Role of feedback approaches and adjustments for learning needs/support in nursing

Role of feedback approaches and adjustments for learning needs/support in nursing

Introduction
New nurses often identify their initial adjustment to the nursing profession as filled with
anxiety, insecurity, inadequacy and instability. It provides an opportunity to combine cognitive,
psychomotor, and affective skills. Nursing students often prefer continuous supervision, ongoing
feedback, interpersonal relationship and personal support from nurse educators as useful tools in
the clinical practice. It is therefore imperative to have a better understanding of what constitutes
quality clinical learning environment from the students’ perspective of engagement in evidence-
based nursing, reflective practice, e-learning and simulated case scenarios facilitated by the nurse
educators. Moreover, engineering supportive environments in the classroom, incorporating
students in the learning process and having a continuous feedback loop between nursing students
and educators have proven to be important when assessing learning outcomes and refining the
quality of learning for students.

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Role of Clinical placements in assessment and feedback
Research evidence suggests that clinical placements are important to both the perceptions
and outcomes of nurse education. Nevertheless, despite this knowledge, research also indicates
that many students receive negative experiences whilst attending these ‘remote’ settings,
sometimes resulting in missed opportunities for learning and negative impressions of potential
places of employment. It is therefore necessary to maximize this learning experience to offer the
opportunity to improve educational practice in clinically-based education and concurrently to
improve student experiences and outcomes. The quality of nursing education depends largely on
the quality of the clinical experience planned in the nursing curriculum. In the clinical learning
environment, there are varieties of influences that can significantly promote and hinder the
clinical learning among novice students at the entry level. It is therefore vital that valuable
clinical time be utilized effectively and productively as planned by the nurse educators.
Student engagement in teaching-learning process
Engaging students in the teaching-learning process has been shown to improve the
development of critical thinking skills, enhance openness to diversity, and facilitate openness to
challenges. Student engagement (SE) is fostered by pedagogical practices that encourage
experiential learning, develop connections with the nursing curriculum, and promote student
inquiry in the clinical environment. SE can be defined as students’ willingness to actively
participate in the clinical learning process and to persist despite obstacles and challenges in the
clinical environment. SE is the “the extent of students’ involvement and active participation in
clinical learning activities”. Consequently, student engagement in a clinical learning environment
has been adopted as a vital component in the curricula of pre-licensure nursing students.
Supportive Learning environments

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Supportive clinical learning environment (CLE) is vital to the success of the teaching
learning process. Many nursing students perceive their clinical learning environment as anxious
and stressful. Clinical learning experience requires difficult adjustments for students as they
come from different socio-economic and cultural background. Nursing students feel vulnerable
in the clinical learning environment, so it’s not surprising that learning in the clinical area
presents a bigger threat to students than learning in the classroom. Student activities are
unplanned in the clinical area and not all practice settings are able to provide student nurses with
a positive learning environment.
Increasing student engagement in feedback
Feedback loop is has a major influence on learning and achievement especially for
nursing students. However, student dissatisfaction with feedback in the clinical context is
common and has traditionally been viewed as the unidirectional transfer of performance
information from teacher to student. The learner has a central role in feedback. Studies show that
nursing students’ agentic feedback behavior increased across all outcomes except for feedback
utilization. Overall student satisfaction with feedback increased when their suggestions during
the learning process are implemented.