Abstract:

The majority of the skills that social workers possess are of analytical nature. A social worker is required to collect, process, analyze information and carry out other similar tasks. The article analyses the organization of social work practice by particularly focusing on the development of analytical skills during the latter practice. The objectives of the research include the following: to establish the prerequisites of developing analytical abilities during social work practice in a community; to reveal the opinion of the students regarding the organization of social work practice in a community through the aspect of developing analytical skills.

The quasi-experiment design has been chosen to carry out the research. The design focuses on the evaluation of one group prior and upon the end of the field experiment. 58 fourth-year students of the Social Work Bachelor study program at Mykolas Romeris University have been chosen as the test subject group for the research.

The research was carried out by applying a questionnaire-based survey. The questions mainly focused on the research and self-evaluation of the changes and alterations of analytical skills of the students. The statistical analysis was executed by using the SPSS 21 (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) software. The software was applied in a manner of comparison as the pre-test and post-test data was compared, and the Wilcoxon mark criterion was estimated in order to establish the significance of the alteration.

Following the findings of the aforementioned analysis of the portfolio content, the underlying reasons of the alterations and changes of the analytical skills of the students, also their self-assessment skills were revealed. During the quasi-experiment a significantly positive increase was recorded, especially in the students’ skills of self-assessment with a score of ‘well’ or ‘excellent’ in analyzing the community, carrying out research, identifying the needs of the community. The students developed their analytical skills in the practice by applying their knowledge and abilities, independently searching for the required information, and executing other tasks given out during the practice, and the tasks of other study subjects.

Keywords:

Analytical skills, social work practice in community, self-assessment.