Our Curriculum
医生的职业疗法课程是delivered in a sequential manner with each step designed to ensure that students develop their fundamental professional skills and scholarly knowledge while drawing on their individually unique and diverse backgrounds during the foundational didactic portion of the program. The supporting documents explain how the steps progress through foundational practices and scholarly skills, evaluative, cultural leadership and advocacy, holistic and integrative care, scholarship programming, clinical experiences, and conclude with self/professional actualization. Relating to Kolb’s experiential learning style, the curricular thread steps are grouped accordingly:
| Kolb’s Learning Style | Curricular Thread Steps |
|---|---|
| Concrete Experience | 基本实践和学术技能,国际化程度ative, Cultural Leadership And Advocacy |
| Reflective Observation | Holistic And Integrative Care |
| Abstract Conceptualization | Scholarship Programing |
| Active Experimentation | Clinical Experiences, Self/Professional Actualization |
The design builds off the University, School of Health Sciences and OTD program mission statements aimed at excellence in professional education to meet the global society practitioners may face.
Foundations
Students engage during the first step in foundational course work to develop a strong background in human science, professional knowledge, evidence-based practice, and core professional skills. These classes include topics on occupational therapy theory, history and structure of the profession, neuroscience and conditions influence on daily occupations, and how humans’ engagement with and without disabilities vary across the lifespan. Global societal changes are intertwined across the course work into lectures and experiences. The foundational knowledge and skills gained are yielded by an integration of concrete experiences, reflective observations, and abstract conceptualization to prepare for the future active experimentation through clinical fieldworks and the doctoral experience.
Evaluations
The evaluative step builds upon the concrete experiences and reflective observations to gain abstract conceptualization into how human development, various conditions, and the context for which we engage and evolve can influence our occupational being across the lifespan in a global society. Topics covered in this phase include core skills for evaluation, assessment, and occupational task analysis across the life span combined with level 1 fieldwork introduction to help build upon the growth towards self/professional actualization.
Cultural Leadership & Professional Advocacy
Prior to moving from evaluation and assessment skills into providing care, students are taken to the next step of cultural leadership and professional advocacy. These courses outline what it means to be culturally sensitive and aware as a leader, practitioner, and individual to consult and engage collaboratively with other professionals and stakeholders. Students also gain the advanced certification in quality improvement methodology to apply not only in a leadership role but as a clinician to assure plans of care are efficient, culturally inclusive in nature to meet the global society we all engage in. Topics include course work on ethics, cultural and anti-racism, interprofessional skills, private practice, and certification in lean six sigma at the greenbelt level.
Holistic & Integrative Care
Upon successful completion of steps 1-3, students are prepared to engage in the development of holistic and integrative care plans across the lifespan in a variety of contexts to meet the challenges, threats, and opportunities for their clients. During this step, students engage in their second advanced certification as a reiki practitioner I. In addition to reiki practice, topics in this step include practice and interventions application across the life span, group dynamics, and ongoing level 1 fieldwork integration of skills and learning. Students learn how to translate knowledge gained from prior steps into meaningful and purposeful culturally sensitive occupation-based interventions to promote healthy engagement in everyday occupations for the clients they serve.
Scholarship Programming & Clinical Experience
The skills and knowledge gained and reflected upon in the holistic and integrative care step allow for students to progress into the step of scholarship programming. This step starts to bridge the translation of didactic and evidence-based practice principles into conceptualization of advanced skill acquisition related to research and design, program evaluation and development, and clinical competency across the life span. Students also gain their final course to obtain advanced certification in reiki practitioner II to maximize their skills in holistic alternative concepts to meet the global challenges of a modern society. During this step, students complete their final level 1 fieldwork in preparation to begin their level 2 fieldwork during the clinical experiences step, aligning with the active experimentation concepts of the curricular design and philosophy.
Self/Professional Actualization
The final step after clinical experiences concludes with the self/professional actualization stage. This step culminates the prior steps into an innovative experience to gain more in-depth, advanced knowledge and appreciation for the skills they have gained through their doctoral experience and capstone. At this time, students will engage in applying culturally inclusive skills to address current and emerging global issues in a chaotic and complex global society. They will be challenged to address current and emergent practice issues, and to reflect more broadly on topics, when possible, to advocate for occupational and social justice to demonstrate excellence in programmatic delivery.
Our Philosophy
Occupational Therapy Education has as its goal to prepare learners to:
- Be competent practitioners in all the foundational skills of practice
- 批判性的阅读,理解,and apply relevant and current research to provide a basis for evidence-based practice
- Exercise critical thinking and clinical reasoning skills
- Embody the professional identity of serving the occupational needs of their communities
OTD Philosophy Learning Statement
在occupati的哲学博士项目onal therapy at the University of New Haven is rooted in a holistic, inclusive approach by preparing future occupational therapy profession to be leaders in a global economy. Our mission and values aim to serve society by promoting engagement in everyday occupations for all people. This will occur by guiding our students to service the local and global communities within which they engage, to advocate for occupational and social justice and to accept the complexity of the human system with the contextual environment in which they live.
See MoreOccupational therapy (OT) holds a core philosophical assumption,
"that by virtue of our biological endowment, people of all ages and abilities require occupation to grow and thrive; in pursuing occupation, humans express the totality of their being, a mind–body–spirit union. Because human existence could not otherwise be, humankind is, in essence, occupational by nature."(p. 46) (AOTA, 2020)
This basic assumption is infused in the programs mission, vision, values, and curricular thread building the strong foundation of learning as a lifelong process in which the student needs to be prepared to further their knowledge as they encounter new challenges and innovations. Students enter their education with diverse experiences, knowledge, and skills which have influence on learning experiences. The program models Kolb’s Experiential Learning Theory.
Through the learning cycle of dissemination of concrete experience, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization, and active experimentation our students will reflect on new and past experiences to transform what they believe and understand to grasp new ideas and concepts as growth in knowledge occurs. The learning cycle is a process where information is transferred from teacher and experiences to student. Information is received through concrete experience of the subject matter and transformed through reflection and conceptualization. It is then transformed one more time in a new experience which requires students to act on their newly discovered understanding of the information.
In the students’ first year of the Occupational Therapy program, students will engage in concrete experiences through lectures and be given the opportunity to abstractly conceptualize this information through classroom activities and learning experiences including labs and Level I Fieldwork to transform core principles into the foundation of sequential years in the program. During their second year, students will build upon their new concrete experiences and reflect on gained knowledge through abstract concepts around classes and experiential learning opportunities on occupational therapy assessment and treatment. Students will utilize their own rich and unique personal experiences to gain further understanding through abstract conceptualization and active experimentation while on their Level II Fieldwork. In the third year, students will transform from an entry-level general practitioner in order to engage in the doctoral experience and capstone to develop in-depth skills and experiences in at least one of the following areas: leadership, advocacy, administration, research, education, clinical practice, theory development, and/or program and policy development. Through active experimentation and reflective observation of knowledge gained in the first two years of the program, a culminating doctoral capstone experience will be completed to demonstrate integration of occupational therapy with their own personal values, mission, and beliefs to ultimately bring their novel ideas to the world around them.
Our students graduate not only as qualified occupational therapy practitioners but as the future of occupational therapy, engaging, leading, and advocating in an occupational global economy we all engage. Navigating the chaotic geopolitical workforce to continue the profession and program’s mission, students achieve this level of excellence through the program’s curricular design starting with foundational knowledge and skills in the first semester and concluding with doctoral experience. The skills to not only help humans across the lifespan pursue a fulfilling and engaging life, but also to become transformative leaders in our nation and world, advocating for occupational and social justice in their personal and professional pursuits. The connection of social determinants of health and the fundamental tenant of human performance is critical for leaders to incorporate into their policies and operating procedures as well as working in the occupational therapy professional clinical settings.
References
American Occupational Therapy Association. (2020). Occupational therapy practice framework: Domain and process (4th ed.). American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 74(Suppl. 2), 7412410010.https://doi.org/10.5014/ajot.2020.74S2001