Initially, Curran (2014) used adult learning theory to explore the teaching style of senior nurses. Curran (2014) discovers that adult learners are motivated and self-directed, and learning activities need to involve learners actively. According to Gatti-Petito, Lakatos, Bradley, Cook, Haight, & Karl (2013) adults learn through experiential learning that includes problem-solving, critical thinking, reflection and also concentrating on matters which are essential to the learner’s needs. Adult learners take their own responsibility for learning. They identify their own learning needs and form their goals, collaborate in planning their learning experience, participate actively in their learning experience, monitor their own progress and pace their learning (Billings and Halstead, 2009).
According to Curran (2014), in preceptorship both preceptor and preceptee move along on the novice to the expert continuum, thus, in this process, the learning becomes the center, rather than content. In preceptorship, the use of andragogy supports learner-centered and self-directed learning approach and clinical teaching methods.
Novice to Expert Nursing Theory
Curran (2014) explicates that knowledge is the out product of the learning process,; it transforms through experience and experience is then reflected in the ideas which is subsequently utilized for experimentation in developing new knowledge through new experiences. Benner uses five stages of experience in his novice to expert nursing theory. These five stages include novice, advanced beginner, competent, proficient, and expert. Each stage in this theory is built upon the previous stage., Tthus, indicates towards the attainment of skill and knowledge through nurses’ experience and explains the evolution of nurse from novice to expert (DeSandre, 2014). Below is the brief discussion describing each stage;.
Novice: The novice nurses use facts and rules to take action. They are inflexible and limited when they have to think through the situation’s context. This could be because novice nurses take a role which is unfamiliar to them and hadve no hands-on experience to relate to the situation (Hnatiuk. 2012). They faced difficulty in seeing the big picture and unable to take judgments because of their limited critical thinking ability. According to Hnatiuk (2012), novice nurses do sweat when it comes to organizing the tasks and prioritizing the patient care because they focused on tasks rather them holistic care. In this situation, the preceptor needs to take this into consideration that the novice is the stage where learning formulates new knowledge in the process of acquisition of experiences, though this is time requiring a process. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the preceptor to show and be told what to be expected while offering individual based support and as soon as they have attained some more knowledge based on their experience, they will step into the advanced beginner level.
Advanced Beginner: The advanced beginner has more focus on completion of the task rather than management of patient care (Koontz, Mallory, Burns, and Chapman, 2010). According to Hnatiuk (2012) they are the new registrant, which are in their first few years of practice and exhibits satisfactory performance. They struggle with multitasking and memorizing policies to deliver safe and sound patient care (DeSandre, 2014). The clinical education for them must involve confidence building, and prioritization and delegation. Thus, a preceptor must encourage newly graduates which at this stage, to enhance their critical thinking skills and offer one-on-one support in correctly identifying their priorities based on the context of the situation.