Lecture Outline for Session 2: 5/24/12

Thinking about Practice

· Overview of Evidence-Based Practice

· The role of research in social work

· Ways of Knowing

· Critical thinking

· Scientific attitudes

Objective: Learn about ways of thinking about practice and the role of research in informing practice. 

We covered the overview of Evidence-Based Practice last week. To pick up where we left off, we’ll talk a bit about the different perspectives that Greenhalgh and Rubin bring to the process. What do you think? Which approach “sits” better for you?

From there, I will provide an overview of the role of research in social work, and talk a bit more about the research process in general. In particular, I will highlight the differences among basic research, applied research, and evaluation research, and how each fits into knowledge for practice.

Finally, we will spend some time talking about ways that social workers typically make decisions about practice, which often have little to do with scientific attitudes.  What is critical thinking? What sorts of attitudes facilitate critical thinking? To that end, we will talk about how more common forms of decision making may not serve our clients well, and how adopting scientific attitudes and critical thinking strategies might be both better for our clients and more in sync with our profession's Code of Ethics.

See you in class!!!