.

Although the book is aimed at everyone working in social care, it lends itself more ideally to those who are going to undertake placements as part of social work learning and development.

Nichola Glover-Edge is a day services manager in Staffordshire