Critical Reflection On Human Service Practice

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The following paper will reflect on my chosen reading which is “Skills for human service practice: Working with individual groups and communities”. I will describe the key themes, issues and learnings from the article, in conjunction with my placement experience and the way they have an impact on my emerging practice framework. The article is about a critical reflection, where the author’s main purpose is to indicate the importance of critical reflection, which is particularly vital in these days, to carry out effective social work. Thus, the author illustrate a concise outline to critical reflection, explaining its significance, along with the processes involved in reflecting critically, through a ‘critical incident’ approach.…show more content…
Firstly, critical reflection involves an ability to conceptualize and analyse, together with a commitment to examine the assumptions behind one’s practice in order to enhance it (O'Hara, Agi, & Weber, 2006). We have to be mindful of the ways in which language is employed to authorize certain perspectives; to create connections between the social, personal and political domains; to identify and tolerate diversity; to invite and work with uncertainty; to observe the manners in which one exercises authority and power; and to visualise and consider diverse and unfamiliar behaviors of thinking and acting (O'Hara, Agi, & Weber, 2006). Secondly, the author stated that, justice and fairness are not only crucial to the language of social policy disputes, they are also played out in specific encounters, where inequality is both structurally sustained and interpersonally suffered and played out. The author also stated that, it appears right to challenge a language of supporting, caring and giving for it can be overwhelming (O'Hara, Agi, & Weber, 2006). It can produce two categories of persons- the cared for and the carer, the giver and the receiver, the supporter and the supported-and in doing so, contradict the possibility that both parties employ power, although in an unequal circumstances. It can lead to the abilities and strengths of both parties being disregarded and the relationship being…show more content…
The incident took place when I was co-facilitating a workshop for accessing online services. Everyone is busy setting up online services account, and my team leader is helping some of the community members. I was also assisting Sally (name has been changed), aged 70 who is one of the members to set up a mygov account. After we finished setting up, we try practicing logging into the website. Mygov required a confirmation code that is sent to the member’s cellphone to type in every time they log in. When Sally got her confirmation code, she try to open the message box, but it won’t open because she kept pressing the back button instead of opening the message in her phone and when she typed in the code, it was wrong. After she tried a couple of times, I attempted to do it for her but she demanded “I can do it on my own, let me do it”. I felt a little bit uncomfortable as she voiced her demand because I was just trying to help her out. But as I sit back and watched her do it, I was thinking ‘she has a lot more life experience than me depending on her age, she might even work in offices and know even better than me in using computer and putting data in. Who am I to think that she is not capable of putting information into the computer? All she needed was a little more time for me to let her do it independently’ and she finally succeeded at the end. I felt ashamed within myself for judging her and overlooked her

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