QUALITATIVE PRACTICE EVALUATION.

The article focuses on the qualitative practice evaluation. One definition of evaluation given by the Oxford English Dictionary is, "to express in terms of the known," and so qualitative evaluation might be broadly understood as the expression of that which can be known through the analysis of spoken words, texts or observable behavior. It seeks to interpret and find meaning within these phenomena as means towards the assessment of intervention. The focus of analysis will depend upon judgment, choice and interpretation as part of an inferential process by which categories, typologies and explanations are derived from phenomena which are usually studied in natural environments. Social work practice is itself strongly characterized by such forms of procedure. It would be premature to argue that anything exists as tangible or capable of delineation as a qualitative practice movement. In contrast, the emergence and history of the empirical practice movement is something which can be described in terms of its institutional base, intellectual antecedents, key personnel, methodological contributions, relationship to practice and knowledge building.