Chaundra

Well, seven, I sense just a little hostility. I hope the traditional classes work better for you. Though there is a certain traditional philosophy class that is so boring, it makes me long for CBL. Most of the time however, working in group settings with nursing students makes me want to pull my hair out.

I suppose you are right, I do like it better now that I am in my second year. The first year many were ready to drop out because of frustration with the program. I think we are doing much the same thing, we had to base our tutorial groups on a book called problem based learning which was not an easy read. I do agree though that my researching skills have improved. I have seen the major gaps as you mentioned, when we get into the hospital, for example, this year we had trouble on the floor because we had been given no instruction on charting and were expected to chart once we started working. I think because it is such a new program, there are alot of these 'gaps' to bridge. Thanks for the encouragement

I also think that it would be better as a component of the education instead of the main focus. My class mates and I find ourselves frustrated at the lack of formal teaching, and feel like too much emphasis is put on teaching ourselves.

Does anyone else out there go to a school that uses the CBL (Context based learning) approach. I go to a school in Alberta and all the University of Alberta collaborative schools use this format for their nursing degree programs. It involves group learning instead of formal classroom settings. We are given nursing scenarios and have to research and teach ourselves and our classmates. I am interested to find out if our program is unique and what people think of the program. Our class has very mixed feelings, some love it some hate it. We are only the 3rd class through so there are no graduates in the workforce as of yet to see how we fare in a job setting.