his book provides a framework for professional expertise and practice for our times. Professionals must deal with complex and unpredictable situations and balance competing interests. What specific knowledge and skills should they develop to be able to work flexibly and confidently? How is the often stereotypical knowledge of the novice student transformed into responsive ways of working in uncertainty? This book grounds these issues in a study of contemporary professional practitioners as they developed their expertise over a period of five years beginning with their preliminary training. It describes their initiation into practice and their progression towards professional effectiveness. Using an analysis of patterns in the development of experienced practitioners, the authors create a theory of professional expertise for practice in conditions of uncertainty. The book also proposes educational strategies to help develop this expertise.

Professional Expertise: Practice, Theory and Education for Working in Uncertainty

Politics & Social Sciences

Fook, J.

Ryan, M.

Fook, Professor Jan

Social Sciences

Whiting & Birch Ltd.

Professional practice is in crisis. The formal theoretical knowledge on which practitioners base their practice is often outstripped by rapid changes in the contexts of this practice. The unpredictability of workplace and broader contexts often renders existing traditional practices irrelevant or ineffective. How can practitioners develop new ways of working which are flexible and responsive? The reflective approach, whereby practitioners draw out their theories of action directly from their own practice, is becoming increasingly popular as a new approach which enables breakthroughs in practice impasses. Yet reflectivity is often difficult to teach and learn because it challenges traditional, often unquestioned, paradigms of knowledge development. Therefore, rather than simply arguing for a reflective approach, this book makes a unique contribution by actually modelling the use of the reflective approach in practice. Students, educators and practitioners are able to read illustrations of how individual social workers used a reflective process to break through specific dilemmas in their practice. Thus, they are enabled to understand a reflective approach by gaining in insight into their experience of it. Contributors to this volume come from Australia, the United Kingdom and North America. Their personal backgrounds are diverse. They report on seminal experiences in a wide range of settings, from community work in the Gorbals, to hospice care in Sydney, from child protection to work with addictions. The book will appeal to: . Trainers and managers in social work, social care and health . Social work students and trainees . Social work academics . Professional and vocational educators generally who are interested in gaining practical insights into the development of reflective understanding. Lindsey Napier is Senior Lecturer in Social Work at the University of Sydney. Jan Fook is Professor of Social Work, Deakin University, Geelong, Australia

Breakthroughs in Practice: Theorising Critical Moments in Social Work

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