Parpadeo atencional y modalidad de los estímulos: palabras y dibujos

By the end of Class Two, most of the group appeared to be more comfortable with their role as co-researchers. One student, however, seemed to find engaging in the NGT process somewhat challenging. This student did not write suggestions on slips of paper at the same time as everyone else; rather the student was oftentimes distracted doing something else such as flipping through a book or trying to engage a neighbour in a side conversation. The group had to wait for this student to add contributions to the pile before the voting could begin, causing some tension among group members.

Dottie (who left early the first day), having experienced how the results of Class One‟s NGT discussion were integrated into Class Two, decided to participate in the Class Two NGT discussion. She returned a signed research participation consent form at the

beginning of Class Three.

NGT decisions

Discussion point(s) to be re-visited during next class:

 conceptualisation in critical analysis47 (24 points)

 critical appraisal of a paper (19 points)

 qualitative research analysis/ design (17 points)

Activities which particularly supported their learning:

 critically appraising a paper (CAP) (22 points)

 library database searching session (17 points)

47 _{During the reflective journaling activity I showed Kolb‟s (1984) learning cycle as a theoretical support}

for the process. The students had little difficulty describing experiences. However, they found reflecting (asking why?) more challenging and they really struggled with the step of conceptualising (looking for meaning in the experience which could be generalised to other contexts).

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 debate (16 points)

Learning activities to be integrated into the next class48:

 guidance on reflective paper assignment

 more CAPs

 steps in EBP process

 practice database searching skills

6.3.4 Researcher reflections on learning environment

While Class Two discussions were very rich, I found through asking questions that their depth and criticality depended on the students having adequately „primed their minds‟ through reading the assigned articles and/or book chapters before class. The students appreciated having the benefit of a great deal of experiential practice, though this took a lot of class time. Nonetheless, it was this learning approach which was clearly most meaningful to the students and which facilitated their taking ownership of the issues discussed, as advocated by Knowles et al. (2005). In most cases, I needed only to guide them through a quick theoretical synthesis of the topics under consideration, using one or two powerpoint slides, before focusing on experiential activities. I was still

concerned, however, that a five or ten minute synopsis on a subject such as qualitative/ quantitative research methods would never be a substitute for students reading at least a book chapter or two. This had been the difficulty with the Sunnyview therapists; they had been happy to attend sessions, but were not committed to doing any outside reading to deepen their knowledge. Without such a self-directed learning investment by the students, I questioned whether they would develop enough basic EBP skills to have the tools for implementing evidence-based behaviours in practice.

I did not find it difficult to integrate the student decisions regarding the desired content and learning activities for the next class. I found, however, that having some content and/or learning processes detailed in the module handbook was important for moving the students‟ learning forward. The student NGT choices were focused on previous learning; whereas each class session detailed in module handbook re-visited former topics (on a deeper level) and introduced new ones.

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No points were reported in the NPO notes. I noted in my RFN, however, that the hour was running late and I told the students that as there were only four suggestions, all could easily be incorporated in the next class.

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I found that I did not always correctly anticipate which concepts the students would find easy and which they would experience as being more challenging. For example, I had thought that once clinical questions were formulated, designating key words for database searching would be self-evident. Such was not the case; the students needed considerable guidance from the reference librarian as they had little appreciation of how overly vague key words could result in tens of thousands of „hits‟. I anticipated that critically appraising papers (CAP) would be challenging, but their class comments (and NGT decisions) underlined how truly daunting they felt them to be. As this skill

underpins the entire EBP cycle, I was happy to comply with the student decision that we do some form of CAP during every class. This highlighted how important it was that I remained open about class content and sensitive to their needs and desires; a process greatly facilitated by the NGT feedback and the entire PAR structure of the students monitoring and modifying the module as it unfolded. I also concluded that it was imperative that I continually monitor how comfortable students felt with the new learning (one student being of particular concern). The issues of comfort and competency would probably impact their later research knowledge utilisation in the workplace.