4.6 Assessment

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Contents

• 1. Focus on the Child(Jump to)
• 2. Planning(Jump to)
• 3. Developing a Clear Analysis(Jump to)
• 4. Contribution of the Child and Family(Jump to)
• 5. Contribution of Agencies Involved with the Child and Family(Jump to)
• 6. Actions and Outcomes(Jump to)
• 7. Regular Review(Jump to)
• 8. Recording(Jump to)
• 9. Principles for a Good Assessment(Jump to)

1. Focus on the Child

Children should to be seen and listened to and included throughout the assessment process. Their ways of communicating should be understood in the context of their family and community as well as their behaviour, level of understanding and developmental stage.

Assessments, service provision and decision making should regularly review the impact of the assessment process and the services provided on the child so that the best outcomes for the child can be achieved. Any services provided should be based on a clear analysis of the child’s needs, and the changes that are required to improve the outcomes for the child.

Children should be actively involved in all parts of the process based upon their age, level of understanding, developmental stage and identity. Direct work with the child and family should include observations and analysis of the interactions between the child and the parents/care givers.

All agencies involved with the child, the parents and the wider family have a duty to collaborate and share information to safeguard and promote the welfare of the child.

2. Planning

All assessments should be planned and coordinated by a social worker and the purpose of the assessment should be transparent and understood by all participants. There should be an agreed statement setting out the aims of the assessment process.

The social worker / practitioner, with support from their manager should decide how best to conduct the assessment and direction given as to areas to consider etc. This is alongside the statutory frameworks and legislation that social workers work within.

Questions to be considered in planning assessments include:

• Who will undertake the assessment and what resources will be needed?
• Who in the family will be included and how will they be involved (including absent or wider family and others significant to the child)?
• In what grouping will the child and family members be seen and in what order and where?
• What services, if any, are to be provided during the assessment?
• Are there communication needs? If so, what are the specific needs and how they will be met?
• How will the assessment take into account the particular issues faced by Black, Asian and minority ethnic children and their families, and disabled children and their families?
• What method of collecting information will be used? Are there any tools / questionnaires available?
• Have the parents got any needs [learning difficulties, substance misuse etc] and how these impact on the children, and what we could do holistically to support to ensure better outcomes for the children?
• What information is already available?
• Consideration given to any history held -is this relevant to the current assessment?
• What other sources of knowledge about the child and family are available and how will other agencies and professionals who know the family be informed and involved?
• How will the consent of family members be obtained?
• What will be the timescales?
• How will the information be recorded?
• How will it be analysed and who will be involved?
• When will the outcomes be discussed and service planning take place?

The assessment process can be summarised as follows:

• Gathering relevant information;
• Analysing the information and reaching professional judgments;
• Making decisions and planning interventions;
• Intervening, service delivery and/or further assessment;
• Evaluating and reviewing progress.

Assessment should be a dynamic process, which analyses and responds to the changing nature and level of need and/or risk faced by the child. A good assessment will monitor and record the impact of any services delivered to the child and family and review the help being delivered. Whilst services may be delivered to a parent(s) or carer(s), the assessment should be focused on the needs of the child and on the impact any services are having on the child and family.

3. Developing a Clear Analysis

Research has demonstrated that taking a systematic approach to assessments using a conceptual model is the best way to deliver a comprehensive analysis. A good assessment is one which investigates the three domains; set out in the Assessment Framework Triangle. The interaction of these domains requires careful investigation during the assessment. The aim is to reach a judgement about the nature and level of needs and/or risks that the child may be facing within their family.

An assessment should establish:

• The nature of the concern and the impact this has had on the child;
• An analysis of their needs and/or the nature and level of any risk and harm being suffered by the child;
• How and why the concerns have arisen;
• What the child's and the family's needs appear to be [including parental difficulties/needs and impact on the child/ family];
• Whether the concern involves abuse or Neglect; and
• Whether there is any need for any urgent action to protect the child, or any other children in the household or community.

The assessment will involve drawing together and analysing available information from a range of sources, including existing records, and involving and obtaining relevant information from professionals in relevant agencies and others in contact with the child and family. Where an Early Help Assessment has already been completed this information should be used to inform the assessment. The child and family’s history should be understood and analysed in context with the current assessment.  Where the child/ren and the family have links with another  country the good practice guidance ‘Working with Foreign Authorities: Child Protection Cases and Care Orders Departmental advice for local authorities, social workers, service managers and children’s services lawyers’ (July 2014) may be used to assist in the assessment process. Where a child has linked to another authority, it may be pertinent to contact that local authority to gather information.

Where a child is involved in other assessment processes, it is important that these are coordinated so that the child does not become lost between the different agencies involved and their different procedures. All plans for the child developed by the various agencies and individual professionals should be joined up so that the child and family experience a single assessment and multi-agency planning process, which shares a focus on the outcomes for the child.

The social worker / practitioner should analyse all the information gathered from the enquiry stage of the assessment to decide the nature and level of the child's needs and the level of risk, if any, they may be facing. The social work’s/ practitioner’s manager should provide regular supervision and challenge the assessment to ensure it is robust as part of this process.  An informed decision should be taken on the nature of any action required and which services should be provided, as well as which agency / family members should be involved in offering those services / support.  Social workers, practitioners, their managers and other professionals should be mindful of the requirement to understand the level of need and risk in a family from the child's perspective and ensure action or commission services which will have maximum positive impact on the child's life.

When new information comes to light or circumstances change the child’s needs, any previous conclusions should be updated and critically reviewed to ensure that the child is not overlooked as noted in many lessons from Serious Case Reviews.

4. Contribution of the Child and Family

The Child

The child should participate and contribute directly to the assessment process based upon their age, understanding and developmental stage. They should be seen alone and if this is not possible or in their best interest, the reason should be recorded. The social worker should work directly with the child in order to understand their views, wishes and feelings, and consider the way in which they behave both with their care givers and in other settings. The agreed local assessment framework should make a range of age appropriate tools available to professionals to assist them in this work.

The pace of the assessment needs to acknowledge the pace at which the child can contribute but must be completed within statutory time frames set.  There should never be a delay in taking protective action. It is important to understand the resilience of the individual child in their family and community context when planning appropriate services.

Every assessment should be child centred. Where there is a conflict between the needs of the child and their parents/carers, decisions should be made in the child's best interests. The parents should be involved at the earliest opportunity unless to do so would compromise the safety of the child.

The Parents’

The parents’ involvement in the assessment will be central to its success. At the outset the parents, or anyone holding parental responsibility need to understand how they can contribute to the process and what is expected of them to change in order to improve the outcomes for the child. The assessment process must be open and transparent with the parents. However, the process should also challenge parents’ statements and behaviour where it is evidenced that there are inconsistencies, questions or obstacles to progress.  All adults holding parental responsibility should be consulted and involved in the assessment unless to do so would compromise the safety of the child. All parents or care givers should be supported to participate whilst the welfare of the child must not be overshadowed by parental needs. There may be exceptions to the involvement in cases of Sexual Abuse or domestic violence for example, where the plan for the assessment must consider the safety of an adult as well as that of the child.  

5. Contribution of Agencies Involved with the Child and Family

All agencies and professionals involved with the child, and the family, have a responsibility to contribute to the assessment process. This might take the form of providing information in a timely manner and direct or joint work. Differences of opinion between professionals should be resolved speedily but where this is not possible, the local arrangements for resolving professional disagreements should be implemented.

It is possible that professionals have different experiences of the child and family and understanding these differences will actively contribute to the understanding of the child / family.

The professionals should be involved from the outset and through the agreed, regular process of review.

The social worker’s supervisor will have a key role in supporting the practitioner to ensure all relevant agencies are involved.

Agencies providing services to adults, who are parents, carers or who have regular contact with children must consider the impact on the child of the particular needs of the adult in question.

6. Actions and Outcomes

Every assessment should be focused on identifying the needs and identifying how to meet these needs to enable better outcomes. This will include, deciding which services and support to provide to deliver improved welfare for the child and reflect the child’s best interests. In the course of the assessment the social worker and their line manager should determine:

• Is this a Child in Need? (Section 17 Children Act 1989);
• Is there reasonable cause to suspect that this child is suffering, or is likely to suffer, Significant Harm? (Section 47 Children Act 1989);
• Is this a child in need of accommodation? (Section 20 Children Act 1989).
• Is the child at risk of suffering significant harm to the point where the local authority needs to initiate the Public Law Outline / care proceedings?

The possible outcomes of the assessment should be decided on by the social worker and their line manager.  A multi-agency meeting will then be held to agree a plan of action setting out the services to be delivered how and by whom in discussion with the child and family and the professionals involved.

The outcomes may be as follows:

• No further action;
• Additional support which can be provided through universal services and single service provision; early help services such as the Early Help Assessment process - see Continuum of Support for children and families living in Surrey;
• The development of a multi-agency Family Action Plan for the provision of Early Help services to promote the child's health and development;
• Child in Need plan to ensure the child’s needs are met, as per Section 17 general duties;
• Undertaking a Strategy Discussion/Meeting, a Section 47 child protection enquiry;
• A Child Protection Plan to help ensure the safety and needs of the child are met;
• Emergency action to protect a child.

The outcome of the assessment should be:

• Discussed with the child and family and provided to them in written form. Exceptions to this are where this might place a child at risk of significant harm or jeopardise an enquiry;
• Taking account of confidentiality in line with GDPR;
• Given in writing to agencies involved in providing services to the child and family as outlined in the multi-agency plan, review dates and intended outcomes for the child.

The maximum time frame for the assessment to conclude, such that it is possible to reach a decision on next steps, should be no longer than 45 working days from the point of referral.

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7. Regular Review

The assessment plan must set out timescales for the actions to be met and stages of the assessment to progress, which should include regular points to review the assessment. The work with the child and family should ensure that the agreed points are achieved through regular reviews. Where delays or obstacles occur, these must be acted on and the assessment plan must be reviewed if any circumstances change for the child.

The line manager must ensure regular supervision of the allocated worker and include in this progress being made against the plan. Involved multi-agencies and the family must review the plan regularly with the social worker / practitioner to ensure that actions such as those below have been met:

• There has been direct communication with the child alone and their views, wishes and feelings have been recorded and taken into account when providing services;
• All the children in the household have been seen and their needs considered;
• The child's home address has been visited and the child's bedroom has been seen;
• The parents have been seen and their views and wishes have been recorded and taken into account;
• The analysis and evaluation has been completed;
• The assessment provides clear evidence for decisions on what types of services are needed to provide good outcomes for the child and family.

A useful list from ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018’ to bear in mind for all professionals when reviewing progress:

High quality assessments:

• are child-centred. Where there is a conflict of interest, decisions should be made in the child’s best interests: be rooted in child development: be age-appropriate; and be informed by evidence
• are focused on action and outcomes for children
• are holistic in approach, addressing the child’s needs within their family and any risks the child faces from within the wider community
• ensure equality of opportunity
• involve children, ensuring that their voice is heard and provide appropriate support to enable this where the child has specific communication needs
• involve families
• identify risks to the safety and welfare of children
• build on strengths as well as identifying difficulties
• are integrated in approach
• are multi-agency and multi-disciplinary
• are a continuing process, not an event
• lead to action, including the provision of services
• review services provided on an ongoing basis
• are transparent and open to challenge

8. Recording

Recording by all professionals should include information on the child's development so that progress can be monitored to ensure their outcomes are improving. This is particularly significant in circumstances where neglect is an issue.

Records should be kept of the progress of the assessment on the individual child’s record and in their chronology to monitor any patterns of concerns / cycles of behaviours.

Assessment plans and action points arising from plans and meetings should be circulated to the participants including the child, if appropriate, and the parents. This should be shared in a timely manner.

The recording should be such that a child, requesting to access their records, could easily understand the process taking place and the reasons for decisions and actions taken.

Supervision records should reflect the reasoning for decisions and actions taken.

9. Principles for a Good Assessment

The assessment framework in Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018 provides a model, which should be used to examine how the different aspects of the child’s life and context interact and impact on the child. It notes that it is important that:

• Information is gathered and recorded systematically;
• Information is checked and discussed with the child and their parents/carers where appropriate;
• Differences in views about information are recorded; and
• The impact of what is happening to the child is clearly identified.

Assessment Framework Triangle 

Assessment Cycle