MODULE 7: MAPPING WITH FAMILIES TRAINER NOTES. To showcase how to do mapping with families

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1 MODULE 7: MAPPING WITH FAMILIES TRAINER NOTES Purpose: To showcase how to do mapping with families To showcase how solution-focused questions are used within a mapping conversation Estimated time: This module should take three hours to complete depending on how much time you allow for discussion and the exercises. Handouts needed: PowerPoint handout Blank Three-Column Map Jenna s Three-Column Map Mapping with Families: Questions You Can Use Structured Decision Making (SDM) Policy and Procedures Manual Coaching and Supervision Tips for Module 7 Things to Try for Module 7 Materials needed: Workshop members will need flip chart paper for the group activity at the end. It is best if it is the kind of easel paper that will stick to the wall. Key themes: Assessment is something we traditionally think of as happening to families and behind the scenes. In this practice, assessment is both a professional activity and responsibility but also an intervention designed to help the family, network and professionals learn and move into group agreements. Safety mapping is not a form or a single event. It is a facilitated conversation that happens throughout the life of the case. Three-column mapping is perhaps the best way to start with families. Families can participate and have a better sense of what is coming when social workers orient the family, making it clear why they are there, what they will do and how they will work together. Putting the map on the table, explaining how it will be guiding the conversation that follows, is a great way to start by NCCD, All Rights Reserved

2 The kind of questions this series has talked about questions about impact on the child, solution-focused questions like exception questions all help guide the mapping process. The What needs to happen? question is one about goals and is made up of family goals, agency goals, next steps and plans for monitoring those steps. Instructions: See speaker notes in PowerPoint. Also, for exercises on slides 9 10, 31 33, 45/49/54/63. Exercises: On Helping (slide 9) WHY: Much of this module is based on making a switch in our thinking from seeing assessment as primarily a professional activity to seeing assessment as something that is both a professional responsibility and something that can and should be done in collaboration with families. This exercise generates an experience in the room of good and poor helping efforts to try to help the group come to some of their own ideas about this. WHAT: It is a visualization exercise followed first by conversations in pairs, and then a group debrief. HOW SPEAKING EXAMPLE: I would like to first ask you to get into pairs. We are going to do two quick visualizations. You can look at the floor, you can look at me, you can close your eyes. After we do the visualizations I am going to ask you to have a quick conversation with your partner and then we are going to talk about it as a group. You will have to share something, so make sure what you choose to share will not leave you feeling too vulnerable in a training setting. First, just to yourself: Think about a time you asked for help from someone and received something that was genuinely helpful that really made a difference to you. Think to yourself: When was this time? What was going on? What did you ask for? What did you receive? How was it to get it? Now think about another time you asked for help from someone and despite, perhaps, wellintended efforts or intention, you got something other than what you needed. Perhaps it was a kind of help you didn t exactly want, or a kind of help that wasn t what you needed. Perhaps it was something irrelevant or even intrusive or annoying. Think to yourself: When was this time? What was going on? What did you ask for? What did you receive? How was it to get it? by NCCD, All Rights Reserved

3 Now, if you could go into your pairs, I have a few questions for you (advance slide): What was it like to receive the help at each of these moments? What did the people offering the help do differently from each other? What did you do differently (if anything) at each of these moments? How did each of them leave you? How ready were you to take next steps in the problem you were facing? TRAINER NOTE: After participants talk for about five to seven minutes, bring the group together and discuss. Ask for examples. Then follow with these questions: What, if anything, does this relate to in our work? What, if anything, does this relate to about assessment? The teaching points should revolve around: It is easy to start to think we know what is best for families. Even when we operate from really good intentions, we can offer help that is not really helpful. The best help comes from within really good working relationships. The best help comes when people are really clear about what they are asking for. Our assessment processes are not just for us they are also to help the family do some thinking Short exercise on facilitation (slide 31) WHY: This is a short exercise designed to show how important it is that social workers take basic steps to set the stage for meetings with families. WHAT: This activity should take about 15 minutes Collect three to four examples from the group in each category. Have the group scale the examples to determine the most effective phrases in each category. If you are short on time, you don t have to do each category. For example, the most important steps are:» Why am I here?» What are we going to do?» How are we going to do it? by NCCD, All Rights Reserved

4 Short exercise on questions (slides 32/33) WHY: This is a short exercise designed to show how questions can have an affect and in particular how they can make the person being asked reflect in new ways. WHAT: Three short questions, all similar to one another to be asked to the group. Then the group debriefs. Teaching points are on the next slide. HOW SPEAKING EXAMPLE: I m going to ask you three quick questions designed to show a little of the power of questions. As you listen to them, think about what each one is like and see if they take you to different places or have different effects on you. TRAINER NOTE: Each of the lines should appear on click of the PowerPoint. Read each one out loud, pausing about five seconds in between. What do you do for a living? What s important to you about what you do for a living? Think about a time you were doing your work exactly as you hoped to be doing it a time you felt really proud to do the work you do. If I was a fly on the wall and was able to see you at this moment, what would I have seen you doing that was making you so proud? TRAINER NOTE: After reading the questions ask the group: Was there a difference for you between the questions? What was the difference? Where did each of them take you? What do you think this highlights or reminds us about questions? TRAINER NOTE: As you have this conversation and/or as it comes to an end you should advance the slide to the next one, which contains most of the teaching points to make off of this brief exercise. The highlights are that questions: Are an intervention. Generate an experience and can take people somewhere. Can help people recognize solutions they might have otherwise missed. Can help people reflect. Mapping with Families Exercise (slide 45) WHY: To give people in the room a chance to practice with families the skills and flow of mapping that this module describes. In particular, social workers will get a chance to see and hear these questions and this flow by NCCD, All Rights Reserved

5 WHAT: Group exercise where participants practice mapping and use focused questions to talk with Jenna. Trainees won t know much about Jenna s story, so the person playing Jenna is free to make up information as he/she answers the questions. MATERIALS: Each group will use their blank three-column map. HOW SPEAKING EXAMPLE: Now that we have looked at this process I would like you all to give it a try by getting into small groups. One person will play the role of Jenna, another will play the social worker and the third person will be in charge of writing on the three-column map. I would like each group to take two minutes to look through page 3 on the handout with the questions related to worries and past harm. The social worker should pick out three to five questions he/she thinks might be relevant to Jenna. Consider picking one question per section. You can change some of the questions as well for instance, making questions to the parent more position or relationship questions (i.e., If your daughter was here right now, what would she say? ). Go ahead and do that now. Ask Jenna her thoughts about past harm, and the scribe will write the answers into the three-column map. TRAINER NOTE: We are only doing past harm at this time. Give the groups a chance to do this activity. You may want to wander around the room to make sure they are able to follow the directions. Give the group five to seven minutes to do this activity. When the group comes back together, here are some questions to ask: What was this like for people? What was it like for the people who took the role of Jenna?» What was it like to be asked these questions?» Did any of the questions the person playing the social worker asked take you anywhere interesting? What was it like for the people who were asking the questions?» Was it hard to pick out questions?» Which ones were you most excited to try?» What do you think it would be like to ask your own clients these questions? What was it like to see it documented on the map as you went?» Did that seem to make a difference at all? What other takeaways or learnings do you have from this exercise? by NCCD, All Rights Reserved

6 Exercise Continued (Slides 49, 54, and 63) For the remaining three slides, rotate the roles among the triads. For the exercise on slide 49, use page 4 in the handout. For the exercise on slide 54, use page 6 in the handout. For the exercise on slide 63, use page 7 in the handout. When the group comes back together, here are some questions to ask: What was this like for people? What was it like for the people who took the role of Jenna?» What was it like to be asked these questions?» Did any of the questions the person playing the social worker asked take you anywhere interesting? What was it like for the people who were asking the questions?» Was it hard to pick out questions?» Which ones were you most excited to try?» What do you think it would be like to ask your own clients these questions? What was it like to see it documented on the map as you went?» Did that seem to make a difference at all? What other takeaways or learnings do you have from this exercise? by NCCD, All Rights Reserved