Abstract
Using Posters as a Pedagogical Tool in Nurse Education
Bettan Bagger and Hélène Kelly
Experiences from teaching 5th semester, nursing students at bachelor level with respect to prevention and health promotion have resulted in the introduction of poster presentations as a pedagogical tool. Poster presentations were introduced as a result of Bologna recommendations concerning the average student workload with respect to the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) as well as the competencies described in The Tuning Project. A consequence of the adaptation of ECTS recommendations was that our institution reduced the number of lecturing hours and increased the number of independent study hours in the nursing education, while at the same time shifting the goal of nurse education away from one of formal qualifications towards the concept of developing nurse competencies. These changes have resulted in challenges to traditional pedagogical approaches away from the teacher’s role as the disseminator of knowledge towards the role of facilitator of learning. This is in tact with professional demands highlighting the necessity of life long learning. Poster presentations have successfully been employed in developing students’ intellectual, professional and academic competences as well as being useful in developing competencies with relevance to practice. Working with posters forces students to organize, evaluate and reflect upon information and develops their abilities to communicate their theoretical knowledge. Students have learned to successfully present their ideas in an A4 poster format resembling the types of posters that one normally sees at professional conferences. The posters are produced on computers and as such the students learn to employ the computer as a creative tool. Students evaluate the use of posters as a concrete and useable tool which they deem valuable in their forthcoming professional work.
A result of co-operation with other Scandinavian educational institutions in a Nordic network has been that the poster as a pedagogical tool has been integrated in the network’s forthcoming intensive course to be held in the autumn of 2008. Moreover, the network has applied for funding of a research project with the goal of making recommendations with respect to curriculum best practice guidelines with respect to prevention and health promotion education for students of nursing in the Nordic countries. The intensive course will serve as starting point for the gathering of data concerning student evaluations of the Nordic curriculum in prevention and health promotion. Students’ reflections with respect to the development of their competencies in this area will be collected using a combination of group interviews and questionnaires.
Biographical details:
Bettan Bagger is a registered nurse and has a MA in education from Denmark’s Pedagogical University. Hélène Kelly is a registered nurse and has a BA in anthropology/ MSc in Health from the University of Greenwich. They are both employed as lecturers of nursing at University College Zealand and have published articles concerning the use of posters in the nursing education in Danish professional journals.
E-mail: [email protected] E-mail: [email protected]
Bettan Bagger and Hélène Kelly
Experiences from teaching 5th semester, nursing students at bachelor level with respect to prevention and health promotion have resulted in the introduction of poster presentations as a pedagogical tool. Poster presentations were introduced as a result of Bologna recommendations concerning the average student workload with respect to the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) as well as the competencies described in The Tuning Project. A consequence of the adaptation of ECTS recommendations was that our institution reduced the number of lecturing hours and increased the number of independent study hours in the nursing education, while at the same time shifting the goal of nurse education away from one of formal qualifications towards the concept of developing nurse competencies. These changes have resulted in challenges to traditional pedagogical approaches away from the teacher’s role as the disseminator of knowledge towards the role of facilitator of learning. This is in tact with professional demands highlighting the necessity of life long learning. Poster presentations have successfully been employed in developing students’ intellectual, professional and academic competences as well as being useful in developing competencies with relevance to practice. Working with posters forces students to organize, evaluate and reflect upon information and develops their abilities to communicate their theoretical knowledge. Students have learned to successfully present their ideas in an A4 poster format resembling the types of posters that one normally sees at professional conferences. The posters are produced on computers and as such the students learn to employ the computer as a creative tool. Students evaluate the use of posters as a concrete and useable tool which they deem valuable in their forthcoming professional work.
A result of co-operation with other Scandinavian educational institutions in a Nordic network has been that the poster as a pedagogical tool has been integrated in the network’s forthcoming intensive course to be held in the autumn of 2008. Moreover, the network has applied for funding of a research project with the goal of making recommendations with respect to curriculum best practice guidelines with respect to prevention and health promotion education for students of nursing in the Nordic countries. The intensive course will serve as starting point for the gathering of data concerning student evaluations of the Nordic curriculum in prevention and health promotion. Students’ reflections with respect to the development of their competencies in this area will be collected using a combination of group interviews and questionnaires.
Biographical details:
Bettan Bagger is a registered nurse and has a MA in education from Denmark’s Pedagogical University. Hélène Kelly is a registered nurse and has a BA in anthropology/ MSc in Health from the University of Greenwich. They are both employed as lecturers of nursing at University College Zealand and have published articles concerning the use of posters in the nursing education in Danish professional journals.
E-mail: [email protected] E-mail: [email protected]
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Publication date | 8 Oct 2008 |
| Number of pages | 2 |
| Publication status | Published - 8 Oct 2008 |
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