Critically examine whether social work assessment adequately represent children

Critically examine whether social work assessment adequately represent children

Importance of s. work assessment

Assessment is a dynamic process that keeps going all through the working process with service users. It is expected of social workers to execute an original assessment of the encountered situation before taking any action. Social work assessment involves the process of collecting and interpreting information so that they can understand an individual and their circumstances. It is important to note that an assessment does not only occur in the beginning but throughout the process. This needs to be done because if an assessment is poorly done, the involved children may be exposed to extreme emotional or physical mistreatments, and in some cases, they may experience placement breakdowns. Before submitting any assessment report, the practitioner involved should counter check what she has noted to avoid errors that might cause more damage to a child.

Social work assessment helps the worker to understand and get to know the situation he is handling so that they can identify with it. After following the case, it becomes easy for the social worker to come up with the best solution and way to handle the present situation. The children in participation give their thoughts about their lives, and the information assists in determining how much help is needed. The given information, however, must be verified to avoid errors and to assist in working with accurate and reliable information. Sometimes the worker would have to stay in the assessment place for long so that they can make the necessary observations and ensure that what they have accurate. In doing this, it is often easy for the social worker to determine whether one is in potential danger or not.

Social work assessments help in the determination of children capable of suffering potential harm. Sometimes it is, however, tough for these children to get the protection they need after the assessment process is over because of parental and court issues. Despite these factors, the assessment helps in understanding and the decision-making process so that a child is rescued from a potentially harmful home or parent. If the assessments are done earlier, and children are saved from dangerous homes, it impacts positively on the life of a child. It is so because, if for example, a parent is abusive to the child, rescuing the child would save the child from a lot of trauma. Taking the child to a loving home and seeking counsel would assist in the child’s growth.

The use of assessment framework

The needs of children are different more so children with disabilities as compared to healthy kids. It is expected of the Assessment Framework to individually assess every child’s needs, no matter how the child looks like. Additionally, they should evaluate if the involved parent is capable of care for all the children and also how the environmental factors have effects on the development of the child. It gives a practice framework, and the social workers are expected not to use it as a manual. When talking of the disabled or physically challenged kids, their assessments present various challenges and complexities. For instance, if a child in question is disabled, it is sometimes required of the social worker to tailor the recording templates of the child so that their abilities, strengths, and various needs are captured with their preferred communication method during the assessment. If social workers use the modes on the assessment framework properly as their manual, then every child, including those with disabilities, would be equally represented. There is a variety of information needed in the assessment process, and they may include the following:

The development of the child

For every good assessment, the social worker needs to understand and have the knowledge of the needs for the child development were variable. It should also ensure that the recorded results focused more on the child and not only the individuality of the child. Before a social worker notes down and concludes on a child’s developmental character, it is often advisable for them to do thorough research and observation. For instance, if a child has a clingy style before a social worker misinterprets it and concludes that it is a sign of healthy attachment, she will need a lot of investigation and observation before coming to this conclusion. By doing this, she will get accurate results for every child, and the child will be well represented with his needs catered for.

Environmental and family factors

A child’s functional family needs to receive the necessary assessments because the type of family a child comes from has a lot of impacts on the child. Collecting the required information about family functioning can give in the evaluation an approach that is strength-based that can easily accept that every child and adult have different strengths that can help in improving their life quality. Despite the parental and family factors, the environmental factors have a lot of impacts on the growth and development of a child. For example, a child who grows up in a drug-based neighborhood has higher chances of using and selling drugs as compared to a child with a no-drug neighborhood. The same applies to children with violent parents or parents who give them very little or no attention has higher chances of having family issues as compared to those who grew up with loving parents. For quality assessment, it is essential to look into family history and functioning as they are factors that have a lot of impacts on the parental capacity and a child’s outcome.

Family history does not give predictions on the maltreatment of children. Still, it does make parents vulnerable to impaired parenting capacity, which in turn can contribute negatively to the development and health of a child. It is, therefore, vital that the practitioners get to the bottom of the problem and understand how it has impacted the family and children’s lives. The assessment covers the needs of every child because it involves careful and keen analysis between positive and negative inter-relationship factors in a child. For example, it notes down the various risk factors that are capable of affecting the development and health of a child, and at the same time, it looks into the protective factors.

Assessment analysis

For one to get a proper assessment, he has to take part in a complex activity. Functional assessments involve purposeful and systematic information gathering, and but the practitioner does not merely collect facts. Before taking part in this assessment, the social worker needs to understand the main reason why she is taking part in the assessment and taking the information from the beginning. After understanding why they should ensure that they can process the collected material so that they can come to an understanding of the child and the parent’s meaning. Not anyone can do this because it requires a variety of skills and knowledge, which is mostly inclusive of analytical and critical thinking.

The social worker uses critical and analytical thinking to process the given information methodically and to wonder reliable her content and sources are. In an attempt to analyze the assessment, the practitioner should not use her intuition as it is often bias and not credible. In the assessment process, every noted information is essential and should only be noted down after the reliability is confirmed. To get this information accurately is the reason why social workers and practitioners receive the necessary training and education in such matters. The required information and knowledge are what they apply in the process of assessment so that they ensure that the information received is reliable enough before presenting it or making any conclusions. Following these procedures to the latter is what makes it possible for all the needs of the children to be taken care of.

The voice of the child

These assessments take place because of children, and it would be preferable if the child’s voice were heard to help in the whole process. For proper evaluations, it is always essential to ensure that the sound of the child is kept alive throughout the journey. To have good practice with the involved children, the practitioner involved can take their time to earn the child’s trust and build good relationships with them, respect them, and always support them. As much as sometimes it is hard for practitioners to help these children emotionally, sometimes just being there for them can be the best solution. Being available for a child whose parents are never home can be very helpful, and as a result, it might be easy for them to trust the practitioner more. These assessments always keep the child in the middle of the research.

The information acquired in the assessment should be all about the child in question and nothing more. If children are less engaged in the evaluations, the vulnerable children may be misunderstood, and others may leave them with the thought that they will take care of everything by themselves. Sometimes if the voice of children is not heard, most of them who saw the practitioner as their only solution often opt for suicide. In these cases, the practitioner gave a child hope of salvation and rescue but left the place without coming to an understanding. At that particular moment, the child has gained hope, but then sadly, the practitioner leaves her with the responsibility of finding a solution for herself. There are cases where parents fail to allow or make it difficult for practitioners to see their children. In such occurrences during the assessment process, the situation becomes a clinical process that requires clinical supervision.

The parent-social worker relationship

During the assessment process, the parent-social worker relationship gives multiple functions of providing the work a chance to go on. It also provides the practitioner with an opportunity to get relevant information that is necessary for the assessment. The relationship between the social worker and the parent, if good, helps in the decision-making process of the child’s destiny. Sometimes a parent might cooperate, but when it comes to deciding matters of the child, they get uncomfortable and occasionally rebellious. In other cases, if a parent refuses to take part in the assessment, it can cause very little intervention as a lack of cooperation denies the practitioner an opportunity to get access to the child or the evidence in the house. As a result, it becomes difficult to help a child or obtain the necessary information for the assessment.

Practitioners in the assessment process often focus on the common ground, the child with the parent, even if it means ignoring and managing things she and the parent does not agree with. Doing this helps them focus on what is essential and collect as much information for the assessment as possible because if they fail to communicate, there may be the dissolution of the whole project. However, it is not compulsory for parents to work with the practitioners because sometimes all the social workers receive in return is hostility despite their good intentions and attempts to help. Sometimes in the assessment process, social workers are forced to use their acquired knowledge and skills so that they can work with parents who do not comply so that they can get the needed information and help the involved child. Taking such actions help in attending to the needs of every child despite the relationship a parent forms with the social worker.

Barriers in quality assessment

There are several obstacles that social workers undergo so that they can meet the needs of children and achieve the best possible results during these assessments. These include;

Organizational constraints- these include a lack of resources as the collected data from the assessment depends on these resources for implementation. Sometimes despite the hard work in the field and assessment process, the management lacks the commitment to implement the changes needed.

System problems-this This is another barrier that includes the management’s dependence on Information Technology systems. As a result, it causes a lack of face to face time as the data needs to be fed on the orders. This interferes so much with time management in saving and taking care of children in need.

Personal barriers- some social workers are not competent enough and lack the necessary knowledge that one needs to take part in these assessments. Some are not confident enough to approach different families and their children. Therefore, it leads to many children remaining behind in the whole process of helping them.