| Course | MSW 532 Social Work with the Aging and Their Families |
|---|---|
| Week | 2 |
| Paper type | Genogram write-up |
| Length | About 510 words, 5 pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Chamberlain University |
| Program | Master of Social Work (MSW) |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MSW 532 Week 2
Genogram Write-Up for E.'s Family Read by Work Rather Than Generation: Hours in an Ordinary Month, the Bad Week Column, Distance as Travel Time, Bills With Names Against Them and the Job Nobody Holds
Student Name
Chamberlain University
MSW 532: Social Work with the Aging and Their Families
Instructor Name
Month Day, Year
Genogram Write-Up for E.'s Family Read by Work Rather Than Generation: Hours in an Ordinary Month, the Bad Week Column, Distance as Travel Time, Bills With Names Against Them and the Job Nobody Holds
The Drawing
The genogram follows the standard symbols for gender, marriage, divorce and death across three generations, with E.'s first spouse deceased in 2009 and the second marriage in 2012 (McGoldrick et al., 2020). The reading below is organized by who does what.
Work in an Ordinary Month
Table 1
Work by Person in an Ordinary Month
| Person | Hours a month | Tasks | In a bad week | Travel time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| D., daughter, lives in | About 120 | Pills, meals, bathing help, appointments | Takes unpaid days from work | None |
| S., son | About 6 | Taxes, bills by phone, Sunday call | Drives up once | 90 minutes |
| Grandson | About 8 | Lawn, church rides | Unavailable on weekday days | 20 minutes |
| M., second spouse | About 2 | Holiday visits | Calls daily | 25 minutes |
| Neighbor | About 4 | Snow shoveling, checks if lights are off | Calls D. | Next door |
Note. Note. Hours are estimates from interviews with E., D. and S. in October.
The Bad Week Column
In a bad week, such as after E.'s September falls, D.'s hours roughly double and come out of paid work. S. drives up once. Nobody else's hours change. The bad week shows who absorbs the strain.
Bills With Names Against Them
E.'s pension and Social Security, about $2,600 a month, pay the mortgage-free house's taxes, utilities and food. D. pays nothing toward the house and contributes unpaid care; S. pays nothing but manages the accounts. Nobody has said aloud that D.'s housing depends on E. living at home.
Who Has to Be Told Through Whom
S. hears about E.'s health only through D.; M. hears through S. A message about a fall reaches M. a day later and in S.'s words. In family systems terms, information traveling along a fixed chain is one sign of a triangle in which a third person carries what two others will not say directly (Kerr & Bowen, 1988).
The chain also shapes what gets decided. By the time S. hears about a fall, D. has already handled it, so S. experiences each crisis as a report rather than a decision, which keeps S. at a distance.
The Job With No Name Against It
No one tracks E.'s appointments with the memory clinic or reads its letters; D. assumes S. does because the letters come to the home address in E.'s name, and S. assumes D. does. Two follow-up visits have been missed.
What the Write-Up Suggests
The family's care runs on one person's hours and one person's housing. The first practical step is to name an owner for the medical letters.
References
Kerr, M. E., & Bowen, M. (1988). Family evaluation: An approach based on Bowen theory. W. W. Norton.
McGoldrick, M., Gerson, R., & Petry, S. (2020). Genograms: Assessment and treatment (4th ed.). W. W. Norton.
Reading the MSW 532 Week 2 instructions
The genogram drawing follows your section's template and standard symbols, but the marks come from the reading beneath it. Organize that reading by work rather than by generation. Give each person the hours they contribute in an ordinary month and what changes in a bad week. Record distance as travel time, which is what matters when something goes wrong. Write names against the bills: who pays for what and who depends on whom. Note who has to be told through whom, since information often travels along fixed paths. Look for the job with no name against it, the task each person assumes someone else is doing. Close with what the reading suggests.
How this MSW 532 Week 2 example is built
The drawing section names the conventions from McGoldrick et al. (2020) and E.'s two marriages. Table 1 gives five people with monthly hours, tasks, bad-week changes and travel time, from D.'s 120 hours to the neighbor's four. The bad-week section shows D.'s hours doubling from paid work while others stay level. The bills section sets E.'s $2,600 monthly income against the house's costs and names D.'s housing dependency. The communication section traces news from D. to S. to M., citing Kerr and Bowen (1988) on triangles. The final sections find memory clinic letters with no owner and two missed visits, and propose naming an owner.
Where the points sit in the MSW 532 Week 2 rubric
Faculty grade the reading under the drawing far more than the drawing. A reading organized by generation, describing each relative's relationship to the older person, loses most of the available credit. Credit goes to hours in an ordinary month, a bad-week column, travel time and bills with names against them. Finding the job with no owner is often the most useful finding and earns marks. Communication paths should be described concretely. Theory should explain a pattern rather than decorate. Figures should come from interviews and be labeled as estimates. Sources, including the genogram convention, belong in APA style. Faculty also reward a reading that ends with one practical step drawn from the table.
MSW 532 Week 2 help from the desk
Write-ups most often lose points by describing each relative's feelings about the older person. Another common gap is leaving out money, especially who lives in whose house. Some write-ups list eleven relatives when only five do any work, which buries the finding. Others miss the task nobody owns, which is usually where the next crisis starts. If your family is larger or more estranged, include only the people whose work or absence matters to care, and record estrangement by its effect on who is told what. A reading built this way for your case will end with one task that needs an owner. Leave the warmth to the conversation and put the hours on the page.
Get a MSW-532 Week 2 example written to your instructions
Upload the genogram instructions and the marking sheet your section posted, together with the family case behind them, and a custom example comes back inside 24 to 48 hours with the reading written out in full. The first one costs nothing and is built on the relatives your own case names, at the distances it gives them.
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MSW 532 Week 2 questions, answered
The case names eleven relatives. Do all of them belong in the reading?
Only the ones holding a job, blocking one, or standing next to a vacancy. A cousin who appears on the drawing and does nothing in the arrangement gets a line saying exactly that, which is a finding rather than an omission. Padding the reading with everybody on the page is what makes these write-ups read as description, and sections mark it down.
Two of the siblings have not spoken in years. How does that get written?
As a routing fact with a consequence attached, not as history. Say who passes information between them now, what gets lost on the way, and what happens to a decision needing both of them inside a week. Where the cause is known and the case supplies it, one clause is enough, because the arrangement is what this assignment grades.
Can the reading say the arrangement is unfair?
It can say what each person carries in hours and in dollars, and let a reader reach that themselves. Fairness asserted without the figures underneath it reads as the writer's opinion about a family, and it is the sentence instructors bracket most often. Where the man himself calls it unfair, quote him and mark the judgment as his.
Where can I find a free MSW 532 Week 2 sample paper?
The complete MSW 532 Week 2 genogram write-up read by hours and tasks appears below, and its side notes follow the bills and the task nobody owns.
What job has no owner in the MSW 532 Week 2 sample?
Tracking the memory clinic's appointments and letters, which the daughter and son each assumed the other handled, so two follow-up visits were missed.