Victorian primary school teachers' perspectives on collaboration with occupational therapists.
Abbey Lavery, Caroline MacKinnon, Emma Clark
Teachers in Victorian primary schools described collaboration with occupational therapists as hampered by role confusion, misaligned communication, and time pressure.
They wanted brief, direct contact (email preferred), clearer explanation of what OTs do beyond fine motor skills, and more built-in time to implement strategies.
Key findings
1Most teachers could not clearly define what an occupational therapist does in a school; the role was most often associated with fine motor and handwriting skills, and some teachers felt OTs overlooked their workload and lesson plans when making recommendations.
2Teachers preferred direct, concise communication with OTs — email was the most practical method given their workload — and were frustrated when OTs sent long reports, contacted them through principals, or tried to communicate during class time.
3Teachers identified the absence of clear school policy on how to work with OTs, a shortage of classroom support staff, and a lack of interprofessional training in their teacher education as structural barriers that made collaboration difficult to sustain.
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What it does not show
Only seven teachers, all from the Melbourne–Geelong region, so the findings do not represent rural, remote, or Indigenous school contexts. Five of the seven were recruited through snowballing, which narrows the range of perspectives and may over-represent teachers who already had a strong (positive or negative) view of OT collaboration. No participants were recruited directly through Victorian Government schools (system approval was not granted), so the government-school experience is represented only via snowball referrals. The interviewer was a final-year OT student, which the authors acknowledge may have encouraged teachers to soften criticism or emphasise positive experiences (social desirability bias). The interview guide was not piloted before use, so question wording and flow were not tested for clarity or bias. Only the teacher perspective is captured; no occupational therapists were interviewed, so the 'misalignment' described is one side of the relationship.
Declared interests
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this as evidence that occupational therapy in schools is ineffective or that teachers are resistant to collaboration. The study is a small, single-perspective qualitative account from seven teachers in one region; it identifies barriers to the working relationship, not a failure of OT interventions. No student outcomes were measured, no OTs were interviewed, and no comparison group exists, so the 'misalignment' described is one side of a two-person conversation and cannot be taken as a verdict on the quality of OT practice.
Summarised by AI from the full paper, without a clinician reviewing it. Check it against the source before it changes what you do. Read it on PubMed →