| CODE | OCT1015 | ||||||||
| TITLE | Orientation Placement | ||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 01 - Year 1 in Modular Undergraduate Course | ||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 5 | ||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 4 | ||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Occupational Therapy | ||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | This study-unit will constitute the first placement experience for the students and will serve to orient them to the the profession and its diverse services with different client and age groups and settings in public health hospital and community-based settings and school-based services. This will act as a foundation for future placements and studies undertaken in class. Students will have the opportunity to observe a broad spectrum of occupational therapy interventions, tools of practice and outcomes based on participation and engagement in occupations. Through the support and guidance of practitioners, as well as the requisite observation methods and tools that will be provided by university lecturers, they will be able to capture and describe the nature of and rationales underpinning the profession. This will enable them to start to develop their professional identity and link theory with practice. The study-unit will nominally take the form of a sequence of four 4-day placements at a corresponding 4 different practice areas over the span of a semester. Students will be divided into groups and each group goes through a rotation, being assigned to a different site every two weeks. Students will be required to articulate their observations in an assignment where they will have the opportunity to start applying basic theoretical principles in order to frame clinical observations and impressions of practice through an organising professional and academic lens. The study-unit will also include a number of a classroom seminar and tutorials which will give students the impetus to undertake self and peer evaluations under the guidance of university tutors. Such seminars will be carried out concurrently with the clinical placement and will give students the opportunity to clarify issues related to their practice experience. Study-unit Aims: The aims of this study-unit are: - to familiarise students with the various occupational therapy settings within the public service; - to provide opportunities where students can observe the scope and domain of occupational therapy practice and how this is targeted through the application of various tools of practice in the process of service delivery to clients; - to enable students to develop an initial understanding of how activity and occupation relate to the health and well-being of service users and how occupation is both a means and an outcome of occupational therapy interventions. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - describe and understand the role of the occupational therapist, the scope of occupational therapy services and the underpinning rationales in a number of settings; - illustrate and appreciate how physical, cognitive, perceptual,developmental and social factors influence participation in occupations; - identity,describe and frame the various aspects and manifestations of the occupational therapy treatment process including the scope of the domain of practice and how this is targeted by the numerous tools of practice at the disposal of practitioners; - conceptualise links, connections and insights that go beyond mere descriptions of the occupational participation challenges observed 2. Skills By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - develop and demonstrate effective communication skills principally with the practitioners and practice educators in the effort to learn about occupational therapy practice and derive the correct information and insights; - demonstrate early professional behavior required of an occupational therapist including responsibility to the client, confidentiality and respect; - document detailed observations of occupational therapy service delivery and practice based on the theories learnt in class; - synthesise observations into coherent articulations that describe an assigned service of the profession; - produce a structured assignment where the theoretical principles learnt in class are used to frame and characterise the occupational therapy service at one of the practice sites visited. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Main Texts - Cole, M. B., & Tufano, R. (2020). Applied theories in occupational therapy: A practical approach. NJ Slack. - Duncan, E. A. (2021). Foundations for practice in occupational therapy (6th ed.). Elsevier. - Gillen, G., & Brown, C. (2023). Willard and Spackman's occupational therapy. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. - Kielhofner, G. (2009). Conceptual Foundations of Occupational Therapy Practice. Philadelphia, PA: F.A. Davis. Supplementary Readings - Alsop, A., & Ryan, S. (2000). Making the most of fieldwork education: A practical approach. Chapman & Hall. UK. - Delany, C. & Molloy, E. (2009) Clinical education in the health professions. Au: Elsevier. - Napier-Tibere, B., & Haroun, L. (2004). Occupational therapy fieldwork survival guide: A student planner.FA Davis. - Punwar, A. J., & Peloquin, S. M. (2000). Occupational Therapy: Principles and Practice. Philadelphia, PA: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. - Reed, K. L. (2020). Occupational therapy: A guide for prospective students, consumers, and advocates. Slack. - Sladyk, K., & Barnes, M. A. (2002). The successful occupational therapy fieldwork student.SLACK Inc. |
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| ADDITIONAL NOTES | Pre-Requisite Study-units: OCT1035, OCT1000 | ||||||||
| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Placement, Seminar and Tutorial | ||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Marjorie Bonello (Co-ord.) |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2025/6. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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