Introduction: Scholars have long examined educational approaches and teaching methods in occupational therapy, producing a wide range of educational scholarship. Yet the scope of the scholarship has not been systematically categorised and described, leaving the field without a baseline and guide for its educational science.Method: A systematic mapping review identified topics, research designs, levels of impact and themes across educational scholarship. Through comprehensive database searches and inclusion and exclusion coding, 129 articles published between 2000 and 2009 were studied. Data were collected using a data extraction tool modified from Best Evidence Medical Education, entered into Microsoft Access and analysed using queries.Findings: Conceptual/descriptive papers (n = 76) represented the primary form of inquiry. Research papers (n = 53) used qualitative designs slightly more than quantitative or mixed methods. Educational interventions (n = 22) targeted students' skills, knowledge, attitudes and perceptions, but not their behaviours, organisational change or impact on clients. Prominent themes included integrative learning, learning paradigm, complexities of practice, student reasoning and calls for reforming occupational therapy education.Conclusion: Priorities for educational research include deepen and diversify studies of local learning situations, develop profession-specific conceptual frameworks for learning and measure outcomes beyond student views of the learning activity.

Bibliographic tools can contribute to make the methods that researchers adopt for the phase following the initial literature search more transparent and systematic. The illustrative case description involves a systematic review of academic education in occupational therapy, but easily generalizes to systematic reviews in other health science professions.

Three recommendations were identified: strengthen procedures for studying singular fieldwork experiences, broaden rationales for studying fieldwork, and translate educational concepts for occupational therapy.