Putting Analysis into Assessment, Second Edition: Undertaking assessments of need - a toolkit for practitioners

Putting Analysis into Assessment is the essential guide to improving assessment practice in child care social work. It addresses the issues of central concern to child care social workers, including analytical assessment, outlines how to avoid common pitfalls in thinking and practice, provides strong theoretical foundations, and successfully demonstrates how these theory can be translated into practice. With reference to common and specialist assessments, the book covers every stage of the assessment process: planning and preparation, hypothesising, involving children and making, recording and reviewing decisions. This second edition features new and tested practice tools, practice development sessions and activities, plus new sections on risk and resilience and assessing need and risk in chronic situations. This toolkit will be valued by practitioners, managers, trainers and lecturers looking for a grounded resource which bridges theory and practice, and provides clear guidance to improve assessments.

About the Author :
Ruth Dalzell has social work skills in field work, family placements and youth justice gained during 12 years of direct social work practice with children and families and has considerable experience in individual and group work with children, young people and adults. At NCB for 9 years she instigated, managed and delivered practice development projects, consultancy, policy activity, conferences, seminars and training courses and developed a well regarded network for children's services managers and planners. Ruth has published widely on practice development issues for children's services. She now works as a consultant. Emma Sawyer has worked as a social worker, manager and trainer, she has extensive experience of working with children and families with complex and challenging needs. Whilst working for NCB, Emma published several resources on how services can best work together to support parenting more effectively.

Review :
As social workers are striving to push back the excessive levels of bureaucratisation and increase the space for professional practice, this excellent book offers easily understood ways to improve critical reasoning skills and will be useful for individuals, teams, and agencies. Professor Eileen Munro Social Policy Department, London School of Economics I found the sections on resilience particularly helpful - and when I made use of the section on how to use research skills (e.g. developing hypotheses and cultural awareness) it received excellent feedback from students. Students commented on how it helped them to make sense of research skills, which they had previously struggled with and which with the best will in the world they had often seen as being somewhat distanced from their practice. Ruth Neville, Principal lecturer, Division of Social Work, University of Huddersfield