ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses two integrative learning case studies in the healthcare education context, using the concept of situated learning in Communities of Practice (CoPs). The first case study is of a ward-based intervention, which occurred during a week-long placement for senior medical students within the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). The second relates to a weekly integrated case conference designed for newcomer medical students in a busy, city center general hospital for a 4-week placement. This chapter demonstrates that this adapted CoP Learning Architecture can be applied by other disciplines as an alignment map, between integrative capacity learning outcomes and design for learning in practice settings. Integrative learning should be intentional in design, with a purposeful process embedded in curriculum. The domain of this case study CoP is the care of sick newborn babies and their families in the NICU, perhaps the strangest and most entrancing of all hospital environments.
