Week 5: Engaging in occupations

Key term: Accepting Support and Understanding my Difficulties as a Student/Occupational Being

Following on from last weeks post; this week still felt a tad overwhelming and a bit up and down...

Tuesday was a mixed day with a few meetings and the last Scholarship and Research class of this term... Which if you have been around me the last few weeks, you'll know has caused me a great deal of anxiety as I tried to get to grips with level 7 (masters level) writing.  It was also the day our first assigment was due [see last weeks blog for more info]. I am aware I talked about this in the last blog post so I will just add a few comments on the topic before moving on... 

On reflection: I know I ended up in a complete panic when faced with this particular challenge and to be honest this made the task a lot worse. I hope as I continue on the course this will become less of an issue.

On a more positive note I am really enjoying my Thursday and Friday modules which focus more directly on occupational therapy practice. We have been continuing to develop our understanding of the human life span and the developments that are part of the changes we all go through but yet make us all individual. Our Fridays have been focused on activity analysis the last few weeks and it was great to relate things I did as an OT assistant to the theory we are learning.  We also had the benefit of the second year MSc students with us in the afternoon to help relate it to use on thier placements 

This week has also been a week where I have had some conversations which have challenged me to think about my learning style, approach and the difficulties I can sometimes encounter as a dyslexic student (hence you may sometimes see spelling errors in my blog). I'm really thankful to be in a learning set/class with a group of people who so far have accepted me with my difficulties and managed to work around things if need be... Which is a great trait in a bunch of people training to be OTs. :) I also had a few conversations regarding the need to use the techniques and equipment I have in place to help enable me to get as much out of the course as possible. I love the word enable it is such an OT word too I think. May have sidelined there... The point of me rambling on about this is: it made me appreciate almost being on the otherside of the process as a person wanting to pursue an occupation i.e. being a student (which is a activity thats meaningful to me); and how having strategies (support) and adaptations (equipment - coloured overlays, different software on laptop) can help me to engage in that occupation. 

Don't think I need to grade the activity though? Any fellow OT students want to advise on it?!?

Anyways as a new week starts tomorrow; its exciting if not slightly nerve-racking to think that this time next week I will be in a travel lodge settling down before my first placement; all be it a one week observatory one. 

Lots of things to get done this week... Hopefully it is a intresting and exciting week as the group all prepare for the first outing from university as 'Student Occupational Therapists'.

For more insight into my journey to become an occupational therapist; follow me on twitter: @OTontheTracks