Modernizing course design: An innovative occupation-focused framework

The broad scope of occupational therapy (OT) practice requires educators to prepare entry-level clinicians for diverse practice settings and client populations (Hodgetts et al., 2007). In a rapidly changing health care environment, entry-level occupational therapists and occupational therapy assistants must demonstrate competence in understanding and addressing health conditions, disease, and impairment to promote occupation as our distinct value (Cohn, 2019). In OT education, challenges exist in preparing students with the clinical reasoning skills that identify the interaction between a person's health conditions and impairments and its impact on occupation (Brown et al., 2017). Occupation is often not explicit throughout coursework focused on didactic content, and there is a tendency to focus on skill development rather than meaningful occupation (Cohn, 2019). For example, course materials may emphasize dizziness and dyspnea in pulmonary conditions but not discuss how these symptoms affect occupational performance.