Personal Narrative as Pedagogy: A Model for Socially Responsive Narrative-based Education in Occupational Therapy

The practice of occupational therapy relies on the collection and analysis of life narratives to provide responsive client-centered care. As developing holistic practitioners, occupational therapy students are taught to consider these shared stories within a larger context of historical and societal systems by acknowledging such factors as social determinants of health. Case studies are a frequently used tool to teach these skills; however, evidence supports that the identities of these educational stories’ authors can influence which perspectives are shared and, ultimately, impact developing occupational therapists’ perpetuation of or opposition to existing systems of oppression. Critical Race Theory and qualitative methodology suggest the praxis of infusing counter-narratives to promote more diverse perspectives in the classroom, and narrative medicine techniques offer well-evidenced effectiveness of learning through narratives, across health care settings. Theatre-based education, which enacts narratives using first-person and relevant body language, evokes learners’ mirror neurons and increases empathetic learning encounters, suggesting its promise as an effective teaching tool for occupational therapists. Combining these educational approaches, this paper urges an intentional focus on personal narrative as pedagogy and illustrates a model for centering personal narrative in occupational therapy education through a narrative theatre-based educational intervention that was used to prepare students to address local community needs of marginalized populations who are most greatly impacted by lead exposure and toxicity in Marion County, Indiana.