An essential toolkit that helps students, qualified nurses and other healthcare professionals to become confident reflective practitioners. Developing Reflective Practice is suitable for students and practitioners in a variety of fields, including nursing, psychology, social work, therapeutic child care, and education. The book offers a simple three-stage reflective cycle that will enable students and practitioners to incorporate reflective practice into their workplace and to help them feel confident and competent when confronted with complex and emotionally demanding situations in their practice. Introduces reflective practice and provides a range of reflective methods and techniques. Invites readers to acquire and develop skills by working through practical reflective activities. Illustrates concepts and techniques with extended worked examples. Encourages structured reflection with journal exercises. Provides practical advice on team working, case supervision and recognising and avoiding stress and burnout. Students and qualified practitioners will benefit from reading this book and working through the reflective exercises that accompany the text. From Reviews: "...In this book the clinical psychologist Natius Oelofsen describes the processes of learning and the three-step reflective cycle, explaining how keeping a reflective journal offers insights into self and behaviour, and using critical analysis to reflect on even ordinary, everyday incidents. He shows how the insights of understanding help our interactions with patients and colleagues. Reflection helps us work together, offer support and see where we are able to fit in as team members. The chapter 'All for one and one for all: building supportive teams' is particularly illuminating. There is so much in this book, including getting the most from supervision, ethical issues and dealing with work-based stress, as well as exercises, activities and case examples." Nursing Standard, Vol. 26, No. 48, August 2012 "Developing Reflective Practice is a thorough and concise book enabling students, qualified nurses and any other health professional to become confident reflective practitioners within their own field.... A well-written and educational tool particularly for a nursing student and even a social work student." Nursing Times, 11 October 2012

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements; Preface; Introduction Part 1: Introducing reflective practice 1. Reflecting on reflection: Theories and perspectives on Reflective Practice 2. How to reflect: The reflective practitioner’s toolkit Part 2: Reflecting on the work in frontline services 3. Working with people’s stories: The role of narrative in frontline practice 4. Shaping people’s lives part one: Attachment and family Influences 5. Shaping people’s lives part two: Cross-generational influences and migration Extended example 1: Narrative and forces shaping people’s lives 6. Inside and outside working relationships: Boundaries in frontline practice 7. Getting to the heart of the matter: Helping people change 8. Reflecting on what is really important: Ethics and values in frontline practice Extended example 2: Working with boundaries and change Part 3: Reflecting on emotion in frontline services 9. Absorbing distress: Emotional Containment in frontline practice 10. When strong feelings matter: Transference and countertransference in frontline practice Extended example 3: Working with containment and transference Part 4: Reflecting on staff support in frontline services 11. All for one and one for all: Building supportive teams 12. Making sense of tangles, twists, and turns: Effective case supervision in frontline practice 13. When the going gets tough: Stress and burnout in frontline services Extended example 4: Stress and team support Reflecting in practice: a final word References Index