Encouraging students to learn non-core subjects in health education

Autor: Christian Wahl, Annette Pedersen, Annegrethe Nielsen, Niels Bech Lukassen, Thomas Kjærgaard
Přispěvatelé: Jefferies, Amanda, Cubric, Marija
Předmět:
Zdroj: Scopus-Elsevier
Aalborg University
UC Viden
Wahl, C, Pedersen, A, Nielsen, A, Niels Bech, L & Kjærgaard, T 2015, Encouraging Students to Learn Non-Core Subjects in Health Education . in A Jefferies & M Cubric (eds), Proceedings of 14th European Conference on e-Learning ECEL-2015 . Academic Conferences and Publishing International, Reading, UK, Proceedings of the European Conference on e-Learning, pp. 74-75, ECEL 2015, Hatfield, United Kingdom, 29/10/2015 .
Popis: This paper presents an intervention in nursing education designed to enhance nursing students’ motivation to participate and acquire transferable knowledge within nursing education. A specific part of the curriculum entitled; Organization, administration and management, is of low immediate interest of the students. The students generally regard this topic as irrelevant for their professional development as nurses. In order to motivate the students a range of different IT based pedagogical designs were implemented with the intent of scaffolding the students’ learning.The study, that this intervention is part of, was designed as a 2-year action research project. A variety of data-sources were utilized to document the process, including students’ and teachers’ experiences as expressed in interviews, observations of teaching and learning related behavior and data logging.This paper focuses on how integrating an IT based design affects the students’ learning processes. The research question was; how can students utilize the opportunities for learning in pedagogical designs that include; IT, video-clips, simulations, role playing and collaborative activities? To explore this we used a didactic model developed by University Colleges in Denmark: the study activity model. One of the main objectives for the study activity model is to look beyond traditional didactics and strengthen the awareness of the study activities that the students carry out themselves. The learning opportunities provided by the pedagogical design in this intervention seemed to engage a smaller group of students while a large group of students were frustrated. Our analysis suggests that the students viewed the flexible learning environment and the IT based designs as optional rather than sequential stepping stones towards the learning objectives.The aim of our pedagogical design was to include all students in reflective learning. In order to work with the content on a taxonomically appropriate level a substantial group of students needed more scaffolding and feedback. To respond to the heterogeneity of the student population in nursing education teacher presence and guidance is crucial. Our results suggest that the pedagogical design should support students at different levels to allow them to work and learn in such a way that the learning content can be put to use in a practice environment. The study also suggests that it takes more than one pass of a new pedagogical design to fully understand how to learn in a changed teaching environment. The objective of our project was to enhance nursing student’s motivation to work and acquire transferable knowledge within nursing education. Parts of the curriculum have shown to be of low immediate interest of the students who feel the topics to be irrelevant for their professional development as nurses. In order to obtain our goal a range of different IT based educational designs were implemented with the intent of scaffolding the student’s learning.The project was designed as a 2-year action research project and a variety of data was collected to document the process, including students’ and teachers’ experiences as expressed in interviews, observations of teaching and learning related behavior and data logging.This paper focus on how our educational intervention integrating IT based designs affects the students’ learning processes. The research question is: how (if at all) do the students take advantage of the opportunities for learning provided by educational designs (with or without IT) as simulations, role playing and collaborative activities? To explore this we employed a didactic model: study activity model. One of the main scopes for the study activity model is to look beyond traditional didactics and strengthen the awareness of the study activities that the students carry out themselves. Our analysis consequently highlights a variety of student learning behavior.The learning opportunities provided by the educational design seemed to engage one group of students while a large group of students responded differently. These students did not grasp the learning opportunities given. Our analysis suggests that the students viewed the flexible learning environment and the IT based designs as optional rather than sequential step stones towards the learning experience planned.In general the students felt a great need for feedback when completing activities and our results suggests that the students felt highly motivated by immediate feedback. The students seemed less motivated by the activities or the acquisition of competence thus needing the teacher’s feedback to be gratified. The activities were meaningful for the students in preparation for examinations, but the invitation to reflect on professional challenges, were met only by some of the students.The aim of our educational design was to include all students in reflective learning. In order to work with the content on a taxonomical appropriate level a substantial group of students need more scaffolding and feedback. To respond to the heterogeneity of the student population in nursing education teacher presence and guidance is crucial. Our results suggest that the educational design should support students at different levels to allow them to work and learn in such a way that it can be put to use in a practice environment. IT based designs may here come in handy!
Databáze: OpenAIRE
Externí odkaz: