Learning Zone - Frequently asked questions

The Learning Zone is developed to support Social Care Council registrants continuous learning and development but can also be used by anyone undertaking learning and development or qualifications to become social care workers or social workers and/ or to support families and carers.

Click here to access the Learning Zone

On the Learning Zone you can find a wide range of learning resources within the Learning Resources Library covering topics that are relevant to your social work and social care practice.

Click here to see a full list of resources currently available.

You can also find lots of other key information and guidance to support your continuous learning and development journeys and career pathways. This can include information about:

• Standards, including National Occupational Standards (NOS).
• Induction for social care practitioners
• Qualifications for social care and social work e.g. the new Level 2 Certificate in Safe and Effective Practice, the Review of Social Care Qualifications and the Degree in Social Work.
• Professional practice frameworks such as the Professional in Practice (PiP) Framework, and the Care in Practice (CiP) Framework.
• Apprenticeships – Northern Ireland Apprenticeship Framework.

As the regulator for the social care workforce, the Social Care Council works to ensure registrants put its Standards of Conduct and Practice (the Standards) at the heart of social care and social work practice and education.

All learning resources on the Learning Zone are underpinned by the Standards. This is to ensure registrants are provided with consistent messages about standards, values and best practice. Adherence to the Standards supports the delivery of effective social care services both now and in the future and supports registrants to uphold:

• Standard of Conduct 6: You must be accountable for the quality of your work and take responsibility for maintaining and improving your knowledge and skills;
• Standard of Practice 6: You must develop yourself as a social care worker and social worker.

Our resources are not developed like traditional eLearning resources. There are no registration or login requirements and, currently, there is no function or system to collect completion data.

Our digital learning resources are developed to support registrants continuous learning and development within the workplace by providing you with an accessible, bite sized, practical reference tool, that allows you to learn at your own pace and time. As such, we purposely do not state how long it will take to complete each resource – nor do we include summative assessments or certificates.

We know from evidence-informed research that this approach, providing access to learning content as and when needed, can support learners to better retain key information and/or to quickly refresh their memories of previously learned material at the exact moment they need to, thereby supporting them in their day-to-day practice.

What we have included are reflective learning questions, which can be completed by learners to evidence their learning and completion of the resource. We recommend sharing these completed questions with line managers during supervision and/or team meetings and keeping a record of these to provide as evidence for a Post Registration, Learning and Training (PRTL) audit.

When you join the Social Care Council Register you agree to abide by the Standards of Conduct and Practice. It is therefore your responsibility to ensure you continue to develop your knowledge and skills and have access to relevant learning and development to support your job role and level of responsibility.

You have a responsibility to consider your learning and development needs and raise these with your manager during supervision and 1-2-1 meetings where you believe these would be of relevance to your role and level of responsibility – this includes undertaking self-directed learning such as; using the Learning Zone.

Your employer must provide you with an appropriate induction when you start in a new role. Your employer should also work with you to develop your individualised learning plan –which is a plan of the learning and development you will undertake during the year ahead to support your role.

The Learning Zone resources do not replace the employer’s responsibility to ensure workers are provided with comprehensive training that enables them to deliver safe, effective care and support and to meet the training requirements within their roles and settings.

Employer responsibilities for learning and development of their employees are clearly outlined in the Standards of Conduct and Practice for Employers – Standard 4.

Employers are more than welcome to use the Social Care Council’s resources and guides within the workplace to supplement and support a continuous learning and development culture which has standards and values at its core.

Yes. There are two search functions available on the Learning Zone. On the top utilities bar (the one in white with a yellow search button). You can use this to search across the whole of the Learning Zone website by typing into the yellow section e.g. apprenticeships and clicking return. A search results page will be displayed indicating where you can access content on apprenticeships.

You can also access another search function in the Learning Zone Resources section. This search allows you to search for learning resources by name or category. If you know the name of the resource e.g. reflective practice or standards use the “Search resources tab”.

You can also search by category for e.g. child development or dementia and the search will bring back all resources linked to that category.

NB: If you are unable to find what you are looking for, please email: learningzone@niscc.hscni.net for further assistance.