Once the students had completed that portion of the assignment the second part of the asssignment was to administer the questionnaire to at least five nurse educators or students of nursing and then evaluate the results. I found this assignment especially intriguing and enlightening (probably because I am very analytical and desire very much to know and understand how people think and feel). Without this teacher's concern with how students perceived ethics and their importance in the nursing field, I likely would not have enjoyed this educational foray as much as I have.

On the flip side of effective teaching was the instructor who believed that the students should only be lectured to, and that they should sit quietly and take notes. The information that this instructor imparted was important, and I did learn to rapidly write notes as the instructor was lecturing, however, this method of teaching (for me) is not the most effective manner in which to garner the needed material. Instead, I would have liked a more hands-on approach. I am much more interested in participating in discussions rather than having discussions directed at me without my input.

As a nurse educator of other nurses the experiences I have had so far have been mostly positive in nautre. I feel that one of my strengths at facilitating a learning environment as a nurse educator is that I am more than able to self-reflect on my weaknesses and strengths...

I accomplish this by listening to student and peer feedback, and by asking a lot of questions of other educators and teachers on how they approach certain situations. Additionally, I am able to facilitate learning through the use of Information Technology and the Internet. I am firm believer in using technology tools and ask my students to do so as well.
Two tasks which I need to show improvement in to better facilitate learning is to gain more

knowledge of evidence-based teaching and teaching strategies and secondly, I need to maintain a much stronger professional practice knowledge base. I feel that I would be a much more effective teacher and be better at facilitating learning if I developed the needed additional knowledge and was able to implement it in the classroom.

References

Fyffe, T.; (2009) Nursing shaping and influencing health and social care policy, Journal of Nursing Management, Vol. 17, Issue 6, pp. 698 -- 706

National League for Nursing, Core competencies of nurse educators with task statements, accessed on November 1, 2011 at http://www.nln.org/profdev/corecompetencies.pdf

Numminen, O.; Leino-Kilpi, H.; van der Arend, A.; Katajisto, J.; (2011) Comparison of nurse educators' and nursing students' descriptions of teaching codes of ethics, Nursing Ethics, Vol. 18, Issue 5, pp. 710-724