- Title
- A comparison of three types of stimulus material in undergraduate mental health nursing education
- Creator
- Stone, Teresa E.; Levett-Jones, Tracy
- Relation
- Nurse Education Today Vol. 34, Issue 4, p. 586-591
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2013.07.014
- Publisher
- Churchill Livingstone
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2014
- Description
- Aims and objectives: The paper discusses an innovative educational approach that compared the use of different textual forms as stimulus materials in the teaching of an introductory mental health course. Background: Practitioners in many disciplines, including nursing, appreciate the value of narratives in making sense of experiences, challenging assumptions and enhancing learning: they enable exploration of reality from different perspectives and create an emotional resonance. Narratives help nursing students to uncover embedded meanings, values and beliefs; they can include written texts, illustrated texts or picture books. Participants: 180 students enrolled in an elective undergraduate nursing course. Method: This project afforded students the choice of critically analysing (a) a chapter from one of two autobiographies, (b) an illustrated text, or (c) an illustration from a picture book. Each text was a narrative account from a personal or carer's perspective of the experience of mental illness. Their written submissions were then analysed by means of a qualitative descriptive approach. Results: In analysis of the autobiographies students tended to paraphrase the authors' words and summarise their experiences. Those choosing the illustrated text were able to link the images and text, and provide a deeper and more insightful level of interpretation, albeit influenced by the author's personal account and expressed emotions; however, those analysing a picture book illustration demonstrated a surprising level of critical and creative thinking, and their interpretations were empathetic, insightful and thoughtful. Conclusion: The use of picture books, although not a common approach in nursing education, appears to engage students, challenge them to think more deeply, and stimulate their imagination.
- Subject
- picture books; nursing student; mental health; education; empathy; therapeutic engagement
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1066268
- Identifier
- uon:18064
- Identifier
- ISSN:0260-6917
- Language
- eng
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