Review of Journaling as a Teaching and Learning Strategy

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Highlights

  • Reflection through journaling is important for the development of a nurse.

  • Students report that journaling is helpful to learning, but they may perceive a trust barrier.

  • Journaling is most effective when expectations are set by the educators for content, length, and degree of reflection.

  • Journaling is now occurring through learning education modules, blogs, and discussion groups and extending to simulation debriefing and graduate programs.

Abstract

Journaling is an educational tool commonly used within nursing associate and bachelor degree programs. This article reviews journaling history, research, usage, and advantages and disadvantages within nursing education. New research trends reflect an interest in combining journaling with technology, pairing with simulation, and incorporating into graduate nursing programs to evolve with the changing needs of health care and technology.

Section snippets

Research

A number of research studies focusing on the use of journaling in education, nursing, and other health care disciplines have been completed over the past several decades. Most of the research available on this topic is qualitative because of the subjective nature of the activity and limited scoring methods (Epp, 2008). A literature search on journaling reveals that many of these studies focus on the benefits that journaling provides or the students' ability to be reflective of their practice

Usage

When the journaling strategy and expectations are well explained, there are specific roles for the teacher and the learner. The teacher's role is to explain the purpose of journaling and his or her expectations in regard to content, reflection, and length. Teachers are also responsible for providing guided questions, when applicable, that represent the outcome the educator would like to achieve in regard to student learning. The teacher also has the responsibility to review the leaner's

Advantages and Disadvantages

Journaling as an educational strategy has several advantages and disadvantages. Journaling provides an emotional outlet where students can explore emotions related to emergency situations, new experiences and situations, and emerging values and social responsibilities (Ruiz-López et al., 2015). Nursing programs can also be very stressful, and journaling helps the students to cope with these feelings (Ruiz-López et al., 2015). At the same time, this sharing of personal feelings is very personal

Issues and Trends

A literature search from PubMed and The Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature reveals that journaling research in nursing was popular from about the 1990s until about the early 2000s. During this period, nursing professionals concentrated on the need for reflective nurses. More recent journaling trends focus on journaling with the combination of technology. For example, Bussard (2015) and Reed (2015) focused on journaling following high-fidelity simulation. Others, such as

Conclusion

Journaling is an effective learning and teaching strategy within education and nursing to meet student learning outcomes. Research suggests that it encourages critical thinking, value development, and expression of feelings and deepens learning experiences. It is most effective when used appropriately and the advantages, such as emotional exploration, coping, increased learning, and improved writing, and disadvantages, such as difficulty grading, increased time required to grade and provide

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