Using Structured Academic Controversy With Nursing Students

Abstract

Nurse educators use a variety of strategies to foster critical thinking in undergraduate and graduate students. Structured academic controversy, although used by other disciplines, offers a novel approach for nurse educators. The author describes structured academic controversy and its use in a graduate course in gerontological nursing. The article also presents a rubric developed to grade the structured academic controversy assignment.

Clinical reasoning in undergraduate nursing education: a scoping review

“…However, strategies and teaching tools involved in the studies of this review were derived from more active perspectives of education. Generally speaking, it can be assumed that the results converge in order to support the idea that clinical experience is indispensable for developing clinical reasoning (3,(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17) . However, current difficulties to ensure undergraduate students exposure to clinical settings of appropriate duration, diversity and quality (33) have limited such opportunities, which certainly has important consequences on the development of clinical reasoning of young professionals.…”

“…In another study, improvement in critical thinking was observed as evaluated by the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (WGCTA) after a community health course based on scenarios (16) . The theoretical articles reported all the teachinglearning experiences as being successful in the authors' opinion (3,(11)(12)(13)17) . The experiences reported were: using mobile technology in clinical practice to promote critical thinking of nursing students (3) , teaching and practicing critical appraisal of research as an opportunity to develop transferable skills for critical thinking (11) ; the experience of structured debate mediated by the teacher creating the opportunity for students to explore different care perspectives in decision-making on issues related to nursing care (12) ; the use of mind mapping strategy to develop critical thinking skills when planning patient care (13) ; using clinical emergency simulations for developing the students' clinical reasoning skills (17) .…”

“…Among the strategies identified in the studies we have: mobile web-based learning technology (3) , critical appraisal exercises (11) , SAC learning tool (Structured Academic Controversy) (12) , mind-mapping tool (13) , learning activities based on the concept (14) , the genogram, scenarios based on community health practices (15)(16) and clinical simulations of emergency situations (17) . Empirical studies have proposed to evaluate the effect of strategies or instruments on the development of reasoning and critical thinking of nursing students.…”

The Effect of Structured Academic Controversy on English Proficiency Level within Communicative Language Teaching Context

“…Reverse perspectives (forcefully present the other pair's position, including any arguments they believe the 'opposition' has failed to incorporate); 5.Synthesise and integrate the best evidence and reasoning into an agreed joint position. (p. 1) In the present study, the above procedures were customized and then used to implement SAC in the language classroom. (See "Procedure" section)…”

“…Some practitioners have employed SAC in their classroom or professional context. Bull (2007) used SAC in a graduate course in nursing. Nathan and Lee (2004) used SAC in the social studies classroom.…”