Occupational Therapy (Extended Degree) BSc (Hons)

You will develop your understanding of academic conventions in UK higher education aligned to your level of study, including expectations around critical analysis, structure, argumentation, evidencing, and referencing. The module focuses on developing communication strategies that will help you express your ideas clearly and coherently in written assignments and spoken activities. You will also reflect on your current academic and language skills and develop strategies for development ahead of your assessments.

This module will help you to understand how occupational therapy is responding to emerging socio-economic, ecological, technological, and political determinants of health. Drawing on knowledge gained during Level 4, particularly in occupation in context 1 and 2 modules, you will deepen your understanding of health and wellbeing needs for individuals, communities and populations.

You will explore common causes of mortality, morbidity and disability. Examples of themes include individual and population health concerns relating to ageing, lifestyle, mental health and wellbeing, neurodiversity, race, gender, and intersectionality; work-health, and disaster/climate response. Using real-world scenarios, you will consider how this informs contemporary occupational therapy practice. These may include expansions in primary care and community services, preventative models of health, the role of technology, and responding to global issues. You will also understand how policy and legislation guides and informs developments.

People with lived experience have been involved in identifying core values. In this module, you will extend your understanding of the occupations of people, communities and societies, opening up discussions about decolonisation of occupational therapy practice. You will also draw on a range of perspectives to critically reflect on assumptions, challenges of health systems and about ways of working as an occupational therapist.

At level 5, you will continue use of the ePortfolio to further develop your analytical and reflective skills and set yourself learning outcomes.

‘Evidence Based Occupational Therapy’ builds on learning in year one to expand your understanding of the role of research in occupational therapy practice. Building on the skills developed during Level 4, such as finding and evaluating sources of information, this module will develop your knowledge and skills to explore how research is conducted and applied to practice, cementing the role of occupational therapists as both researchers and consumers of research.

Together, the content, delivery and assessment is designed to will build the depth of your awareness of EBP and your understanding of the principles of qualitative and quantitative research. Your learning will be linked with other modules to help you find and use evidence across all learning, and the use of real-world scenarios will help you to critically appraise the role of EBP through application to ‘real’ lives.

People with lived experience have been involved in identifying core values. Through our learning, we will continue to explore, and value lived experience as a source of knowledge and critically consider how people’s voices are represented in research and evidence.

You will complete a 2000-word review of the evidence relating to real-world case studies. This will include searching for, selecting and appraising the evidence relating to an issue or need that they experience.

At level 5, the use of the ePortfolio will further develop your analytical and reflective skills. You will be able to analyse and evaluate information drawn from complicated learning scenarios to set yourself further learning outcomes and take responsibility for working towards personal and/or group outcomes.

‘Innovation Through Occupation’ is designed to provide you with the opportunity to deepen your understanding of occupational issues through a negotiated experiential learning project. Drawing on knowledge gained during Level 4 modules – such as foundation knowledge of human occupation, of lived experience as a source of knowledge and understanding the collaborative nature of professional practice – you will workin small groups, alongside an identified community or partner organisation, to identify an innovative occupation-focused response to a need.

You will connect with a community, using principles of co-production, to identify their occupational needs. You will use a quality improvement approach to identify an evidence-informed, occupation-focused way to address an issue or challenge of importance to the community. Alongside this, you will also develop skills in entrepreneurship, service improvement, project management, leadership and teamwork. You will also be encouraged to consider the sustainability issues for your project.

People with lived experience have been involved in identifying core values. This module will help you to reflect on people within contexts and communities and you will explore a range of topics to support your project such as co-production, and strengths-based approaches.

The module is year-long to provide the time and opportunity to build the necessary connections and work collaboratively on your project.
With the identified community and alongside module tutors, you will work together in your groups and will be encouraged to reflect on and develop your ability to work in small teams.

At level 5, the use of the ePortfolio will further develop your analytical and reflective skills and help you to identify personal and group learning outcomes.

Occupational therapists use a range of practical skills when working with individuals, groups and communities. Building on Level 4 modules ‘Introductory Skills for Practice’ and ‘Assisted Practice Based Learning’, you will continue to develop skills to build relationships, assess activities and environments and to help people achieve their goals.

People with lived experience have been involved in identifying core values. You will develop flexible approaches to relationship building in different situations. You will further develop group facilitation skills, reflecting on your role, and the role of others in groups. You will continue to learn about a range of assessments used in occupational therapy. We will increasingly focus on the development of skills in close-to-life contexts. Furthermore, you will continue to analyse how people engage in a range of self care, productive and leisure occupations, developing skills in adapting and modifying these occupations to help people to do what they want and need to do in everyday life. Throughout this, you will be developing professional language and terminology but will also practice making language accessible for people.

At level 5, the use of the ePortfolio will further develop your analytical and reflective skills. You will be able to analyse and evaluate information drawn from complicated learning scenarios to set yourself further learning outcomes and take responsibility for working towards personal and/or group outcomes.

This is your second practice-based learning module and will support you to build on knowledge and skills developed in your ‘Assisted practice based learning’ module in year one. With supervision, you will develop core practice skills, work collaboratively, and explore how the environment can support or limit people’s participation. The target placement hours for this module are 300 hours of supervised practice, contributing to the 1,000+ hours required for Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) registration. 100% attendance on placement is expected in order to meet required practice hours. Absences will be reported to the placement area and the University, and if required, opportunities to catch-up with missed time negotiated at the next most appropriate opportunity.


To meet ‘Supported’ practice-based learning outcomes, you will be encouraged to take a more active role in occupational therapy practice and to translate learning from previous modules and placements to new learning situations. You will take increasing responsibility for identifying your own strengths and learning needs through reflection and supervision.

People with lived experience have been involved in identifying core values. As you gain more diverse experiences in practice, you will continue to reflect on the values that matter to service users and carers in order to work towards person-centred services which help to meet a range of needs.

As part of your inter-professional education, you will reflect on your own role within teams and organisations and think about your contribution to collaboration and shared decision-making, keeping people at the centre of services.

At level 5, the use of the ePortfolio will further develop your analytical and reflective skills. You will continue to develop as a reflective, evidence-based practitioner and link theory from your Year 1 and 2 modules to your practice experiences.