I teach non-clinical courses in the School of Nursing and Population Health, which has benefits and burdens. The benefits are that I don’t have to create and deliver multiple choice exams as in the clinical courses; student anxiety over objective exams is high. Instead, I create team projects, which allows for creativity while students learn to work collaboratively (bringing a different level of stress!). The burdens are that students often prioritize clinical courses (and those exam grades) over non-clinical courses, failing to see the relevance of the projects to their future nursing practice. Student response to group work betrays the findings published in the literature – very few students respond favorably! Despite the seeming negativity, though, students typically come to realize the application of their projects to their emerging clinical practice. So why do I enjoy these projects? When students return as alumni once they enter the workforce, they often talk excitedly about how prepared they were for professional practice as a result of those projects. They sometimes admit that they resented the time they felt was “wasted” that they could have spent studying for exams and now realize the value of those projects. I reflect on this teaching practice because it could be easy to fall prey to those less-than-desirable student course evaluations and instead opt to deliver my courses in more “popular”, albeit less effective, ways. It does take a great deal of soul-searching and courage to continue to teach this content using what I consider more authentic methods. If I want the students to become reflective practitioners, I need to be an equally reflective educator. My hope is to take these projects to a higher level by adding an ePortfolio component where students reflect on the learning that occurred and how it will support their future provision of safe, high quality, evidence-based nursing care. After all, that is my reason for becoming a nurse educator!
Dr. Deb Kramlich
Reflections
Hi Deb,
I identify with your experiences of teaching in a way that highlights reflection and process rather than a more traditional objective test model. Having taught the required English course for 10 years, I often encounter students who find value only in graded assignments or test scores that get returned within minutes of their completion of the test. My frustration with this focus on essay grades only is part of what led me to using ePortfolio. By shining light on the steps that must be taken to fully engage, I am able to have students think and reflect upon their changing practices and the results of those changes. For example, students are able to see each other’s practices of active reading rather than just my examples. They learn to offer valuable feedback, even if they do not feel they are expert writers because we are easily able to use technology to share drafts and respond to one another beyond what would be captured in classroom discussions. Students revisit their work more regularly, and re-evaluate their thinking for signs of progression. Although ePortfolio is not needed for all of these things to happen, it makes it easier to have the work accessible and organized while also adding the element of a “real” audience, rather than just me.
I would like to learn more about your group projects. I have often considered group projects but have not integrated group work beyond small-scale peer review or group discussion posts. Do you find that you often get feedback that some group members do “all the work?” Are they each assigned sections of work or roles in the group? I think I recall you saying that they each provide feedback about every group member’s contributions. How do you manage that feedback? Do you sit with the whole group to work out issues, or do they generally work them out on their own?
I look forward to learning more,
Jen
I occasionally have teams whose members have not contributed equally, but for the most part they work well together. I have gone back and forth on whether they choose their own teams or I place them in teams; ultimately I settled on letting them choose their own teams due to logistics around clinical schedules. They must create team contracts that look like this:
Develop a team work-plan – this will be your contract.. Identify each team member’s roles and responsibilities.
Timeline for task completion (deadlines):
Describe your communication plan and how you will hold yourselves/one another accountable for task completion:
Plan for conflict management (team member not fully participating, failing to complete agreed upon work on time, poor quality work, etc.):
At the end of the team project or paper, they each complete an evaluation of how they functioned as a team and as individual members of the team (themselves and each other), using a structured rubric, which can be quite revealing. If there was team conflict, I bring them in, review their contract with them, and facilitate dialogue about where team function broke down. It is sometimes the first time they’ve had to manage conflict and can be quite uncomfortable for them. I do get pushback from some students, and I explain that since they are future health care professionals they need to learn to work effectively in teams, sometimes with people they don’t like.