Understanding Learning Theories in Education

• Promoting health and well-being relies on educating people about its importance and impact on society.
• Health education develops strategies at individual, group, institutional, community, and systemic levels to improve health knowledge, attitudes, skills, and behavior.
• Health education aims to positively influence the health behavior of individuals and communities, along with their living and working conditions.
• Effective health education leads to healthier lives, reducing hospital patient numbers.
• This course covers concepts, principles, and theories in teaching and learning, focusing on health education strategies applicable to various healthcare scenarios.
• Learners will develop basic skills in designing and implementing a teaching plan using the nursing process.

Course Learning Outcomes

• Apply evidence-based practice in health education.
• Communicate effectively using age-appropriate language.
• Collaborate effectively within a team.
• Engage in lifelong learning for competence in health education.
• Use appropriate technology in health education activities.
• Adopt nursing core values.

Specific Learning Outcomes

• Apply principles from physical, social, natural, health sciences, and humanities in health education.
• Distinguish different theories and strategies in health education.
• Assess individual client learning needs related to their health status.

Module Contents

• Learning theories related to healthcare practice
• Principles of teaching and learning related to health.
• Assessing the learner.

Learning

• Learning combines personal and environmental experiences to acquire, enrich, or modify knowledge, skills, values, attitudes, behavior, and world views.
• Learning leads to change through experience, enhancing future performance potential.
• Acquiring knowledge and skills from memory enables understanding future problems and opportunities.
• Learning requires lasting changes in long-term memory.
• Learning results in enduring behavioral changes from practice or experience, involving acquiring and modifying knowledge, skills, beliefs, and attitudes.
• People learn cognitive, behavioral, linguistic, motor, and social skills.
• Learning involves permanent changes in disposition and capability due to experience, requiring performance to assess if learning has occurred.

Learning Theories

• A theory explains why or how something occurs, helping us understand knowledge creation and learning processes.
• A learning theory aims to systematize knowledge about human learning, explaining, predicting, and shaping learner behaviors.
• Learning theories improve teaching, help educators reflect on practice, refine work, advance the discipline, and provide tools to organize research into educational practices.

Behaviorism

• Behaviorism originated in the early 1900s, focusing on behavioral changes through associations between environmental stimuli and individual responses.
• Thorndike's theory includes reinforcement through positive effects and strengthening responses through exercise and repetition, similar to drill-and-practice programs.
• Skinner's operant conditioning uses reinforcement to encourage recurrence of desired behaviors, with programmed instruction as a key application.

Cognitive Psychology

• It began in the late 1950s, shifting focus from external stimuli responses to viewing people as information processors.
• Learning is seen as knowledge acquisition, where learners process and store information.
• Instruction methods include lecturing and textbooks, but can position the learner as a passive recipient.

Social Learning Theory

• Developed by Albert Bandura, integrates cognitive and behavioral frameworks, emphasizing attention, memory, and motivation.
• Learning occurs in a social context through modeling, observational learning, and imitation.
• Bandura introduced "reciprocal determinism," where behavior, environment, and personal qualities influence each other.

Experiential Learning

• It builds on social and constructivist theories, placing experience at the core of the learning process to understand how experiences motivate learners.
• Learning involves meaningful everyday experiences that change knowledge and behaviors.
• Carl Rogers suggests experiential learning is self-initiated with a natural inclination to learn when fully involved.

Multiple Intelligences

• Howard Gardner's theory challenges the idea of intelligence as a single ability, proposing multiple distinct intelligences.
• These intelligences include logical-mathematical, linguistic, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, and intrapersonal.
• Recognizing multiple intelligences broadens the conceptual framework for skilling, curriculum, and testing.

Hallmarks of Good Teaching

• Students may have different opinions on the qualities of a good teacher based on individual learning styles, goals, and personal needs.

Effective Teaching in Nursing

• Jacobson outlined effective teaching in nursing which comprised of the following:
• Professional competence
• Interpersonal relationships
• Maintain self-esteem and minimize anxiety by using therapeutic approaches.
• Desirable personal characteristics

Professional Competence

• Showing interest in patients and displaying abilities, stimulating students, and demonstrating expertise, through accurate knowledge and polished skills.

Interpersonal Relationships

• It is demonstrated by showing interest to students and caring for them, being sensitive, respectful, alleviating anxieties, being available, fair, and warm.

Therapeutic Approaches

• Maintain self-esteem via empathic listening, acceptance, and honest communication

Personal Characteristics

• Desirable traits include authenticity and enthusiasm

Other effective traits include:

• Cheerfulness
• Self-control
• Patience
• Flexibility
• Sense of humor
• Good enunciation
• Self-confidence
• Caring attitude

Mechanics include:

• Methods and skills in classroom and clinical teaching

Evaluation Includes:

• Clear communication expectations
• Timely feedback
• Tactical correction
• Fairness
• Pertinent tests

Availability Includes:

• Presence in stressful situations
• Guidance in nursing situations
• Adequate supervision
• Open communication
• Resourceful

Teacher Clarity

• Teacher clarity involves behaviors that make learning intelligible, comprehensive, and learnable

Clear teachers:

• Logically instruct
• Explain learning goals
• Use simple terminology
• Assess comprehension
• Provide examples
• Dedicate thought time
• Implement repetition and summarization

Committed teachers:

• Dedicated and inventive, promoting intellectual curiosity and exploration.

Caring teachers:

• Have an unreserved caring for their students and a blending of style and form

Teaching attributes are rooted in:

• Personality
• Character
• Teach style
• "Teaching persona"
• Memorable and worth listening to

Teaching Styles

• Teacher-centered; the teacher lectures and the student passively listends
• Student centered; where the student learns actively with a collaborative approach

Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate Education (Chickering and Gamson, 1987)

• Encourage Faculty Cooperation
• Encourage student partnership
• Encourage active learrning
• Give Prompt Feedback
• Emphasize time
• Communicate High Expectations
• Respect diverse talents

Nurses as Teachers are responsible for:

• teaching, training and curriculum design

Principles of teaching require the teacher to consider:

• Learners
• Heterogenous audiences
• Individual differences
• Range factors associated with maturation

In order to incorporate learners the instructor must be:

• Multitasked
• Flexible
• Efficient

Teaching should involve:

• Relatable course design and teaching
• Aligning the three major components; learning objectives, assessement and instructional activities
• Prioritizing
• Explicitness regarding objectives
• Imploring appropriate roles
• Overcoming our expert blind spots

Effective learning stems from:

• Prior knowledge which can help or hinder
• The way students organize and how to apply it
• Mastery
• Focused feedback
• Development, emtional climate to engage,
• Student commitment to monitor and adjust new approaches

Nurses as Educators must facilitate:

• Information readiness
• The need to learn
• Identify learning styles

In teaching, the facilitator should:

• Assess deficit
• Presents information
• Identify progress
• Give feedback
• Reinforce knowledge
• Evaluate knowledge

Assessment Should Account For:

• Learning readiness
• Learning style
• Learning needs

Assessing Learning Needs requires:

• Identifying the needs
• Congruency
• Recognizing diversity
• Establishing trust
• Protecting information with privacy
• Confidentiality
• Collect data after exploration for typical problems
• Include learners in the process
• Involve those who are also in healthcare
• prioritize needs

Set Realistic goals.

• Ascertain Resource Availabilty

Methods of Assesment include:

• Objective data and Subjective Data
• Assess and learn the information
• Provide Informal Conversation
• Provide Structured interviews
• Focus Groups
• Questionaires
• Administer Self Tests

Prior to the test there should be:

• Test of known materiel
• Skill test
• Obvservation

Readiness of Leaning

• An interest to learn. Demonstrate a willingness to learn. Determine the ability of an individual to learn.

Determine Factors of Learn:

• Physical
• Emotional
• Experiential
• Knowledge

Physical readiness

• Includes ability, environmental effects, health status and the gender of student as factors

Emotional readiness

• includes the students anxiety level and support system as factors

Experiential readiness

• Includes, aspiration levels, past coping strategies and cultural background

Knowledge readiness includes

• Present knowledge and learning styles

Types of learning

Visual

• Learning by visualization

Auditory

• Learning by processing information through listening

Kinesthetic

• Learning through touch

Learning includes:

• The educators and student's styles of choice
• No one is limited by the current style
• Assist leaning by identifying style
• Provide opprotunity in the current style
• Encourage more styles
• Stimuli to reinforce and affect learning

Stimuli to reinforce and affect learning includes:

• Emotional factors
• Sociological factors
• Environmental factors
• Psychological factors
• Physical factors
• A range of activities

Explore the foundational principles of learning theories, including behaviorism and cognitive perspectives. Understand how these theories, as defined by Ambrose, Mayer, Sweller, Harasim, Lefrançois, and Schunk, relate to changes in memory, capabilities, and educational practices. Identify the aims and applications of these theories in enhancing educational outcomes.