Facilitating Learning in Professional Practice Essay

Facilitating Learning in Professional Practice - Essay Example The word construction can be used in terming the learning of nursing students in course of their education. 1 The conceptions of students change during education and they are studied by vosniadou (1994), Tynjala (1999). Their study gave knowledge about how the student nurses define the health promotion concept's relationship with health education. The student's descriptions about promotion of health emphasised the approaches, which concentrate on life style and changes in behaviour. Some students did not understand the relationship between health promotion and health education and the relationship between them in professional practice. The student must be aware of the interpretations of health promotion and the methods to apply them in practice. The change in conceptions and constructions of student nurses can be viewed as change in conceptions in the learning process. In this course the students understand what is the right meaning of health promotion. When the understanding is advanced the students act like experts. They observe a large area of results due to promotion of health and they will be able to apply them in new and critical situations. When the constructivist idea about knowledge is present, then the learning can be consistent. The learners build their knowledge by re constructing their concepts about health promotion and they interpret new information by using existing knowledge. In the process of moving from education while understanding health promotion to assess competence, it is necessary to be aware of the developments in the student in the course of education.1 In number of countries the teaching regarding health promotion in nursing education is on the basis of two WHO declarations; the Ottawa charter (1986), Health for all 2000. According to those charters, health promotion is defined as a process of making people capable of having control over their health and even to improve it. It should combine the structural change along with individual education. In nursing it is viewed as an integral part of daily practice. It should incorporate disease centred approach as proposed by Robinson and Hill (1995) as they are cited in 'Investigating student nurses' constructions of health promotion in nursing education, health education research'. But this is not enough. For modern needs of the society the nursing students must be equipped with promotion of health, which incorporates societal, political, economic and media aspects. The new approach should refer to interaction about promotion of health, which needs to clarify about the values, beliefs and determinants of health along with behaviour. The aim should be well being of individuals and empowerment of their communities. The promotion of health is situation specific and occurs in even complex situations. Then the knowledge building needs flexibility along with critical thinking, which reflects health promotion. The most complex form of change in student's conception is about revision at the level of theory, which is capable of causing misconceptions. This results in inconsistency and inertia. The studies of Tynjala (1999) establish that the change in concepts occurs on four levels; individual's semantic level, at the level of relationships between concepts, ontological level, and at the level of theory. According to Boud and Walker (1998) the context is the most important influence on reflection of learning. Different