Abbie Rodgers Civitan Camp is a volunteer summer camp for Adults with Disabilities. I volunteered for two summers from 2007-2008. During my volunteer efforts, my duties were to assist our campers with maintaining their hygiene, assist with meals, and activity schedules. Each year I observed Occupational Therapy Assistant students that would attend and assist volunteers with camper’s daily activities. I knew, after observing the students, that Occupational Therapy would be a career that would fulfill my calling to serve others.
Description On the 10th of April 2017 at 10am I, a first year Occupational Therapy student interviewed a participant about her favourite leisure activity which was touch rugby in a semi-formal setting for 10 minutes which took place at City College. The main reason why this interview took place was to help me reflect on my communication skills and to make goals to improve my skills. Due to the participants confidentiality I have made sure that I have used a different name throughout this assignment, the name in which I am going to use is Jane.
According to the American Occupational Therapy Association. “Transitions or movements occur throughout an individual’s life. Each person navigates through different life stages, settings, and situations.” Based on personal beliefs and assumptions, transitions can have a positive or negative impact (). Change is interrelated to circumstances, people, and the environment ().
I desire my future to be successful. I will learn more about myself and what I need by completing these surveys. Looking at the broad view in life makes the most sense because having an outline for the future is the path to triumph. Being capable of inspecting the details in life gives prospects you might never see coming otherwise. I grasp that much of what has sculpted my personality are the things I have experienced and the community I have been entangled with.
and intrigued by the mind-body connection as well as the importance of human activity and occupation in maintaining mental and physical well-being. At the same time, my desire to work directly with people and be able to make a positive and lasting change to their lives by empowering them and helping discover their strengths and confidence in themselves to achieve their goals, led me to a realization that a career in occupational therapy would be a perfect fit for me. To me occupational therapy is a dynamic, rewarding, challenging, and inspiring field where I can fully realize my skills and knowledge. Having always been a firm believer in the patient-centric approach, I am passionate about providing excellent service to patients by improving their performance, preventing illness and disability and promoting adaptation to life
Growing up as a twin, I always had that one person who I was always looking after. Growing up as a child I always knew I wanted to work with people. I always enjoyed looking after her, and making sure she was okay. The medical field was something that I have always been very intrigued by. As I got older, I got to experience not only looking after my sister but my gram too.
Introduction There are so many ways in which we can work collectively as a society to help make a child’s life better. When asked at the beginning of the semester to pursue a project that is going to make a real difference in the life of a child I immediately became excited. I have a passion for children and have loved learning about their different stages of development throughout the semester. I also have a passion for occupational therapy, and aspire to begin graduate studies in this field once I have completed my undergraduate degree. Therefore, for my final project I decided to incorporate the two.
I have always had the intense desire to care and look after people from a very young age. I firmly believe that everyone deserves the best quality of life possible and this is what had drawn me to occupational therapy as a career path in the first place. It is so easy to take for granted all the everyday tasks we can do and we seldom consider the effect of not being able to complete them. As an occupational therapist I would be able to make a positive impact on someone’s life and make it possible for them to enjoy their life. I want the opportunity to provide support to people, help them gain independence and watch them grow more confident in their own ability.
Occupational therapy saved my family. Growing up with a sister with severe spastic cerebral palsy to include both cognitive and functional deficits, life existed on a day to day, hour by hour basis, as we were unsure of challenges each moment would bring. This all changed the moment occupational therapy brought quality of life back to me and my family. My very personal experience defined my purpose to become an occupational therapist, to pay the gift given my family forward.
Emily Herman Dr. Dittmer-McMahon December 8, 2015 As we all get older and we continue to change, there is one thing that most of us avoid talking about, death. Death is a time of life that each of us will experience, whether it is at a young age or at an older age we all die at some point. However, it is the times before death that people as medical professionals will see the most. Eventually, I hope to become an occupational therapist. By doing so, I will be helping people by using helping them through rehabilitation using everyday life activities.
Becoming an occupational therapist is my passion and my long-term career goal. Since a young age I have been incredibly inspired and motivated to befriend and help disabled individuals. Having grown up with a disabled mother who benefited from the services of occupational therapy I had the opportunity to see first hand how the experience gave can give individuals like her fulfilling and productive lives. With both parents working as healthcare professionals, including my mother who is now an occupational therapist herself, I see every day how rewarding the field is. Through my life I have had unique personal, professional and educational experiences that have shaped me into a strong candidate for an advanced education in occupational therapy.
Occupational therapy enables individuals of all ages with an injury, disease, or disability to be able to perform meaningful everyday activities through therapeutic interventions. Historically, occupational therapy derived from social justice philosophies and was influenced by events at the Hull House. It was surprising to learn that occupational therapy is connected to the Hull House, Chicago’s first settlement house; so, a meaningful connection as a Chicagoan and a future occupational therapist. Although it did not seem apparent, there were traces of occupational therapy within the exhibit at the Hull House. Furthermore, the Hull House was a meeting place for contemporary social movements, such as the resistance against the tyranny of the
When I was 16 years old, I solidified my life decision to become an occupational therapist. My love for this career path was sparked during my sophomore year in high school when I completed a career aptitude test, and it progressively deepened as I spent the rest of my sophomore and junior year doing further research for this occupation. I graduated high school in 2015 with completed college credits that I knew would be required prior to applying for my Masters of Occupational Therapy. Furthermore, while I was obtaining my degree from Southeast Community College, I completed additional prerequisite classes and began job shadowing local occupational therapists before graduating in June of 2016.
My initial impression of the profession was that this was a career that assisted individuals with ADL’S. As a CNA, I occasionally interacted with the OT practitioners at my place of employment and I assisted some of them with helping patients engage in activities such as dressing, bathing, and feeding. As a CNA, I assist patients with these things as well and it generated an interest in the OT profession. Initially, my beliefs and understanding of the profession was centered around the physical activities that can be performed in an occupational setting included but not limited to, the amount of weight that can be lifted, the type of movement a patient can perform comfortably, the part of the body that is used more often, and how much walking or lifting that can be exerted. These were my exact thoughts of my impression while completing the occupational profile in my first writing class of the program. After the completion of the assignment, I received feedback from the instructor and learned that I was incorrect in my thinking.
It’s been a rough journey trying to find a career that I am interested in for my profession. When I discovered occupational therapy, I didn’t know much about the field. A family friend of mine was the one who introduced, because I always knew that I wanted to work with families and infants. I then did some research and found occupational therapy that specializes in infants. I wasn’t aware that you could be an occupational therapist that works with infants, until the end of my senior year of high school.
