This blog is my course work that will enable me to achieve the learning outcomes provided for participation occupation one paper as a part of the Otago Bachelor in Occupational Therapy Programme.
Motor planning is a skill which I had the privilege to learn
about on my fieldwork one placement, working in a CDS paediatric team.
Motor planning or praxis is the ability of the brain to
conceive, organize, and carry out a sequence of unfamiliar actions.
Therefore Motor Planning is a skill we all have that allows
us to complete new tasks that we have not done before by watching the task be
completed then copying it.In children motor planning can be effected by sensory
integration disorders which can cause the child to have difficulty in all new
tasks that they attempt in life. Due to this the child may appear to not be
developing correctly as they are unable to learn new activities at the spend of
a child that does not have sensory integration problems.
For a child who has minimal motor skills a new task, one
which may seem so easy for us now that we have completed it numerous times,
could be the most difficult task for them to master.You may be thinking that
giving clear instructions to explain a task as you go would help overcome this problem.
However then the child would no longer be using motor planning, they would have
switched into using cognition which is a different skill to motor planning.
Motor planning can have an effect on every motor skill task
that we do. Form walking, running, co-ordination of balls/ balloons and much
much more.
Following this write
there are five youtube clips. Each clip presents a range of motor skills that
can be learnt or be effected by motor planning and motor skill development.
Clip One:
This clip explain how sensory information can effect a child's ability do develop motor skills. This is only one case, every case presents differently.
Clip two:
This short clip is of a child with difficulty with co-ordination which is effected by motor planing development. This shows how difficult a simple task of catching a ball can be.
Clip three:
This clip shows a child moving through an obstetrical course. This task requires motor planning to co-ordinate through the course and is a task that is very difficult to do if a child has motor planning problems
Clip four:
This clip is of an OT who works in paediatrics and discusses how he assess sensory development and its effects on children's development
Clip five:
this clip is of a group of children using motor planning skills to co-ordinate balloons and their play in the gym
The aim of this tutorial was to
create a 1 minute film, as a small group, that focused on one of the following
concepts:
1.Occupational justice
2. Occupational disruption
3. Occupational transition
4. Occupational deprivation
My group choose the concept
Occupational deprivation. Occupational deprivation can be defined as "a
state of prolonged preclusion from engagement in occupations of necessity or
meaning, due to factors outside of an individuals control." C.H, Christiansen &
E.A, Townsend.
To get the concept of
occupational deprivation across to our viewers we chose to focus on
the environments in our society and how the simplest things are
depriving wheelchair bond individuals from taking part in a range of
occupations. things as simple as putting ramps in where there are steps and
creating doors that are easy to manoeuvre wheelchairs
through independently can remove this occupational deprivation.
As an OT student I attend a range of fieldwork placements
around the country. One of my placements was a paediatric placement which I
help run a weekly hand writing session in a primary school. The children were
very reluctant to take part as to them hand writing seemed pointless because
the introduction of computers meant everything was typed. This made me reflect
on how handwriting was certainly becoming a dying occupation. However it is not
only an occupation taught in schools to help improve fine motor control it also
requires us to look at the core strength and stability necessary to sit in a
chair. This is an aspect of hand writing, computer skills and many everyday
activities. Due to this I have created a slide show on the progression of handwriting
to typing including the aspects of core stability.
The following defines
the concepts do, being, become, belong.
Do or doing:
doing can be described as “the emphasis of knowing and doing as a focal
concern.” (G.D, Rowles). It is a “concept that includes purposeful,
goal-orientated activities.”(Hammell, 1998). In terms of the slideshow
handwriting is shown as a purposeful and goal-oriented occupation, this
therefore shows doing. This can be seen in almost all slides. For example in
slides two and eight.
Being: being is
defined as “time taken to reflect, be introspective or meditative and
re-discover self.” (Hammell,1998). In turn this links to self actualisation and
finding a meaningful appreciation. The slides reflect being through the use of
achievement. Such as is slide nine when the students are being all they can be
through their skills of handwriting.
Becoming: Becoming describes the “ideas that people
envision of future selves” and “explore new opportunities. (Hammel,1998a
;2003a. In terms of the slide show it is through becoming that we are able to
explore the new technology of typing over the skill of handwriting. It is a
skill that has become an aspect of everyday and has certainly progressed from
the basic means of typing shown in slide twelve (a typewriter).
Belonging: The
term belonging refers to “the contribution of social interaction”... “And the sense
of being included, to occupational performance and life satisfaction.” (Duggan
& Dijkers, 1999). We can link the skill of handwriting to having a sense of
belong as it is through handwriting that skill of letter writing came about. We
were able to feel as if we were a part of something, whether it be a family or
a business as we received or past on letters. In today’s society we type
letters in email format and pass them on with the click of a button over the
internet. Letter writing and emails are both shown in slides seven and
seventeen.
Ethical considerations you made:
1. For my
slideshow, as I was using images, to attend to any ethical concerns i have provided
a link under each picture that I took from the internet. These links show where
the original image was obtained.
2. In regards
to the images that i have taken myself, of other people (e.g. slide 5), I
obtained both verbal and written consent. By doing so I have evidence of the
given consent if i am required to present it at any given time.
3. Lastly I
have provided a reference list for all viewers to refer to that states what
slide an image is on and where that image was attained.
For week one of our PIO studies we began looking at both information technology and communication technology. This required us to look into the society’s interactions with technology and how technology was being accepted in society.
What is Information and communication technology?
Information technology is “the development, implementation and maintenance of computer hardware and software systems to organize and communicate information electronically.” In turn ‘Information communication technology encompasses areas such as telephony, broadcast, media and all types of audio and video processing and transmission.” http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/information+and+communication+technology
In other words information and communication technology can
be defined in many ways due to it being a very broad topic. It can include all
forms of computer and internet technologies and also incorporate the use of cell
phones, radios, iPods, television and
all the social networking site that many of us use on a daily basis.
The reading “mainstream Technology as an occupational
therapy tool: Technophobe of technogeek?” written by M.C, Vendonck and S, Ryan
focuses on the introduction of mainstream technology can be useful to improve
both functional independence and occupational performance in everyday
interventions.
Information and communication technology are both growing
aspects in today’s society. We spend more than half our lives engaged in
occupations related to the internet, including study, research, shopping,
socialising (e.g facebook, blogs, skype,
etc.) and business. All these
occupations involve the basic state of communication where there is a sender
and a receiver. This loop of sending and receiving creates a sense of purpose
and has been greatly enhanced through the use of information and communication
technologies.
Technology is an aspect of society that is constantly
changing. We learn to use one form of technology then the next new latest and
greatest technology is released. Currently I feel comfortable using a range of technologies for
example my laptop. My laptop is an Acer laptop. I have had it for a year and know most of the ins and outs of how
to use it. These are skills I have learnt through using it ever day to increase
my knowledge on the occupational therapy course. However if I have to use an
apple computer such as my sisters laptop,
I have not got a clue on where to start. Personally I believe that whether you
are a technophobe or a technogeek, everybody has limitations with technology
use; it’s just a matter of practise and sticking with what works for you
because no matter how hard you try to keep up with the new technology being
released there will always be the next big thing coming out.
Within occupational therapy it is important to have an
understanding of the technology out there as we live in a techno world so there
is going to be forms of technology out there that will suit a range of different
clients. For example on one of my field work placement I worked with a child
with dyspraxia. To try helping the child with speech therapy we used a talking
story book. This let me record a story for individual pictures a in a story
board so that as the child worked through a story they pressed the picture
which would play a sentence that they could repeat back to help gain an
understanding of how to pronounce words correctly. Another example is in a case
where a young boy had extreme high tone in his left arm. He refused to allow
anyone to touch his arm making it very difficult to exercise the arm. By
introducing him to Nintendo Wii we were able to increase the movement/ function
in his arm while making him think he was only playing games. In turn this
decreased the high tone so that his hand has now uncoiled and he has increased
from having 15% function to having 85% function.
In the case of the boy with high tone we had a small
technical issue the sensor not registering to the Wii remote due to the way the
boy had to hold the remote. To redeem
this we had to adjust where the sensors were.
In the future I believe that technology is going to become a
massive impact on the tools of practice.
We are already seeing this being adopted through the use of online
communications. By having online
communications the lines of communication between those in multi disciplinary
teams and other physicians involved with an individual client can communicate a
lot faster allowing the treatment plan to go ahead in minimal amounts of time.
Another reason that technology will impact is because society is becoming much more technologically structured,
meaning that the amount of technology available and relied upon is only going
to increase.
Having a understanding of technology is becoming important
in the position as occupational therapist. This is due to the increase in the
availability to technology in society. There is no longer a choice in whether
you use it or not. If you want a job
you need to have a basic understanding of the technology in the work place. Due
to this fact occupational therapists need to have the ability to work alongside
clients that are required to use technology and help them to adapt the required
technology to suit their personal function, both physical and mental to help
them achieve goals of participating in meaningful occupations (including
employment.)
Yes technology is a growing aspect of society; however there
are growing concerns for the ethical issues arising around using it in health
fields. Without the correct protection on mobile phones and computer files
there is a risk of client’s personal information being released into the wrong
hands. This is why it is very important to gain consent when taking images and
also having the correct knowledge about the technology you are using to
transfer, save and report any information about a client’s case.
