Synopsis
Designed to effectively guide instructors, Clinical Instruction and Evaluation: A Teaching Resource provides clinical nurses with the theoretical background and practical tools necessary to succeed as a clinical nursing instructor. The theory used to support the practice of clinical education is presented in a straightforward, easily accessed manner. The book offers approaches to structuring clinical experiences for students, evaluating student performance, and solving problems encountered in clinical settings.
The second edition has been updated and expanded to address emerging trends and issues in health care delivery and nursing education and incorporates frequently used technologies in the clinical setting: computerized patient care records, cell phones, and computerized simulators. Clinical Instruction and Evaluation provides specific suggestions for guiding students' analysis of clinical problems and expands on teaching in the affective domain.
Doody Review Services
Reviewer:Cherie G Howk, PhD, FNP-BC(Indiana State University)
Description:This book was written to fill a specific need in the education of competent nursing professionals -- the complex job of teaching and evaluating students in the clinical setting.
Purpose:It specifically addresses both the theoretical and practical know-how needed to succeed as a clinical nursing instructor and provide the highest quality of clinical education for nursing students. This is not only a worthy goal, but one that has been sorely missing in the education literature. The book is a very good start in acknowledging the need to enhance and support the role of clinical instructor.
Audience:This book is intended to be used as a teaching resource for clinical instruction and evaluation. The author, a professor in the department of nursing, reports interviewing both the neophyte and experienced faculty for insight into areas in which she has no personal experience.
Features:This teaching resource thoroughly covers the role of clinical instructor from entering the instructor role, becoming a member of the nursing department faculty, through teaching in specialty settings and dealing with specific problems that one encounters in this role. Strategies for working with students in particular situations, such as the student who lies or the student who is poorly groomed, provides information that is not available in any other source. The book does a good job in covering theoretical approaches to teaching and learning in the clinical setting. Strategies are provided for teaching clinical students technical skills, integration of theory and practice and developing critical thinking skills. The appendixes provide, among other valuable documents, samples of course objectives, outlines, and evaluations for clinical components in nursing education. Although the author refers in the preface to "literature sources, both books and articles," she does not provide a reference section to augment the information she offers.
Assessment:This is a long overdue addition to the clinical instructor's library. It offers guidance on what, up to now, has been considered "on the job" training. Although many professional nurses are able to translate their roles of expertly caring for patients into that of teaching students to do the same, a reference source and guide book will enhance the abilities of these nurses.