CHALLENGING CULTURAL NORMS THROUGH REFLECTION – RLO’S AS TRIGGERS FOR LEARNING

The TransCoCon project focuses upon enhancing cultural awareness and promotion of transcultural competence in the professional context of nursing and healthcare. Output from the project will see the development of innovative open access multi-media learning resources to empower undergraduate nursing students and registered nurses to develop their cultural self-efficacy and cultural competence in nursing.

Learning is traditionally based on three broad learning theories behaviourist, cognitivist, and constructivist theories, which are most often utilised in the creation of instructional environments. These theories individually consider knowledge to be acquired through cause and effect, the supposition is that human beings behaviour is largely dependent on actions that are positively and negatively reinforced (Quinn 2005, Bruning et al 1999).

There is a recognition in the evolution of teaching methodologies of the need to employ interactive e-learning methods to recognise the technological age nurses are practising in. TransCoCon project aim is to develop Reusable Learning Objects (RLO's) that encourage reflection, can be used as part of a teaching plan at various levels of competency and encourage nurses to explore their own understanding of culture and individualised patient care.

The TransCoCon project commenced in September 2017, funded as an ERASMUS+ strategic partnership in Higher Education (TransCoCon 2017) comprising of five European countries – Belgium, England U.K., Germany, Ireland and Portugal. The educational content of the RLO’s focus on the topic of cultural competency, utilising cultural competency frameworks to enhance cultural competency in clinical practice across the 5 partner countries. The educational intervention i.e. Reusable Learning Objects will address the structure of the intervention and participant’s characteristics. Our trigger related learning assets are targeted learning, bringing real life clinical scenarios together to provide effective care in a culturally diverse contexts.

Evaluation by students from all 5 partner countries remains ongoing, however, the authors aim to present their own reflections on the development of RLO’s and explore the pedagogical impact of RLOs in developing understanding of transcultural care and cultural competency within nurse education.

Acknowledgement:
Authors would like to thank all our partners for their ongoing and valuable contribution to the TransCoCon project - This work was supported by “TransCoCon: Developing Multimedia Learning for Transcultural Collaboration and Competence in Nursing”, a project funded under the ERASMUS+ Programme of the European Union, (GA No 2017-1-UK01-KA203-036612).