Professional practice is at the heart of youth work training but integrating the theory learned in class with the reality of placements can sometimes require extra support. This comprehensive textbook is designed to help students working with young people become competent and ethical practitioners, able to reflect on their learning and interventions in young people’s lives. Divided into three parts, this core text: provides an understanding of and commitment to the principles of youth work explores how contexts shape youth work demonstrates the core practice skills that are required to make a meaningful impact on the lives of young people. Engaging and practice-driven, this is an essential text for all students learning about working with young people, whether on youth work or allied courses. It includes case-studies, tasks, further reading and reflective questions to help readers make connections between their own knowledge and practice.

This popular textbook gives students a practical understanding of the broad range of skills they will need during the course of their studies and throughout their youth work career. Topics covered include: - Reaching out to young people - Developing young people′s participation - Working in different settings - Bringing young people together - Practice placements The new edition will be essential reading for all foundation and undergraduate students of youth work. It will also be a valuable resource for qualified health, social care and education professionals who wish to understand the intricacies of working with young people.

The fundamental aim of youth work is to build trusting and mutually respectful relationships with young people, creating transformative experiences for young people in formal and informal spaces outside of homes and schools. These complex and multidimensional situations mean that the day-to-day work of youth workers is full of dilemmas, pitting moral, developmental, motivational, organizational, and other concerns against each other. By showing how different youth workers respond to a variety of such dilemmas, this authentic text makes visible youth workers’ unique knowledge and skills, and explores how to work with challenging situations – from the everyday to the extraordinary. Beginning by setting out a framework for dilemma resolution, it includes a number of narrative-based chapters, in which youth workers describe and reflect on dilemmas they have faced, the knowledge and experiences they brought to bear on them and alternative paths they could have taken. Each chapter closes with a discussion from the literature about themes raised in the chapter, an analysis of dilemma and a set of overarching discussion questions designed to have readers compare and contrast the cases, consider what they would do in the situation, and reflect on their own practice. Teaching us a great deal about the norms, conventions, continuities, and discontinuities of youth work, this practical book reveals essential dimensions of the profession and contributes to a practice-based theoretical foundation of youth work.

Informal Learning in Youth Work offers fresh perspectives on all aspects of informal education in the youth work setting. Designed to develop the reader′s knowledge and skills, this comprehensive textbook explores key issues such as communication, power relations, ethics, gender exclusion, sexuality, race discrimination and social class. The author places particular emphasis on conversation as a key means of promoting informal learning and engaging effectively with young people. Other key features include: " case studies that illustrate the application of theory to `real-life′ practice " an emphasis on critical reflection, including reflective questions " an easily accessible style, with key terms and tips for further reading " a four-part structure guiding the reader through different stages of conversations and relationships in informal education. Informal Learning in Youth Work provides a unique combination of theoretical analysis and practice tips. Satisfying training and course requirements in the area, it will be essential reading for all students on youth and community work courses, as well as those in allied fields such as education and social work. It will also be a valuable reference for practitioners working with young people on a daily basis.

Showcases the value of professional work with young people as it is practiced in diverse forms, and in locations from around the world.

Understanding the law is now a more important part of youth work practice than ever before, and all successful youth work professionals need to understand the way that law and policy supports good ethical practice. This book provides a coherent overview of the legal processes and requirements encountered by today’s youth work professionals, helping readers learn how to make informed ethical judgements and offer appropriate advice to young people. It offers an insight into how laws are made, explains major legal requirements for safe youth work practice and details a range of guidance on the current frameworks and legislation students and practitioners need to be aware of. Using real world scenarios, case studies, and reflective questions, it helps the reader to engage critically with the current legal context of youth work, and develop their thinking, skills and practice. This is essential reading for all students working towards professional recognition in work with young people.

This open access volume critically reviews a diverse body of scholarship and practice that informs the conceptualization, curriculum, teaching and measurement of life skills in education settings around the world. It discusses life skills as they are implemented in schools and non-formal education, providing both qualitative and quantitative evidence of when, with whom, and how life skills do or do not impact young women’s and men’s lives in various contexts. Specifically, it examines the nature and importance of life skills, and how they are taught. It looks at the synergies and differences between life skills educational programmes and the way in which they promote social and emotional learning, vocational/employment education, and health and sexuality education. Finally, it explores how life skills may be better incorporated into education and how such education can address structures and relations of power to help youth achieve desired future outcomes, and goals set out in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Life skills education has gained considerable attention by education policymakers, researchers and educators as being the sine qua non for later achievements in life. It is nearly ubiquitous in global and national education policies, including the SDGs, because life skills are regarded as essential for a diverse set of purposes: reducing poverty, achieving gender equality, promoting economic growth, addressing climate change, fostering peace and global citizenship, and creating sustainable and healthy communities. Yet, to achieve these broad goals, questions persist as to which life skills are important, who needs to learn them, how they can be taught, and how they are best measured. This book addresses these questions.