Critical analysis of the learning environment in the community - Essay Example

Modern nursing is changing with new roles and working practices. They are leaders, coordinators, teachers and practitioners. There is still a need for nurses to care for patients in hospitals, but much nursing practice now takes place in the GP surgery, in peoples homes and in specialist clinics in the community. Laschinger (1992) used the Kolb’s learning theory (ELT) to study 179 generic baccalaureate students’ perception of the contributions of different types of nursing learning environments to development of adaptive competences.

Nursing learning environments were thought to contribute most to divergent competencies, reflecting the importance of both people-oriented and scientific skills in nursing. However it was found that clinical experience and senior preceptorship experience contributed significantly more to the development of these competencies than typical nursing classes and non-nourishing classes. Besides, the students considered assimilative competencies such as leading and influencing others relatively unimportant to successful functioning in nursing learning environments.

The preparation for the practice of professional nursing occurs in the early training program for nurses that integrate liberal arts and sciences, as well as nursing theory and practice. Besides this program need to develop altruistic values, an understanding of and appreciation for the social and ethical issues of life in a global society, the conceptualization and synthesis of general education and nursing knowledge and the development of affective, cognitive, and psychomotor skills and behaviors to function as a caring, beginning practitioner in nursing.

The clinical learning environment creates many opportunities for student learning and the development of critical competencies in the nursing profession. The learning that takes place in this environment, however, confronts the first year nursing