Adult Education in the 21st Century Reflection Series: Creativity and Nursing – Part 3

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Teaching strategies that will engage nursing students’ creative processes and establish (hopefully!) creative behaviours in the clinical setting

• Process: Develop background knowledge and experience.
  • Teaching strategies:
    • Review key concepts at the start of the class.
    • Have students identify all the pertinent medical data involved in the case study.
    • Have students identify additional data relevant to the case study:
      • alternative perspectives and actions;
      • environmental; and,
      • their own somatic experience – what they saw, felt, heard, smelled.
        • Acknowledge that students may be best at finding creative solutions to clinical problems when they are physically in the space that they work (embodied simulation).
• Process: Reflection activities that examine the creative process.
  • Teaching strategy:
    • As part of the student reflections on the case study presentation that they submitted with each case study I will include the following questions:
      • What was the biggest challenge you encountered with this case? (Yang, 2017).
      • What did you do to overcome these challenges?
• Process: Develop cognitive flexibility (the ability to adapt to new situations).
  • Teaching strategy:
    • Following student led case study presentations I will ask the class:
      • What would you would do in this case?
        • Have them change perspectives and have them look at it from the view of another care provider or patient.
• Process: ‘Connect the dots’ between theory and clinical situations.
  • Teaching strategies:
    • Theory: Link theory with data and over all patient presentation collected in case study.
    • Mental models: Make visible with the class what the different health care providers and patient/family mental models may have been through examination of actions taken based on the data and the sharing of reflections on the case.
    • Practice standards: Discussion with the class the practice standards that are applicable to the case.
    • Actions: Examine actions taken and explore factors that contributed to these actions.  
• Process: Create a safe and positive learning environment.
  • Teaching strategies:
    • Allow for self-direction in creating case studies.
      • Students will develop own case studies based on clinical experiences.
    • Create a supportive, respectful and collaborative community of practice.
      • Feedback to peers for case studies is grounded in Appreciative Inquiry.
    • Role model honesty and acceptance of mistakes.  

References

Brewster, A.L., Lee, Y.S.H., Linnander, E. &  Curry, L.A. (2021, August, 17). Creativity in problem solving to improve complex health outcomes: Insights from hospitals seeking to improve cardiovascular care. Learning Health Systems. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/lrh2.10283

Chan, Z.C.Y. (2012). A systematic review of creative thinking/creativity in nursing education. Nurse Education Today.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2012.09.0

Cheraghi, M. A., Pashaeypoor, S., Mardanian Dehkordi, L. & Khoshkesht, S. (2021). Creativity in nursing care: A Concept analysis. FNJN Florence Nightingale Journal of Nursing, 29(3), 389-396.  https://fnjn.org/Content/files/sayilar/211/389-396.pdf

Khalil, R., Godde, B. &  Karim, K.A., (2019, March, 22). The Link Between Creativity, Cognition, and Creative Drives and Underlying Neural Mechanisms. frontiers in Neural Circuits. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fncir.2019.00018/full

Leschziner, V. & Brett, G. (2019, August).  Beyond Two Minds: Cognitive, Embodied, and Evaluative Processes in Creativity. Social Psychology Quarterly. DOI: 10.1177/0190272519851791

Yang, R. (2017, November, 29). How to Reveal the Creative Process Through Reflection. The Art of Education University. https://theartofeducation.edu/2017/11/29/revealing-creative-process-reflection/