This text presents the basic knowledge required to set up and work with a group. It looks at how to plan and lead a group successfully and how to intervene skillfully.
A new edition of the classic group work textbook! In Working More Creatively with Groups, Jarlath Benson presents the essential knowledge required to set up and work with a group. He looks at how to plan and lead a group successfully and how to intervene skilfully. As well as covering the different stages in the life of a group, the book emphasizes the various levels of group experience and gives suggestions for working imaginatively with them. This thoroughly updated third edition not only provides a comprehensive guide to groupwork but shows the groupworker how to move on to more in-depth and intensive work, using a variety of strategies illustrated by full clinical vignettes. Many chapters are updated and expanded to include Benson’s latest thinking and teaching and the book includes two new chapters. The first focuses on working with and developing different sorts of groups along the therapeutic/educational continuum. The second new chapter discusses how to best use a supervisory process and set up and run a supervisory group. Well known and widely used by social workers, psychologists, educationalists and youth workers, this popular text is suitable for all those working with groups.
Jarlath Benson presents the basic knowledge to set up and work with a group. He looks at how to plan and lead a group successfully and how to intervene skilfully. The author also shows how to move on to more in-depth and intensive work.
Here is an important look at creative ways to successfully blend theoretical knowledge with skillful intervention in social group work. Theory and Practice in Social Group Work represents leading works in conceptual development that creatively connect practice with theory and also reflect the current diversity of interventions in group work practice. The book calls for more carefully articulated connections between knowledge and action and maps a strategy for strengthening social work curriculum and expanding group work practice. Some of the areas discussed include group work in medical and health settings, group work with people undergoing life cycle transitions, and group work interventions with vulnerable populations. A wide range of possibilities for applying theories in group work situations are presented in this thought-provoking volume. Some specific examples discussed include group work interventions with persons affected by the AIDS crisis and persons at high risk of contracting HIV, a group model for the management of chronic pain, group intervention services for the homeless mentally ill delivered through a mobile outreach team, a bingo group in an SRO hotel, group work with adults molested as children, and a model of practice for work with minority populations and communities.
As group facilitators, we can use methods like Open Space Technology, Future Search, and World Café to reliably evoke "group magic" when working with larger groups. Yet how can we tap into the generative power of self-organization when working with smaller groups - especially ones facing complex and conflict-laden issues? In From Conflict to Creative Collaboration: A User's Guide to Dynamic Facilitation, collaboration consultant Rosa Zubizarreta describes a ground-breaking facilitation method for transforming unproductive group friction into effective teamwork and innovation. Dynamic Facilitation's agile approach draws task groups into a co-creative "flow zone" - where participants create practical and innovative solutions while building trust, empathy, and authentic community. Some of the distinctive features of this approach include welcoming solutions initially and throughout the process, as a form of rapid prototyping, and using empathic listenint to create safety for both solutions (creative thinking) and concers (critical thinking). As we create a "map" of the different perspectives that are present, we support participants' own ability to recognize patterns and create new meaning.
IDEO founder and Stanford d.school creator David Kelley and his brother Tom Kelley, IDEO partner and the author of the bestselling The Art of Innovation, have written a powerful and compelling book on unleashing the creativity that lies within each and every one of us. Too often, companies and individuals assume that creativity and innovation are the domain of the "creative types." But two of the leading experts in innovation, design, and creativity on the planet show us that each and every one of us is creative. In an incredibly entertaining and inspiring narrative that draws on countless stories from their work at IDEO, the Stanford d.school, and with many of the world's top companies, David and Tom Kelley identify the principles and strategies that will allow us to tap into our creative potential in our work lives, and in our personal lives, and allow us to innovate in terms of how we approach and solve problems. It is a book that will help each of us be more productive and successful in our lives and in our careers.
Paul Crimmens aims to show that working with older people can be made exciting and stimulating by using storymaking as a basis. Adopting a holistic and person-centred approach, the book shows how to use a variety of traditional stories.
"With its gentle affirmations, inspirational quotes, fill-in-the-blank lists and tasks — write yourself a thank-you letter, describe yourself at 80, for example — The Artist’s Way proposes an egalitarian view of creativity: Everyone’s got it."—The New York Times "Morning Pages have become a household name, a shorthand for unlocking your creative potential"—Vogue Over four million copies sold! Since its first publication, The Artist's Way phenomena has inspired the genius of Elizabeth Gilbert and millions of readers to embark on a creative journey and find a deeper connection to process and purpose. Julia Cameron's novel approach guides readers in uncovering problems areas and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques to free up any areas where they might be stuck, opening up opportunities for self-growth and self-discovery. The program begins with Cameron’s most vital tools for creative recovery – The Morning Pages, a daily writing ritual of three pages of stream-of-conscious, and The Artist Date, a dedicated block of time to nurture your inner artist. From there, she shares hundreds of exercises, activities, and prompts to help readers thoroughly explore each chapter. She also offers guidance on starting a “Creative Cluster” of fellow artists who will support you in your creative endeavors. A revolutionary program for personal renewal, The Artist's Way will help get you back on track, rediscover your passions, and take the steps you need to change your life.
This sourcebook of techniques, designed to supplement theory or practicum books, explores the place and the usefulness of techniques, as well as their abuse. The authors hope to stimulate creativity in the readers approach to group work and to encourage group leaders to develop their own therapeutic styles. They there-fore offer this book as an outline for leaders to build upon in adapting techniques for their own situations, not as a cookbook of recipes to be rigidly followed. The goal is not to catalog techniques for every conceivable situation, but to teach leaders how to adapt the techniques presented and to develop others sensitively, crea-tively, and appropriately..The authors primarily assume that techniques are means, not ends, and that they are fundamentally at the service of the client, not the therapist. The book is especially strong on the leaders executive functions in the group: maneuvering and facilitating the group to optimize its effectiveness and relying on the members themselves to do the majority of the therapy. In addition, the authors hope to stimulate interest in the philosophical and ethical dimensions of group work, and they make reference to the Association for Specialists in Group Work (ASGW) ethical guidelines when relevant.
Creativity is being recognized as an important source of competitive advantage because a single creative idea that is both novel and useful may take an organization in a profitable new direction. This work aims to promote the burgeoning interest in group creativity by identifying new questions that will drive future research in this area.