Assessment One - Portfolio/Ongoing Reflective Journal

40% Weighting

Word Count: N/A

Due Date: 21/02/2020 (Week 13)

Reflective practice is one of the key elements that contribute to the NMBA Midwife Standards for Practice. It is through reflective processes that both students and registered midwives can identify and explore diverse values, beliefs, learning needs, and sociocultural structures. To facilitate your reflective skill development you are required to complete a reflective piece of writing for each of the three (3) 'continuity of care experience' women you recruited in term 2 who will birth in term 3, and the four (4) newly recruited women in term 3 who will birth in term 4.

Overview: by the end of term 3 you will have submitted a minimum of 10 journals in total:

Term 1: 3 journals

Term 2: 3 journals

Term 3: 4 recruited women due to birth in term 4.

Overview of Reflective Journal Writing

A reflective journal is a way of thinking in a critical and analytical way about your clinical experience. It involves looking at a situation, assessing what you have learned from it, what you could have done differently, realising new approaches to your care and ultimately, how you felt about the whole experience. As a student midwife, it shows how different aspects of your work interconnect and can be very useful for identifying gaps in knowledge and ethical dilemmas or situations that need further thought.

Understanding your feelings is a vital skill for reflective writing, and studying midwifery involves being exposed to many new situations - doing your first antenatal booking; helping a woman with breastfeeding support; witnessing a birth - which can bring new reactions to the surface. It's important to comprehend what you feel, why you feel that way and to then learn from it, as failing to reflect can lead to poor insight and therefore poor performance in practice (Hays & Gay, 2011).

Reflective writing is more personal than other kinds of academic writing and is an exploration of events not just a description of them.

Reflective Journal Requirements

Refer to the provided Reflective Journal Template and the Two Reflective Journal examples.

Journal entries are the student's written reflections of face to face episodes of care with the recruited Continuity of Care woman. Phone calls, emails, text messages or any other form of communication other than face to face contact is not acceptable.

How to structure reflective writing

It can be useful to use a reflective model, or series of questions, which will help you look at the whole event from many different angles (Macdonald, 2011; Driscoll, 1994; Benner, 1984). The Driscoll model has a very simple 'what', 'so what' and 'now what' model, which is easy to remember and write up. There are three common reflective writing models that you may choose to follow when writing reflectively: Van Manen, Gibbs, and Durgahee (Giminez, 2011). The models all involve thinking systematically about the phases of an activity, using headings including description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion and action plan. These theoretical frameworks provide a starting point for the critical skills that all student midwives should develop by the end of their educational program.

Example:

1. Description: (do not make this too long - refer to the provided template).

What is it? What happened? Why am I talking about it?

2. Interpretation: What is important and relevant? Look through your description and try to find words or phrases that require further exploration. Include the rationale for what was done or why it was done. Where there is controversy about what was done or found, provide the rationale and sources of evidence for both sides of the argument. How can it be explored and explained using contemporary theories?

3. Outcome: What have I learned from this? How will it influence my future work?

Above all, enjoy writing the journal - it is about you and your reflection and your development as a clinical midwife!

Weighting 60%

Word Count 3000 words (+ or - 10%)

Due Date 23/12/2019 (Week 6)

Task Description

Transition to motherhood: the impact of mode of birth and negative birth experiences on breastfeeding.

The process of becoming a mother is more than the physical task of pregnancy and giving birth. New mothers can feel unprepared and overwhelmed, resulting in a range of complex emotions. Factors that can contribute to this include mode of birth, negative birth experiences and lack of experience in infant care including breastfeeding.

You are required to:

• Discuss and analyse: the impact of negative birth experiences and Obstetric Post Traumatic Stress Disorder upon postnatal mental health and transition to motherhood.

• Explore and analyse the evidence and literature on how the mode of birth (vaginal vs. caesarean) and birth complications can either positively or negatively impact breastfeeding and the development of the human microbiota of the infant.

• Formulate a comprehensive midwifery education plan for a new mother and her partner discussing the following: lactogenesis, benefits of skin to skin care upon infant physiology and breastfeeding, the letdown reflex and signs the infant is getting enough milk.

Assessment Criteria

Formatting according to academic conventions:

1. Your essay is to follow academic conventions of structure with an introduction, body and conclusion.

2. Your introduction will outline the key points of your essay.

3. The body of the essay will cover all the elements of your discussion.

4. Your conclusion will provide an overall summary of your main points with no new information or references.

Line spacing: 2.0 Font size: 12

Further information:

· Review the marking criteria sheet. Consider that your paper's grade will be derived from criteria outlined in that sheet and thus clear explanations of the expectations for varying grades are provided for both your direction and the assessment of your paper.

· Use a separate page for the reference list.

· The quality of your references is what is important rather than the volume of references (use references that are from contemporary (from the last 5 to 7 years) and valid sources such as peer-reviewed journals; do not use websites that end in “. com.au” as academic sources).

· Word count excludes the cover page, abstract, contents page, reference list, and appendices. The word count includes in-text references and direct quotes.

· Words in excess of 3300 words will not be read and thus not contribute to your grade.

· The cover sheet should include your name, student number, the unit code, the assessment item number, and word count.

Assessment 3 - Placement

MDWF12006 - Midwifery Practice 3 - Clinical Placement

Due date: 21/02/2020 (Week 13)

Weighting: 0% - Pass/Fail

Minimal clinical practice experience of 224 hours is required by completion of this course. This clinical experience will allow you to consolidate knowledge and skills acquired throughout the term and enable you to draw a distinction in your scope of practice between normal and complex midwifery care. You are required to meet the clinical requirements listed below and these requirements need to be documented within your Student Clinical Experience Record Book. Please note that successful completion of this unit is not merely the completion of requisite clinical hours and skills but also the demonstration of midwifery novice competency based upon the NMBA requirements and professional behaviour as per relevant CQUniversity policies.

You are expected to work towards minimal clinical requirements and they include:

1. Recruit four (4) 'Continuity of Care' (CoC) experience women, and add this to your reflective journals, that can be found on the Bachelor of Midwifery Meta page.

2. Complete three (3) CoC experiences from term 2 2018.

3. Complete Competency Performance Assessment

4. Complete 224 hours of clinical practice experience plus continuity of care hours (10-20 in total per woman recruited).

The required clinical experience will be reviewed by the midwifery educator/manager in conjunction with the unit coordinator.

Weighting 0% - Pass/Fail.

This is a pass/fail assessment item and therefore a marking rubric is not applied to this assessment item.