Manual therapy is a cornerstone of musculoskeletal care, yet teaching safe and effective techniques can be challenging. This webinar highlights how ATu’s Orthopaedics app organizes joint mobilizations, soft tissue techniques, and movement-based interventions by body region and diagnosis, providing a structured, evidence-based guide for instruction.

Faculty will explore strategies to teach these techniques and how to incorporate app resources into labs, classroom demonstrations, and case-based activities. This session emphasizes linking interventions to observed movement faults, associated impairments, and patient presentation, helping students develop practical skills and clinical judgment that directly inform treatment planning.

Featured Speaker: Christopher Schmidt, PhD, ATC

An athletic training professional for 30 years, Dr. Schmidt’s career spans clinical care, academic leadership, and professional service. From treating patients across diverse settings to shaping undergraduate and graduate programs, he’s a contributor in the field, influencing best practices through research and committee roles with the NATA and CAATE. His passion extends to curriculum design, interprofessional education, and youth sports injury prevention, helping to shape the future of athletic training.

 

00:00 Faculty Webinar Welcome & Overview

02:36 Skill Meets Science: Manual Therapy Techniques in ATu

04:35 ATu Suite Overview and Features

05:45 Using the AI Search Tool to Find Specific Techniques

08:58 Orthopaedics App Overview

11:24 Quick Access to Manual Therapy Techniques

12:50 Lumbopelvic Pathology Example

15:44 Manual Therapy Techniques for Lumbar Disc Pathologies

17:51 Lumbar Accessory Mobilizations (PAIVM)

21:17 Hip Flexion Mobilization with Movement (MWM)

22:30 Educator Tools: Adding Videos to Lectures and Handouts

24:25 Integrating ATu into Your Teaching

26:53 Video-Based Learning for Gen Z AT Students

28:32 Webinar Wrap Up: Next Webinar, Share Feedback, & Thank You!

Helpful Links: Complimentary Educator access | Educator resources | Set up a Demo

Teaching Manual Therapy in the Digital Age: How Video Resources Transform AT Education

When it comes to teaching manual therapy techniques, we’ve all faced the same challenge: students need to see it, understand it, and practice it repeatedly before they can confidently apply these hands-on skills with real patients. Traditional textbooks with static images can only take learning so far. Live demonstrations are invaluable, but students can’t pause, rewind, or revisit them at 2 a.m. when they’re studying for exams.

That’s precisely why we designed the manual therapy content in our ATu Orthopaedics app to bridge this gap—providing comprehensive, professionally produced video demonstrations that students can access anytime, anywhere, while maintaining the clinical reasoning framework that makes these techniques meaningful in patient care contexts.

In our recent faculty webinar, we explored how educators can leverage these video resources to teach everything from lymphatic drainage and soft tissue mobilization to joint manipulation and muscle energy techniques. But more importantly, we discussed how to integrate these tools in ways that align with both evidence-based clinical reasoning and the learning preferences of today’s students.

Beyond Generic Technique Libraries: Context-Driven Learning

Here’s what makes our approach different: we don’t just provide a generic library of manual therapy videos organized alphabetically. While we do offer that quick-access option for educators who need it, the real power lies in how we’ve embedded these techniques within a clinical reasoning framework.

Each manual therapy intervention in ATu is curated and contextualized for specific pathologies. Take lumbar disc disorder as an example. Rather than overwhelming students with every possible manual therapy technique for the lumbopelvic region, we present only those interventions that are clinically relevant and validated by research evidence for this specific condition. Students see lumbar central accessory mobilizations and hip flexion mobilization with movement not as isolated techniques to memorize, but as targeted interventions that address the particular impairments associated with disc disorders.

This approach mirrors what we want students to develop: the ability to match interventions to patient presentations. The content is intentionally organized to follow the rehabilitation pyramid—addressing centralization and pain management first, then progressing to mobility and mobilization, and finally targeting associated impairments. This sequencing helps students understand not just how to perform techniques, but when and why they’re appropriate.

Short, Professional, and Perfectly Practical

Every manual therapy video in ATu is short enough to maintain attention, yet long enough to demonstrate proper technique. Each video includes clear verbal cueing, proper positioning, and professional demonstration quality that students can confidently reference.

But the videos don’t stand alone. Each is accompanied by concise, bulleted text that reinforces key concepts, patient positioning, clinical cues, and evidence grades. Hyperlinked references connect directly to primary sources in PubMed, allowing students (and faculty teaching evidence-based practice) to dive deeper into the research supporting each intervention.

During lab sessions, these videos become dynamic teaching tools. Faculty can project them full-screen, pause at critical moments to check student technique, rewind to emphasize hand placement, or set them to loop continuously while moving about in the lab or classroom to provide individualized feedback to students. Students can simultaneously pull up the same video on their own devices, creating a seamless integration between demonstration and hands-on practice.

The Three-Phase Learning Journey

The most effective use of these resources follows a suggested three-phase approach, perfectly suited to flipped classroom models and Gen Z learning preferences.

• Pre-learning happens before students ever step into the lab. Faculty can assign specific videos through hyperlinks in course management systems or lab handouts. Students watch these short, professional demonstrations on their own time, priming their understanding and arriving to class with foundational knowledge already in place. This preparation transforms lab time from basic instruction into active skill refinement.
• In-class practice then becomes far more productive. Rather than spending 20 minutes demonstrating a technique to 30 students who can’t all see clearly, faculty can have videos playing in the background while providing hands-on feedback. Students receive that crucial in-the-moment correction that refines technique and builds competence. They can reference the video as needed, checking their hand placement or body mechanics without waiting for instructor availability.
• Clinical application extends learning beyond the classroom. When students encounter relevant cases during clinical rotations, they have professional-quality references literally in their pockets. They can review techniques immediately before treating patients, building confidence and supporting that critical transition to independent practice. The learning becomes truly deep and durable, not just surface-level memorization for a practical exam.

Meeting Students Where They Are

Research tells us that Gen Z students—those currently filling our classrooms—overwhelmingly prefer video learning over printed materials. They’re digital natives who process information in short bursts, value visual orientation, and expect self-paced, on-demand access to resources.

But it’s not just about generational preferences. Studies of athletic training students specifically show they want content that’s directly relevant to the profession, supports active learning, and provides opportunities to observe and repeat skills multiple times. Every element of our manual therapy content addresses these documented learning needs.

The videos align with research on cognitive load and retention. By combining visual demonstration, verbal cueing, and supplementary text, we create multiple neural pathways for learning. As Christopher Schmidt, our ATu Education Lead, noted during the webinar, when students see both an image and text together, “I’m building more neural pathways in that student’s brain, so that when they’re dealing with patients, it’s going to be there when they need it to recall.”

Practical Integration Made Simple

We’ve designed ATu to make integration as frictionless as possible. Our Educator Tools feature lets faculty copy page titles with embedded hyperlinks, grab images, or copy URLs directly to paste into existing presentations, lab handouts, or learning management systems. Creating a curated playlist of relevant videos for a specific lab session takes minutes, not hours.

The enhanced AI search functionality means faculty can quickly locate specific content even if they’re not sure where it lives within the app’s structure. Searching “manual therapy techniques for the shoulder” instantly surfaces the top 50 relevant results, with the ability to filter by specific apps or content types.

For those teaching from a pathology-based approach, the clinical pattern recognition pathway starts with patient signs and symptoms, progresses through physical examination, and arrives at interventions—including those carefully curated manual therapy techniques—organized exactly as clinical reasoning unfolds in practice.

Evidence-Based Teaching for Evidence-Based Practice

At its core, teaching manual therapy effectively requires balancing the art of hands-on skill development with the science of clinical decision-making. Students need technical proficiency, certainly, but they also need to understand the evidence supporting these interventions and the clinical reasoning that guides their application.

Our approach provides both. Each technique includes evidence grading, helping students understand the strength of research support. The pathology-specific organization inherently teaches clinical reasoning. And the accessibility of the platform supports the repeated practice and spaced retrieval that neuroscience tells us are essential for long-term retention and skill transfer.

As athletic training education continues evolving to meet accreditation standards and prepare students for the complexities of contemporary practice, having comprehensive, evidence-based, readily accessible resources for teaching manual therapy becomes increasingly valuable. We built ATu’s manual therapy content to be exactly that resource—one that serves faculty needs, meets students where they are, and ultimately supports the development of confident, competent clinicians ready for independent practice.

Whether you’re teaching therapeutic interventions for the first time or you’re a veteran educator looking to enhance your lab instruction, we invite you to explore how these resources might strengthen your teaching and your students’ learning.