Coaching is commonly used in sports settings to instruct and motivate the athlete but has emerged as an intervention approach to support children and young people to participate in occupations. There is no consensus on a definition for coaching, but key characteristics emerging from the literature have been identified which include; joint planning, observation, action, reflection and feedback (Rush and Shelden, 2011).
Occupational therapy has increasingly used coaching within child health to:
- Facilitate parental involvement in interventions (Foster et al., 2013)
- Enhance performance and participation (Weinstock-Zlotnick & Hinojosa, 2004)
- Evidence-based approach (Novak and Honan, 2019) Occupational Performance Coaching (OPC) is described as an “Intervention for people with goals related to improving occupational performance and social participation in personally valued aspects of life” (Graham Kennedy-Behr and Ziviani, 2021 pg.9).
The basic concepts of this approach are founded on parents being the experts and a process of enablement which looks at the person, environment and occupation. OPC has three domains which are integrated and used by occupational therapists to facilitate parents to find a strategy for a specific goal (Kahjoogh et al.,2020)
I am keen to hear about individual experiences of coaching in paediatric occupational therapy services and identify what can be done to help develop coaching in this area.
The Questions
1. What is your understanding of coaching as an intervention approach in children’s services?
2. What coaching approaches are you aware of and use within children’s occupational therapy services?
3. How confident do individuals feel in delivering coaching as an intervention approach in children’s services?
4. What are your needs as an occupational therapist to embrace coaching as a therapeutic tool?
5. What would be helpful in building capacity for delivering coaching as an intervention tool?
OTalk 