Instructors making up words *rant*

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OK, just a little rant here. I know this is nursing, not English, but it bugs me so much when my instructors don't use proper words!! Every single one of them says "malnutritioned" instead of "malnourished," and the other day, one said "ethnicicity" instead of "ethnicity." The worst part is, students are starting to use these too!! There are tons and tons of misspellings on our notes as well. I know these are smart people, but I don't understand how they have masters' and doctorates and still can't use proper English. They even butcher medical terms and then wonder why doctors think they're stupid. Has anyone else run across this type of thing?

How about paternal when the instructor must have really meant parental. And, my favorite, impotenance for impotence.

I am going for my RN. But, frankly, if my instructors are any indication, nurses are stupid. At this point, I assume that you have to be ignorant and insecure about it to seek an advanced degree in a joke science like nursing.

Yes. No wonder the doctors think the nurses are fools.

Personally I want to simply carry out the medical orders. That's the job. If I want to give orders or make diagnoses, I will go to medical school. Nursing diagnoses are the system equivalent of made-up words. The are silly approximations of the real thing.

Sorry (a little) for dumping so much into this little response. But I am thoroughly disgusted with the pathetic, ignorant, and unprofessional delivery from my instructors. The bar is set way too low.

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Specializes in School, Camp, Hospice, Critical Care.

Today we were told to check for a "fetish" :uhoh21: odor when changing an abdominal dressing.

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Specializes in Psychiatric.

We had a teacher talking about sleeping and rest during a Foundations class and she kept telling us that 'yarning' was a signal that the body was tired...I was tired myself and kept thinking 'WTF is yarning??'...took me about 10 minutes to realize she was trying to say 'Yawning' LOL :rolleyes:

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As I read these posts I am wondering if any of you have ever done any teaching? I can tell you that you can be very smart and still make goofs like these when you are talking in front of an audience. Once I was teaching an entire roomful of new parents (about 40 people) about sponge bathing the newborn. As I went on with my spiel (which I had given at least 100 times before) I said "And now might be a good time to clean the circumcision with alcohol". I continued on with my talk but I was noticing some muttering and squirming going on in the audience. One brave guy tentatively raised his hand to ask "Did you really mean to put alcohol on the CIRCUMCISION?!" I was aghast! I said "NO, oh my goodness, I meant to clean the UMBILICAL CORD with alcohol!"

I am sure that over the past 20 years of teaching I have made many such gaffes. I hope my students had the kindness to forgive me for them?

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Specializes in Psychiatric.

I think my teacher's 'yarning' was just a regional dialect, and not necessarily a bad pronunciation of something...I just found it funny lol...To be perfectly honest I always pay attention to the way people pronounce things...it's the need to use my English degree coming out in me!

I will say that it woke me up a bit because I thought I was being taught a new word for a few minutes! lol :rolleyes:

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As I read these posts I am wondering if any of you have ever done any teaching? I can tell you that you can be very smart and still make goofs like these when you are talking in front of an audience...I am sure that over the past 20 years of teaching I have made many such gaffes. I hope my students had the kindness to forgive me for them?

Sometimes it is poor pronunciation, pure and simple, but sometimes it's right inside your head but something happens in between the brain and the tongue.

I taught a year of middle school. I take care to pronounce things they way they are supposed to be pronounced (I was a language teacher...pronunciation is extremely important, and I hear every little mistake everyone makes). But sometimes even my tang gets all tongueled up. :)

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Actually I have done some teaching - formal and informal. And yes, it is easy to misspeak. What I am experiencing is not that. Most (not all thankfully) of my nursing instructors are retchedly ignorant when it comes to the particulars of the skills and sciences that they are ostensibly teaching. It's as if their knowledge is limited to what they can remember from their own training 30 years ago. Unlike the professors I have experienced at other colleges and universities, these instructors show no interest in actually keeping their knowledge current - or even accurate. Often they don't even read the material that they have assigned out of the text. So when we point out a contradiction between what they teach and what we just read, they are confused and irritated that we have noticed. (I am fine with a teacher contradicting a text book. I just expect the teacher to be able to defend their own position. I was stunned when I realize that these nursing teachers would be defensive and unable to explain the differences.) More often than not, my nursing instructors will inhibit questions from the students if they appear to challenge the myths or delusions that they are spouting. It is the most anti-intellectual environment I have ever experienced - let alone in a so-called institution of higher education. These instructors degrade the entire nursing profession. I am appalled at the general ignorance demonstrated by these RN teachers. I feel as though I am back in grade school and being taught by nuns. Shameful.

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I think my teacher's 'yarning' was just a regional dialect...

Okie, maybe? All my dad's family say warsh, as in "warsh those clothes". It always cracks me up. :chuckle

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Actually I have done some teaching - formal and informal. And yes, it is easy to misspeak. What I am experiencing is not that. Most (not all thankfully) of my nursing instructors are retchedly ignorant when it comes to the particulars of the skills and sciences that they are ostensibly teaching.

I wish you could have attended the community college I graduated from. Those profs were GOOD. And I've had enough school to distinguish good from bad.

Some schools are better than others when it comes to quality of teaching.

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Actually I have done some teaching - formal and informal. And yes, it is easy to misspeak. What I am experiencing is not that. Most (not all thankfully) of my nursing instructors are retchedly ignorant when it comes to the particulars of the skills and sciences that they are ostensibly teaching. It's as if their knowledge is limited to what they can remember from their own training 30 years ago. Unlike the professors I have experienced at other colleges and universities, these instructors show no interest in actually keeping their knowledge current - or even accurate. Often they don't even read the material that they have assigned out of the text. So when we point out a contradiction between what they teach and what we just read, they are confused and irritated that we have noticed. (I am fine with a teacher contradicting a text book. I just expect the teacher to be able to defend their own position. I was stunned when I realize that these nursing teachers would be defensive and unable to explain the differences.) More often than not, my nursing instructors will inhibit questions from the students if they appear to challenge the myths or delusions that they are spouting. It is the most anti-intellectual environment I have ever experienced - let alone in a so-called institution of higher education. These instructors degrade the entire nursing profession. I am appalled at the general ignorance demonstrated by these RN teachers. I feel as though I am back in grade school and being taught by nuns. Shameful.

All very good points....do you think the abysmal salaries that are paid to nursing faculty might be part of the problem? Maybe they aren't attracting the best and the brightest by paying so little?

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Specializes in School, Camp, Hospice, Critical Care.

I taught college English for five years.

I can chuckle at the occasional slip of the tongue, but the handouts and Power Point presentations with misspelled words and punctuation errors make me want to reach for my green pen (red is such an

angry color). :)

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Specializes in Psychiatric.

LOL Judith...I tutored in my college's writing lab and I guess the urge to 'correct' never goes away!

I can handle the mispronunciation...my biggest pet peeve is when somebody interchanges 'affect' and 'effect', or else uses "it's" as a possessive rather than a contraction! lol

Jake, I truly hate that you're having such a dismal school experience...I can honestly say that I love my school...my teachers are an inspiration to me...they encourage us all to think outside the box, and to reach for what we wouldn't otherwise be able to see...I will be very proud to call myself an RN...are there any other schools you can attend?

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