Plan Group Supervision
- Supervision groups should only comprise students at the same level of training; it can be threatening for the student if there is a mix of levels of training in the same group.
- Group supervision can provide a range of perspectives on practice issues but it can also provoke considerable anxiety for group members. This means that the person leading the group must be skilled in managing the needs of the individual at the same time as the well-being and development of the group as a whole.
- Group supervision should be used in conjunction with one-to-one supervision with the practice teacher. Practice and views vary as to how often this should happen. Possible models include:
- Group supervision and one-to-one with practice teacher alternate weeks
- Group supervision, supervision with link supervisor and supervision with practice teacher on a three-weekly cycle
- Group supervision once in three weeks with one-to-one practice teacher supervision twice in those three weeks
Group supervision sessions can be learning sessions or supervision sessions.
The learning sessions could include input from the practice teacher, from an outside speaker or from a video/DVD. They could also be based on the students bringing a case to explore, not in terms of the student’s practice but in terms of the issues, such as risk assessment, within the case story. This can be a case-study from a real file and could be matched with input from an academic colleague on what the main theories are in use in that case.
Learning sessions will not usually provide evidence for assessment of practice competence.
Supervision group sessions would incorporate students’ reflections on their work, bringing to the group an issue with which they are grappling. These sessions would provide evidence for assessment and the students need to be clear about the assessment basis from the start.
Sessions can be a mix of learning and supervision as in the University of the West of Scotland model