ASWB Exam Prep in Pictures

A quick drawing of your attention to yet another way to prep for the ASWB exam. Need a break from practice tests and podcasts? Check out Pass the ASWB Exam on Pinterest. In addition to links back here, there are collections of helpful stuff, including lots of material just right for visual learners. Freudian theory as iceberg. Personality disorders as mini-chart. That sort of thing. Check it out, follow, repin...enjoy!

LCSW Exam Prep

Once upon a time, you had to buy expensive packages full of CDs and books to hope to approach the LCSW exam with confidence. That's changed. Now, all you need is an Internet connection, some time to do some reading and take some practice exams, and maybe a touch of common, social work sense.

The web is overflowing with the very stuff that pricy exam prep CDs and books are filled with. The side bar of this blog has a short list of links to some essentials--the NASW Code of Ethics, the DSM, etc. Throw in some basics about human development and various theories and--given enough exposure to practice questions (like those at SWTP)--you can consider yourself ready to go get licensed.

That is to say, your LCSW exam prep doesn't have to wear your down emotionally or financially. Passing the exam is a big part of your career. Getting there isn't necessarily going to be half the fun, but it doesn't have to be joy-free either.  This goes for future LMSWs, LICSWs, LSWs, and all the rest too!

Here are some additional sweet spots on the web worth checking out as you head toward the licensing exam--ethics, study tips, flash cards.

• Eye on Ethics at Social Work Today
• NASW Ethical Dilemma of the Month (change the number in the URL to crawl through the series)
• Study Tips at Social Work Test Prep
• LCSW Flash Cards at Cram.com

And, because all of this still might rough you up a little, here's this:

• Self-Care Starter Kit

Take care and good luck!

NASW Code of Ethics and the Social Work Exam

The NASW Code of Ethics is central to the social work licensing exam and should probably be central to your test prep. If you're the gambling and time-wasting type, you might experiment with taking exam studying nothing but the Code of Ethics.  Whether or not you that appeals to you, here's something that might: Underway at Social Work Test Prep's blog, a section by section examination of the Code, the ways you might expect to encounter it on the exam, and strategies for getting Code questions answered right. A little bit like our KSA of the Day series. Enjoy!

LCSW and LMSW Exam Study Guides

As we've talked about in other posts, the feeling around here is that the age of the big, bound social work exam study guide has passed. The web has taken over. Once upon a time, not so long ago, it wasn't easy to gather all the info you needed to review in one place. But that's changed. There is one place that everything can be gathered easily, and for free: the screen you're looking at right now.

You used to need a hard copy of the NASW Code of Ethics on hand.  And a copy of the DSM.  And some textbook walking you through various developmental theories and the like. No longer. Each is just a click away. And the links offered in this post are not rarities. If you don't like how things are presented on any of those sites, other versions are easy to track down with a quick web search. 

Prefer to curl up with a book? Wipe the dust off your MSW textbooks. They'll do the trick for just about everything covered on the exam. Use the web to fill in the holes.

Feeling ready to sit down for the exam? Great! First, assess your readiness with a practice exam or two. Get a sense of what it's like to answer 170 questions over 4 hours. Get your multiple choice chops back up and running. Soon, you'll have the test content and process both down. You'll be all-the-way ready. You'll be ready to go in and get that license. It's not that far away. Good luck!

Breathing Through Social Work Exam Jitters

Test anxiety is, for many, a substantial impediment to harnessing the energy and focus needed to tackle the four-hour, 170 question ASWB licensing exam. Managing that anxiety is a good to-do to add to your exam prep.  You've likely worked with clients on managing anxiety. Now it's your turn. Whatever's worked in the past, try that. Try it as you sit down for real-time practice exams.

Here's one way to breathe through test anxiety via YouTube:

 See how it goes. Good luck!

ASWB Exam Advice: Keep It Simple

Words of wisdom from a now-licensed social worker:

"Somewhere it said not to study in the 24 hours right before taking the licensing exam. I ignored that. I ignored just about everything that said when not to study, what not to study. When in doubt, I studied. What did I realize after I'd taken the exam? I should've listened.

The exam is not complicated. You're being tested to see if you're ready to be a licensed social worker. That is, can you competently help people in social work situations? Without doing harm...without overstepping your bounds ("scope of practice" questions are pretty much guaranteed). What the people who put together the exam want to make sure is that, once you're licensed, they won't have to deal with you again. You'll do your work, be professional, and stay out of trouble.

So keep it simple. If you're basically competent and know your way around the basics of the DSM and the Code of Ethics, you're more than halfway there. Next is learning how to take the exam. And you know most of that too--you've gotten all the way through graduate school. You've taken lots of tests.

This one is bigger, though. Have you ever taken a four hour exam?  What's the last time you did anything for four hours straight?  170 questions was more at once than I'd ever encountered. That takes some getting ready for. Takes some training. That means practice. So do that some. And then you're ready. You know the content, you know what they're looking for, you know how sit still for four hours, you're ready. 

Is that all? Yes! Really? Really!"

Free Social Work Exam Study Guide?

A recent post at SWTP focused on a quick, free way to get your Freud learned. The resource: AllPsych.com.  Have you poked around there? What the site really amounts to is a free study guide for the social work licensing exam. Developmental theories? All there. DSM-IV? Yep. And on and on. The Psychology 101 section alone contains a huge chunk of what's worth reviewing for the exam. 

Of course, social work isn't psychology and psychology isn't social work. No one's suggesting you limit yourself to this one resource. But as you're putting your study materials together, you could do much worse than digging into All Psych...some practice tests (e.g., SWTP)...and, of course, the NASW Code of Ethics. You'd be off to a very good start.