The Learning from Practice Manual: 2 (Avenue Practice Manuals)

Helping people to learn is rewarding but challenging work. If you are involved in any aspect of helping people learn and improve their practice, this manual will be an invaluable guide to support you in doing so. Based on the author’s extensive experience of promoting best practice in social work and the people professions more broadly, it offers clear and helpful practice guidance.

Dr Neil Thompson is a renowned author with an extensive track record of helping people learn. In this manual he offers positive advice about various aspects of supporting workplace learning. It covers providing supervision for student placements, mentoring colleagues involved in pursuing occupational qualifications and other aspects of promoting learning. This is the second in a series of practice manuals published by Avenue Media Solutions. This one complements well the first in the series, Neil Thompson’s The Social Worker’s Practice Manual.

Endorsments

This manual has the Neil Thompson quality hallmark shining through on every page. Characteristically accessible and down to earth, it offers guidance and pointers to best practice for a wide range of practitioners. The emphasis upon learning is crucial; if you not only read but reflectively engage with its content you will enhance the service you provide. A "win-win" outcome is what this manual promises and deserves.

Bernard Moss, Emeritus Professor, Staffordshire University

In just one publication, this manual provides significantly in-depth knowledge and understanding linked to practice learning and wider themes relevant to ‘getting the job done’. No matter what stage you are at in your career and understanding, the key learning points will refresh or introduce current learning opportunities in a format that is easy to understand, and one that is extremely well written. I have no hesitation in recommending this publication for practice teachers, students, social workers and managers. Neil Thompson’s extensive social work knowledge and experience clearly come through in an accessible way.

John McGowan, General Secretary, The Social Workers Union

In his usual vibrant, personal and engaging way, Neil Thompson has drawn together the key elements of learning into an invaluable practice resource. He integrates individual and organizational realities (culture, leadership, values, power relations and politics), infuses them with theoretical depth, and translates this all into a guide for managing the practicalities of day to day practice in social work, social care and beyond.

Professor Lou Harms, University of Melbourne

It is good to have available something that brings together key elements of teaching and learning social work in one publication. The book is presented in a way that will be helpful to professional social workers across the whole continuum of professional life. Furthermore, other professions involved in working with people and developing professional practice will no doubt find its contents relevant and very useful.

Gwenan Prysor, Director of MA Social Work, Bangor University