teaching physical assessement

Published

Specializes in family nurse practitioner.

Hi everyone,

I am new to this so I am not sure exactly what to do. I joined for a number of reasons but one at the top of my list is to seek ideas for teaching. I have a health assessment class that I teach to LPN students. Using traditional methods and power points is not enough so does anyone have any creative or different approaches to teaching LPN students?

Thanks

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Med-Surg.

Welcome to Allnurses! I'm going to move your post to the Nurse Educators forum. Hopefully some nursing instructors such as yourself will help.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in OB, NP, Nurse Educator.

I also teach in an LPN program. Starting last semester as a faculty we decided to do less teaching, and do more facilitating. That meant doing away with alot of lecturing and coming up with more simulations and critical thinking projects. The students balked - big time. The seniors who graduated evaluated the change as excellent and many said they learned more that last semester than they had previously because they had to find their own answers and apply them.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in family nurse practitioner.

Thanks for the response. I talked with several other instructors and we came to a similar conclusion.

I found that the students at this school and level were very hands on. So what I am trying to figure out is what sort of activities could I incorporate for them? One idea is to have everyone have a partner or buddy. When trying to teach lung sounds I thought everyone could have a plain white T-shirt and marker pens. I would teach them to locate positions for auscultating lung sounds and make a mark on the T-shirt. I would use the same T-shirt to help them locate heart sounds and then abdominal sounds. What do you think?

Last semester, I had several lab sessions daily and taught four to ten students at a time how to assess regions of the body. Those who attended the practice sessions did much better than those who did not.

Thanks again.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in OB, NP, Nurse Educator.

You could do the t-shirt thing - that sounds reall cool - especially since it would be added to with each system.

Another thing you could do is put them in groups and have them make a video to show the class on assessment of a certain system. In Pharm I have my students make "drug commercials" on assigned drugs to show to the class. They are hysterical and it really helps the class to learn the drugs (I never think about Penicillin without humming a few bars of "If your Clappy and you know it clap your hands" ;)).

Or let them come up with a way to "teach" it - they are creative - way more creative than we are some time. Once I had a group of students teach the class how to circulate a lady partsl delivery - one of them pretended that she was having a baby(and did such a great job that she popped a number of blood vessels in both of her eyes and around her mouth!), another circulated, one acted as the physcian and they did a great job explaining the what and whys and what fors.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

This post/ thread looks very promising for a lab activity:

https://allnurses.com:80/forums/f205/what-would-lab-values-mi-199591.html

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

One activity that worked very well in my lecture on asthma was the "straw" exercise. There are many variations to this. I passed out straws to the students in my class, and then had the students break up into groups of two.

One of the students in each group runs vigorously in place for a minute, while the partner times the activity. After the minute is complete, the "runner" is to pinch his or her nose with one hand and attempt to breathe entirely through a straw held in place in the mouth with the other hand (lips tightly sealed around the straw). Then, each group switches up and repeats the exercise. This serves well to give a sense of empathy for the asthmatic patient. Students who have medical conditions that preclude them from this exercise are excused and do not actively participate.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in family nurse practitioner.

Thanks for the idea about the straw and breathing. That would be interesting and difficult to repeat at my school.

Has anyone ever come across an internet video on heart beats, what the actual heart looks like while beating?

David

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.

Hello, mdavidfnp,

Here are a couple links:

Shockwave

NOVA Online | Electric Heart

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I did physical examination skills lab sessions with the new RN-BSCN students last semester.Role plays and simulations helped a lot.Students who are not ionvolved in bed side nursing appreciated this and they say it was made it real than the lecture.It was also easier to adjust to different situations eg adolescents,special situations eg suicidal cases,mute client.The functional health pattern approach also makes it holistic.When teaching about the circulatory system,i used the tap,house and pipes water and pump.This explained about heart failure=pump failure,pipes=blood vessels,house=different body parts,water=blood.Incase of pump failure the water does not reach the house and the taps are dry;if the pipes are narrowed,little water reaches the house,and the pressure for pumping has to be greater.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion