Helping students to learn in the community: An interpretive study of a Project 2000 placemen

This thesis presents an interpretive study which developed out of an English National Board funded research project. Fourteen district nursing sisters and twelve Project 2000 students were interviewed between January and April 1992. In this thesis, the data from the interviews are re-interpreted in the light of two questions: 'do Project 2000 students learn from their experience in the community, and if so how?'; and 'how do community nurses enable Project 2000 students to learn?' The epistemology underpinning this work is phenomenology; the study examines students' and supervisors' subjective experiences. The thesis discusses the way in which the interview data reveals participants ideas about learning and how it may be facilitated. The approach to the data is interpretive, and is guided by H.G. Gadamer's theory of hermeneutics. The literature review considers existing work in the following relevant areas; learning by experience; the role of reflection in learning; the nature of supervision; and the 'helping relationship'. Data are presented in Chapters Four and Five, and are interpreted thematically and schematically in Chapter Six. Students believed the process by which they learned in the community was a sequential one, which is referred to here as the 'learning career'. Supervisors enabled this process by demonstrating their practice; enabling students to practice for themselves; building confidence; helping students to reflect on practice; and monitoring and assessing students' work. They also created an environment which was conducive to learning by forming 'learning relationships' with their students. Supervisors enabled their students to acquire three types of nursing knowledge: 'theories in use'; academic theories; and factual knowledge; they also assisted their students in the acquisition of essential nursing skills. There is a need to recognise the amount of teaching, supervision, monitoring and assessment done by community nurses, and the impact this has on their workload. Supervisor's would benefit from better communication with tutors and from an acknowledgement of the role they play in nursing education.