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WEEK 2 READING 1 - Planning your group: Initial planning decisions (GROUP…
WEEK 2 READING 1 - Planning your group: Initial planning decisions
Planning will make a successful outcome much more likely and will reduce worry and stress as many problems will be anticipated and avoided.
Every group session will need to be planned in detail and this may only be possible as the group progresses, as you will continually need to make adjustments depending on how the group develops.
A MODEL FOR PLANNING:
1. Origins -
the events, situations and opportunities that make it necessary or desirable to consider organising a group.
2. Aim -
What is the aim and is it clear?
3. Directional Phase
Purposes - who, why, what are they doing it for? Advantages/gains
Product - What results are needed?
Outcomes - what will tell us and how, that we have been successful?
4. Preparation phase -
including identification of:
Potential group members
Location
Facilitation
Budget
Resources
5. Plan phase -
You are ready to publicise:
Who, What, When, How, Where
6. Run the Group
7. Review -
Reflect on what went well and learning opportunities for improvement
WHY MEET AS A GROUP: (NEED)
Social work students are required to demonstrate practice skills and knowledge in working with groups in order to qualify
If a practitioner does not like the intimacy of one-to-one work
Can be a cost-effective way of working
IS GROUP WORK THE MOST APPROPRIATE WAY TO MEET THIS NEED?
Would another method of intervention (family therapy or individual counselling etc) be more fitting/effective?
Think about the needs of certain people (parents, children, older people, those with mental health issues etc) and work out if any of them could provide the basis for a group.
AIMS/GOALS:
Set general aims at the start, which can be refined later on.
Most aims starts with 'to'
Benefits of goals:
They motivate both members and workers
They help avoid and resolve conflict
They give us a means of judging how successful we have been
They can provide us with ideas about how to get to where we want to be
They allow us to make decisions about how we will achieve the goals
Goals should be SMART:
Specific, Measurable, achievable, relevant, timely
HOW ARE GROUP AIMS TO BE MET?
What the group will do depends on what type of group it is, it can be a mixture of:
Support and discussion group
Skill-development group (parenting skills)
Therapeutic groups (trauma)
Action groups (improved housing)
Activity groups (walking)
Self-help groups (women's group)
These categories soon suggest the activities that will take place during the life of the group.
GROUP STRUCTURE:
Decisions about the structure of the group will carry both advantages and disadvantages.
Not all the structural aspects are within the worker's control
There are numerous factors to consider...
SIZE:
Small groups are better when the aim is to facilitate members in expressing feelings (it's safer)
Large groups are better for tackling shared problems (can come up with more solutions)
most workers find that for group based open discussion, the optimum number of members 6-8
Activity-based groups where some of the activities are done in sub groups can be a large group - could be 12 or more
In groups of four or less, norms tend to become established that work against the therapeutic process.
Most groups experience a certain amount of drop-out, so you should recruit a couple of extra members to allow for drop out.
FREQUENCY:
The frequency of meetings will be determined by the benefits you hope for the group and the character of the people in the group.
A factor that comes into play is the ratio of time spent in the group to that spent elsewhere.
Intensity:
The more frequently a group meets, the more intense the experience is likely to be - this can be a good and bad thing.
Importance:
Groups that meet more frequently and/or for longer are likely to assume greater importance in the members' lives. This may be desirable (eg people with disabilities who need a reference group) or undesirable (eg. when the aim is to encourage independence)
Continuity:
Groups that meet less frequently tend to lose any sense of continuity - each session is like starting over.
DURATION:
It will depend on the purpose
Short term groups (about 5-6 sessions) can be good for preparing people to join or leave an institution or providing info on health issues
Groups aimed at therapeutic experiences need time for necessary trust-building to take place.
Some groups are set up with a timescale of some months, others are planned to keep going for as long as the need exists, without any end date in mind.
CONSTANCY OF MEMBERSHIP:
Closed groups start and finish with the same members where as open groups change as people join and leave
Very rapid turnover of membership affects the level of intimacy that can be achieved
Solutions to turnover include: 1. Setting up the group with a short lifespan. 2. Organising a group where attendance is not vital to the work of the group. 3. Organise the group to have set intake periods when membership is re-opened for a short period.
COMPOSITION:
The extent to which you will have the power to decide on the actual composition of a group will vary considerably from situation to situation.
Sometimes you have no choice on defining the membership (eg. court orders, open invitation to public)
Homogeneity / Heterogeneity:
The extent to which a group is made up of people with similar characteristics or who differ considerably.
Groups work best if they are homogenous in respect of level of vulnerability and heterogeneous in respect of preferred defences.
Isolation:
It is useful to avoid compositions that isolate and individual within the group (eg. one female in a male group, one asian member in a group of of white members).
Gender:
Men and women differ considerably in both their attitudes and behaviour in groups and this can be a major factor in how the group is conducted.
All female groups give more attention to issues of emotions and relationships, while all male groups tend to be more competitive and status-oriented.
Age:
The older the profile of the group, the more likely it is to be comfortable with a range of ages.
It is often acceptable to have big age gaps for mature adult members, but less acceptable for teenagers.
Ethnicity:
It may be important to have a group of one ethnicity, potentially when doing an affirmation or when discussing issues of racism and oppression in a safe environment.
It may be important to bring different ethnicities together to learn of each other's experiences.
Exclusions:
People who have been through traumatic experiences are likely to need the opportunity to talk it through in the safety and privacy of one-to-one relationship before they feel strong enough to cope with group discussion on the topic.
Other people may need to be excluded to avoid them preventing progress for others in the group or harming others in the group.
CO-FACILITATION:
Needs to be made in the pre-planning stage.
It can potentially swamp the group and inhibit the members.
Co-facilitation can be good for large groups, especially activity-based groups.
VENUE:
Will determine the eventual membership of the group, as some venues are more comfortable for members than others.
Often the choice of venue seems obvious and it can boil down to what is available or what is free.
Factors that come into play:
Local or not
Attached to social services or not (can cause stigma)
Seperate room for a creche
Refreshment facilities and toilets in close proximity
Materials and equipment can be locked away
Cost of the room
First, realise that constraints exist, second, realise their likely effects, and third, work out how best they can be set aside or more effectively used as positive rather than negative influences.
OBTAINING CONSENT:
After the pre-planning of the group, the next step is to seek permission from your agency to get started with setting the group up.
Your group work project is doomed to failure if you do not have the support of your team and colleagues.
Obtaining consent of line manager:
Ensure your proposal keeps in line with agency aims and purpose and think about whether the organisational boundaries are manageable.
Do you have the budget?
Ensure the group work would not cause any problems in the allocation of work within the agency.
Obtaining the support of colleagues:
Get their concerns and negative attitudes out in the open
Provide them with as much info as possible but don't try to be too clever or full of yourself.
Help them identify ways in which things will change and be realistic and objective about the impact the group work will have.
Express your general interest rather than argue for the outcome you are seeking.
Be prepared to compromise and discuss things openly