No abstract

Relevance: Research, education and practice. Purpose: Students have to change from a layperson to a professional during their three years of study on the Bachelor program of Physiotherapy. The clinical placements play a major part in this transformation. Our aim was to assist this transformation through an increased emphasis on in-depth reflection on clinical placement practice, using a visualisation tool specifically designed to elicit tacit knowledge and understanding. We wanted to understand better what happens during the placements and how supervisors and university staff can better facilitate the transformation.Approach/evaluation: We used the Footprints of Emergence visualisation tool, developed by Williams et al., in 2012. This method allowed students to deeply reflect on their clinical placement experiences by considering 25 factors which influence learning. These factors relate to the structure, openness and interactivity of the environment, and learner presence and agency. Students use the tool to place the factors on a continuum between prescribed and emergent learning, resulting in a visualisation known as a Footprint of Emergence. 52 second-year students attended a workshop and created a footprint. These visualisations were then analyzed and compared with the design footprint of the course tutors.Outcomes: The first trial showed that the tutors' expectations of students' placement experiences were similar to those evidenced by the students through their Footprint visualisations. Outcomes vary depending on the individual supervisors in the clinical setting and the students' understanding of their learning experiences. The Footprints of Emergence are useful for getting an overall impression of the student cohort experience as a whole, and provide a helpful focus for discussion of individual students' experiences. Furthermore they enable students to better understand how they deal with open

No abstract

No abstract