Assignment Guidelines

Introduction

Assigments in Physiopedia and Physiopedia Plus are designed to consolidate your learning from a course and promote thinking around how you might implement this learning into practice.  You are required to demonstrate academic skills expected of a physiotherapist or physical therapist which will include providing evidence to support your statements, referencing and good writing skills.

The assignment is designed to:

1. Provide you with a method to demonstrate that you have understood the course content and are able to implement it into your professional practice.
2. Allow you to dig deeper into a topic that is of particular relevance to you and your context.
   
3. Contribute to your profession.  On achieving a pass we may identify that your work is of a sufficient standard to be published in Physiopedia (with your permission of course!) and be used by the physiotherapy community for teaching and learning purposes. This is a great opportunity to contribute to the profession and demonstrate your professional leadership!
   

Assignment requirements

To pass an assignment we expect a good level of academic writing. The assignment should:

1. Demonstrate evidence of learning from the course.  We must be able to see that you have reflected on your practice and how what you have learned has changed your practice.  
   
2. Include at least THREE references as evidence for the approach taken. These references must be used appropriately, cited in the text where they support your statements and be listed in full at the end of your assignment. Read more about referencing here.
3. Must be written in English.  The Physiopedia team are aware that some course participants will struggle writing in english, this is not a problem and will be taken into account when reviewing the submissions.
   

We are not looking for correct or incorrect answers! We are looking for the implementation of the knowledge, techniques and skills covered during the course and an engagement with the relevant literature. 

Submitting your assignment

• We recommend you write your assignment using Word or similar.
• Your assignment should be 1000-3000 words in length.
• You should submit your assignment online through the link in the course page in Physiopedia Plus.
  
• Please make sure you keep a copy for yourself when you submit.

Marking procedure

All submitted assignments are reviewed by the course team in relation to the marking criteria provided.  You will not receive a mark for your assignment, you will receive a pass or fail. Assigments of sufficient standard will receive a pass which will be added to your Physiopedia Plus activity log. 

Common reasons for failing that you should avoid:

1. Plagaurism.  If you have copied text from the internet, the course resources or from other participants submissions your assigment will be failed. We want to see a unique submission written in your own words.
2. Not following guidelines.  If you have not followed these assignment guidelines your assignment will be failed.

Assignment guides

You may be asked to do one of the following types of assignment.  Please make sure that you read the guidelines and ensure that you have done what you have been guided to do before you submit. 

Patient case study

A patient case study is an evidence based report of your interaction with a patient. You should use the following template:

1. Title - the title should be specific to and descriptive of this case.
2. Abstract - this is where you simply summarise your case study into a story which flows logically. It is a narrative that consists of a short version of the whole paper. There are no headings within the narrative abstract.
3. Introduction - what is particularly interesting about the case you want to describe.
4. Case presentation - this is where you describe the case in detail. The complaint that the patient has, information obtained from the history, results of clinical examination and working clinical impression of patient.  You should include the ICF environment, personal, structure, functional and participation model here.
5. Management and outcome - this is where you clearly describe the care plan, as well as the care which was actually provided, and the outcome.
6. Discussion - In this section you should identify any questions that the case raises, implications for practice and summarise the clinical conclusions.
7. References - Only use references that you have read and understood, are cited in the text of the case study and support your writing.

More detailed guidelines for writing a case study

See an example case study in Physiopedia

Marking criteria: following the template, interventions supported by evidence, appropriate clinical conclusions

Knowledge Translation

One of the main challenges following a course is to transfer this knowledge.  As a physiotherapist you may wish to transfer your new knowledge to several different groups of people such as fellow phyiotherapsists, other health care professionals, patients, carers etc.  Knowledge translation resources can take any forms such as an information leaflet, infographic, poster, presentation, handout, plan for phone app etc.  When you create a knowledge translation resource the resource should provide key messages that you think are important to share with your target population.

Marking criteria: correct key messages, appropriateness of communication, innovativeness

Training colleagues

Following an online course you may want to pass on what you have learned during the course to your colleagues. Come up with a training idea that you consider highly relevant for the context or setting that you are working in. Propose a training idea, a summary of the training session you would like to conduct and the relevance of the training you propose using the content of the course. Try to write this document as if you were targeting senior staff in a health facility in your area. The objective of the training could be to improve common practice amongst your colleagues or in another health or social care facility.

Marking criteria: training idea, relevance of training proposed, justification for the training that was provided

Project report

Many of the ideas presented throughout courses might require a change of practice and/or service delivery. In this report you should propose a project idea that could improve practice, service delivery and/ or the care for individuals affected by the topic of the course. Attempt to make the project feasible and make sure to include a proper justification as if you were writing a proposal to senior management in a health or social facility or related stakeholders..

Marking criteria: feasibility, innovativeness, relevance

Discussion summary

The discussions on the courses produce a wealth of information.  In particular the discussions that included a literature search have produced many resources that could be collated into a more useable format.  Choose one of the discussions and summarise the contributions into one concise document similar to a published literature review.  Where possible draw conclusions that aid sharing of knowledge and suggest implications for clinical practice.

Marking criteria: structured summarisation of discussion content, well drawn conclusions, implications for practice

Physiopedia page

Contributing to Physiopedia is a great way to contribute to your profession.  The Physiopedia page that you write should relate to the topic of the course. Your Physiopedia page should be divided by subheadings, concisely written, supported by up-to-date published literature and referenced. It can also include media (copyright free images and youtube video) to enhance your writing as well as links to other Physiopedia pages and external resources to lead readers to other sources of knowledge. You can either choose to write a new page in Physiopedia of your choosing or review and update one of the existing pages.

Marking criteria: well structured and concisely written, inclusion of physiotherapy specific information, supported by evidence