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onsite classroom experience. There are also per-
sonal profile pages developed by and for students
and faculty and the capacity for streamed media,
both audio and video.
Our distance delivery programs are national
in scope, therefore students can benefit from
analysing the diverse ideological and political
contexts that are reflected across geographical
regions. Given that social work practice is con-
structed according to ideological and political
contexts as much as professional knowledge and
skills (Healy, 2005), particular regional politics
and ideologies are implicated in direct practice ap-
proaches. As the social work profession responds
to global labour mobility, honing one's skills in
contextual analysis is yet another priority for
social work education. In our distance education
delivery, the online field education seminar fa-
cilitates experiential learning and reflection about
the micro, mezzo and macro dynamics of social
work practice in the local contexts of students,
between provincial jurisdictions, and according
to the regional disparities of policy and initiatives
on the national stage.
For these reasons, the online seminar cor-
responds well to our school's focus on critical
reflection as a cornerstone of progressive, ef-
fective practice. The online environment offers
space and time to first, consider one's experiences
in retrospect, outside of the actual occurrence
of events and second, to articulate the insights
and conceptualizations that emerge. Social
workers regularly tell of the fast pace of their
work, the minimal time afforded to supervision
and the lack of structured opportunity to reflect
on practice. The realities of shrinking human
and financial resources, organizational changes
and ethical pressures experienced by ever more
complex service situations are felt directly by
students while in their placements. The online
seminar for social work students offers a reprieve
from these often competing and contradictory
demands. Indeed, the online seminar offers a
model which can be taken into long term future
practice, given its use of asynchronous activity
in a self-directed design.
tHe meSSage: critical
reflection on tHe fielD
practicum experience
Field education courses, comprised of an agency-
based practicum and the online seminar, are a
central component of social work education and
a direct expression of the experiential education
tenet of “learning by doing” (Kolb, 1984). This
is often the opportunity that students have been
looking forward to since their first day enrolled
in the program; finally, a chance to try out all the
theoretical formulations, skills, and procedures
studied at length. The student placement in a
community agency immerses the adult learner
in a myriad of experiences and draws on the
full extent of preparedness, both academic and
practical. The online field education seminar
facilitates conscientious reflection on the broad
scope of experience in the interests of develop-
ing and enhancing conceptualizations of social
issues, socio-political analysis, self awareness,
practice skills, and understanding of ethics in
action. Dalhousie's orientation to field education
understands that adult learners come with previ-
ous experiences and insights, drawing upon these
to strengthen the linkages among social work
education, social work practice and personal
professional development.
As experiential learning is nested within the
principles of adult education, the concept of critical
reflection is further embedded within experiential
learning. While there are divergent definitions
circling the terms “reflection”, “reflexivity” and
“critical reflection” (see D'Cruz, Millingham &
Menendez, 2005 for a thorough review of the
literature), some coherence can be found in the
work of Fook (2002), Hick (2004) and Ife, Healy,
Spratt & Solomon (2004). These works provide
foundation for this chapter's exploration of critical
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