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What you will study

This key introductory module will develop your understanding of key social care and social work skills. Throughout the module, you’ll cover the following topics:

Block 1 – Contextualising social care and social work
You’ll be introduced to the role and purpose of social care/social work and the role of the social care professional. You will explore what it means to live and work in our society and consider different people’s lived experiences.

Block 2 – Engaging with people
You will look in detail at communication skills, how to build rapport and actively listen to the life experiences of the people you are working with. You will explore the ways in which you may need to be creative and responsive to the specific communication needs of others.

Block 3 – Reflecting on our practice
You’ll look at anti-discriminatory, anti-oppressive and anti-racist practice - examining how we respond to discrimination, oppression and structural disadvantage. You will explore the importance of diversity in human identity and experience and consider ethical principles and values in practice and their impact on practice.

Block 4 – Assessing needs and risks
You’ll look at the role of assessment planning and intervention in social care/social work, including an introduction to your role in risk assessment and safeguarding, personalisation, and care planning. You will also consider evaluating outcomes of social care and social work interventions.

Block 5 – Being a professional
Finally, you’ll look at what it means to be a professional, including leadership, continuing professional development and personal development planning. You’ll explore emotional intelligence, wellbeing and the importance of resilience and self-care. The block concludes by looking at moving on to the next stages of your studies and/or career.

In addition to passing the assessed tasks for this module, which cover a variety of topics and require you to reflect on your learning throughout, you are also required to complete the following:

• A minimum period of verified practice learning in a social care/social work setting (10 days if you practice in England or Scotland, 20 days if you practice in Wales). It is a requirement that you have work-based learning arrangements in place before enrolling for this module. A manager or appropriate person in your social care/social work setting must verify this practice learning has taken place - they are signing to say that you are ready or prepared for further practice if/when you continue to train as a social worker and undertake longer assessed placements. To carry out this practice experience, you may be asked to provide a current Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) or Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) certificate. If you don’t have a certificate and one is required, it will be your responsibility to negotiate and fund it. At the end of you verified practice learning, you will be required to complete an e-portfolio of work. This is mapped against the standards required for practice in the nation within which you work.


• Actively participate in 10 x 2 hour online workshops and 5 x 1 hour consolidation sessions. You’ll be required to participate in all of the online workshops as they build towards the tutor-marked assignment tasks and act as the link between the module materials that you study and your ongoing practice learning experience in the workplace. If exceptional circumstances mean you are unable to attend a workshop, an alternative piece of work is required to compensate for this.

You will learn

By completing this module you will learn:

• the professional standards and ethical codes relevant to social care and social work in each nation of the UK
• about the development of the key roles of social care and social work with individuals, families, groups and communities
• main areas of knowledge, skills, values and processes underpinning social care and social work, that will enable you to apply them to practice and/or case study examples
• awareness of professional identity across the UK and internationally
• key digital and information literacy skills and reflective writing.

Teaching and assessment

Support from your tutor

Throughout your module studies, you’ll get help and support from your assigned module tutor. They’ll help you by:

• Facilitating your regular online workshops to bring the module materials to life; this will include facilitating discussion, setting small group work tasks and activities and encouraging you to share and reflect on examples from your own work experience and practice.
• Marking your assignments (TMAs) and providing detailed feedback for you to improve.
• Guiding you to additional learning resources.
• Helping you to consolidate your learning and consider practice in your own nation and locality
• Supporting you to collate the evidence for your e-portfolio
• Providing individual guidance, whether that’s for general study skills or specific module content.
• Facilitating online discussions between your fellow students, in the dedicated module and tutor group forums.

Module tutors will also support a forum, allowing students to post and respond to comments and reflections throughout the module. TMA sessions will be delivered by the module team and will be recorded in order to ensure everyone has access to the information provided.

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Assessment

The assessment details for this module can be found in the facts box.

Regulations