Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Instructional (PT) Designer


I’ve always wanted to be a designer, a fashion designer, but I wasn’t blessed with the skill. Lucky for me, our activity was to design an instructional plan that we will be teaching to our clients. Technically, it’s still designing, right?

I know what a lesson plan is but an instructional design, I’ve never even heard of it before. We had to “self-study” the module on how to do an instructional design and it wasn’t easy especially for me since I’m more of a lecture-experience learner. Basically, the contents of a lesson plan and ID are similar: the objectives, content, different strategies, sequence, assessment & evaluation. I am very thankful for the professors around us who were very helpful in giving feedback on how to improve our instructional design because I have no idea if I was doing it right! I had to change my objectives a couple of times just for it to be appropriate for my case, which is pediatrics. Truly, being an educator is one tough job.

The activity made me realize that successful therapists are invariably good planners and thinkers because making an instructional design requires commitment and practice. Planning how your therapy session will be is a fundamental skill all therapists should develop and hone. We always have to begin with something and this all starts with the goals we have in mind for our clients. Having an ID will help you maintain focus and keep you on the right track. It gives you clarity on the decisions on the strategies and methods you will employ to help clients move systematically towards the goals.

Take home message: having an instructional design will have a positive impact on both the therapist and the client. I quote Miguel de Cervantes, “Forewarned, forearmed; to be prepared is half the victory.”

No comments:

Post a Comment